Talkin' Shit About A Pretty Sunset

The 2008 Mustache Contest is tomorrow. There's no way I can lose.

One of my funniest friends, Gregory Quincy McGillicuddy (pictured right), has been hiding one of his finest sources of humor from me. But because I often google my own name, I stumbled across his treasure trove of youtube favorites under the pseudonym "dociousfaggle". Nice.

And holy shit, it contains some of the finest hilarity and entertainment in existence on the whole wide Internet.

And not just funnies --- KICK ASS music, too. Take, for example, this awesome Dutch prog rock band called Focus playing live in the 1970s. (Watch at least until minute 1:15):



On my first viewing, I thought it was a joke, with all the yodel-screaming. Then I watched it about 15 more times and couldn't stop thinking about them. Wikipedia revealed that they're still around and even have their own (scary) website.

Thank you, Greg.

Dociousfaggle's Youtube Favorites

The United States is nothing like a fascist country --- not even close, and not headed toward it.

It's strange that I'm compelled to put that in writing to remind people what kind of state we truly live under but the internet is awash with crap opinions from people who think the US is headed for a dark dystopia.

Take, for example, a recent book by Naomi Wolf where she lays out 10 steps toward a fascist America. The book has 10 doomsaying scenarios --- "steps" --- which try and convince us to be afraid of the government and to be prepared for some kind of 3rd World military takeover.

Wouldn't it be nice if complicated human relations --- not to mention huge institutions like the government, media and private corporations --- could be reduced to "10 Steps"? I suppose that's why it appeals to the media and is getting any attention.

Here are the "Steps" that I will break down to show their ridiculousness:

"#1. Invoke a terrifying internal and external enemy."

Democratic governments have been doing this forever without authoritarian takeovers of anything. Unlike a country like Thailand, the US has no real history of military takeovers and no real suspension of civil rights. Here's some world politics 101: when thinking of the possibility of a coup, ask yourself: has it happened before and often? If yes, then yes, it's likely to happen again.

"#2. Create a gulag."

This is so offensive to the thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of innocent people who died under Joseph Stalin for decades in REAL Gulags that I can easily call Godwin's Law on this whore, Naomi Wolf.

"#3. Develop a thug caste."

Naomi Wolf:

"When leaders who seek what I call a 'fascist shift' want to close down an open society, they send paramilitary groups of scary young men out to terrorise citizens. The Blackshirts roamed the Italian countryside beating up communists; the Brownshirts staged violent rallies throughout Germany.

"The years following 9/11 have proved a bonanza for America's security contractors, with the Bush administration outsourcing areas of work that traditionally fell to the US military ... "

Wolf compares military contracts in Iraq to the thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of innocent people who died by the hands of Adolf Hitler's thugs.


Fuck it. I'm already too pissed to dispute the rest of Naomi Wolf's alarmist crap. Judge for yourself here.

God DAMN, bring on Spring. I can't wait until winter's over.

A few months ago, with little warning, one of my best friends became a "9/11 Truther".

All our group of friends have been putting forth various sociological and psychological explanations for this abrupt change, but my one friend Joe who lived with a hardcore conspiracist for 10 years had the best analysis of the phenomenon:

"Truthers and other conspiracy theorists possess the Truth. That is the essential thing. It cannot be argued. (It has a capital letter).

They have evidence. Whatever additional information they take in is processed through the relevant/irrelevant filter.

Their facts cannot be argued. The value of their work, research, studies --- what have you --- cannot be argued.

To dismiss their concerns is to admit that you are either willfully ignorant --- since they've explained it to you --- or hopelessly ignorant, because you don't get it.

Truthers and other conspiracy theorists latch onto their obsessions because they lack a healthy and nurturing level of interaction and commitment with society. The interaction and commitment could take many forms and the healthy and nurturing level is relative, but overall something is missing and the Truth is filling the void. It might have been religion. Or a lot of golf. But something had to move in and fill a need.

To fully appreciate the drive of conspiracy theorists is to understand that they want to expose the truth and possibly punish perpetrators and effect the cleansing of the system. These are noble goals in some sense and show that there is to a degree a drive for the betterment of society.

But also lurking in there is the Truth that would explain many of the ills that society faces. And this could speak to the need for an easy explanation of why the world is the way it is. And possibly why any meaningful interaction of the world is not possible --- not in reality, but in the shadow of the Truth. Lack of certain actions is wanted because you are working on the Truth. Basically, it is a great excuse not to do anything."

Here's my take: I support Dick Cheney's false flag operation.

I mean, there's no other way the US populace would have been mobilized to support an attack on the Middle East were it not for Cheney's bombing the capital of world finance, bombing the headquarters of our own military, and crashing an airplane into some random field in Pennsylvania. The US military had had such a hard time getting their nerve up to bomb foreign countries prior to 9/11/2001 ...

Genius plan, I say.

I've had Friendster and Myspace accounts but I deleted both. Recently I opened a Facebook account because I heard it was better but whenever I log in, I can't figure out what to do so I just log back out.

First, I uploaded 60 pictures of myself because that's the only thing I ever look at on other people's profiles. But it seems like I'm the only one who has more than three pictures. Am I that vain?

Some of my friends have over 200 "friends"! How can you have over 200 friends? I now technically have 27 friends but there are only five that I talk to on a regular basis. I'm thinking about deleting the 22 others for honesty's sake. But then what's the point of having an account?

Then I keep getting these weird invitations from people which require me to do stupid shit that I don't understand. Man, I feel like Andy Rooney.

I kind of want to delete my account but I spent all that time uploading all those god damn photos.

We finally bought a house! (right).

This means that I will leave Adams Morgan after living here for eight years for a proper row house with a backyard and garage in 16th Street Heights. Thank god for the real estate bubble's deflation!

Here's a list of things I will NOT miss:

1. Being awakened by the sound of urine hitting pavement. Our rented apartment is on the main thoroughfare back to the Metro station from a huge number of bars and restaurants. By the time the drunks get near our apartment on their walk back, the alcohol in their blood starts to push on their bladders. They usually relieve themselves in the parking lot right behind our bedroom window. In the summertime when our back door is kept open, we are awakened every single Friday and Saturday night after the bars let out (2:30AM - 3:00AM). For some reason, the groups of drunks scream and yell when they take their pisses. We used to shout at them, but they acted like they were the ones being imposed upon. Finally my wife bought a Super Soaker Arctic Shock Blast and now we regularly spray them --- even in cold weather.
2. Fighting people from Maryland and Virginia for parking. Adams Morgan is the worst parking district in the city. But the problem is mainly because out-of-towners compete with locals. (I have nothing against Maryland; I'm a suburban boy myself). We regularly spend 20-30 minutes circling for parking, passing parked MD and VA tags along the way. This also prevents people from other places wanting to visit us. More here.
   
3. People who have a snooty opinion about their neighborhood. The local liberal residents seem to think we live in a god damn UNESCO World Heritage Site. My dad's friend Bruce went to bars in Adams Morgan in the 1960s and when he was here recently, he said it looked basically the same: "tacky". People also seem to think Adams Morgan "used to be cool" but it's always been the same: an urban strip mall full of bars without parking lots --- McDonald's, Starbucks, Subway and Popeye's fried chicken included. And don't think that's a recent thing: there was a Long John Silver's on the corner of 18th and Columbia Road as early as 1968.
   
4. Living in an apartment that's a "half". Since I live in a basement --- "English" basement, whatever that means --- my address is 1947 1/2. This is annoying when describing where you live over the phone: "... and a half??" Me, "Yes, 'a half'. Just write the numeral 1, slash 2. It's a basement." I've had to say that phrase weekly for eight years.
   
5. Constant access to over 60 bars and restaurants. This can be a blessing and a curse: it gives you unlimited happiness but also bankrupts you and turns you into a drunkard and glutton.
   

I had no idea where the Strait of Hormuz was located before I read this article. That's where the US almost had a conflict with Iran today.

Turns out, being in the Strait of Hormuz is about like being in the Chesapeake Bay, if you switch the roles. Below is a map of the Strait of Hormuz referred to in the article. Notice any ship passing through has to be within about 30 miles of Iran:



Now look at the Chesapeake, keeping in mind how far 30 miles is (legend, bottom left):



Now imagine the CNN article if I replace the word "Iran" with "America" and reverse the locations:

(CNN) -- Three U.S. Navy ships "harassed and provoked" five Iranian Revolutionary Guard boats early Sunday in the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay, the Iranian military said Monday, calling the encounter a "significant" confrontation.

Now we get a better perspective of the real situation and the naked face of US propaganda.

I was browsing Esquire's drinks page and checked off all the bar ingredients I have in my apartment ("What Can You Make?" - scroll halfway down). My results are above.

I'm proud of myself. About seven years ago one of my goals was to eventually have a proper "adult" home bar and know how to prepare a decent drink using at least every bottle.

Goal accomplished.

I've recently entered the "Clear the 'Stache" mustache-growing contest sponsored by my wife's company.

I'm assuming my opponents will be clean-faced 20-something man-boys who merely dab milk on their faces each Monday so the cat can lick off the patchy, corn-hair stubble.

In short, I'm not too concerned about losing. I've had a beard for two years and have a one-month head start on their naked faces.

But to guarantee the gold, I'll have to put some extra effort into it.

I searched online for a suitable mustache wax, but Amazon only offers Colonel Conk's which got bad reviews. There's a reputable brand called Firehouse Moustache Wax but $15 (with shipping) isn't in my budget.

So I've decided to brew my own. According to Wikipedia, "a simple recipe for homemade moustache wax comprises equal quantities of beeswax and petroleum jelly, combined in a double boiler and allowed to cool before use." Mmm. Exactly what I want beneath my nostrils.

The next issue is what style of mustache do I need?



For now, I'm thinking either the Abra Kadabra or the Connoisseur. Is a Hitler mustache still not PC?

The Sailing Anarchy Forum has generated an interesting conversation about things people have seen floating on various waterways while sailing. The discussion was prompted by this article about a slowly swirling mass of tiny plastic trash that's twice the size of Britain in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.

Below, I've listed the things the sailors wrote they'd seen floating around the world:

• "20' inflatable swim pad complete with a slide"
• "Dead body"
• "Water skiied into a dead cow. Stunk sooooo bad I have never been out of the water quicker - swear to god I could still smell it a month later."
• "20 or so years ago i worked a passage across the pacific on a container ship. When i was on deck and just gazing at the ocean the 1st thing i was likely to see was discarded evian bottles."
• " On three different occasions, I had to yield to moose. One was about 2 miles offshore. They are excellent swimmers"
• "100 miles west of Bermuda - a refrigerator."
• "NY Harbor - What looked like Archie Bunker's couch came floating by."
• "Northern Chesapeake Bay - A barge load of telephone poles. At night (we hit a few, they are invisible in the dark)"
• "A dead guy. In the Sausalito marina, submerged but kept afloat by his foam-lined laptop case. Some guys on a sailboat were heading out and saw the floating case. They snagged it with a boathook, and discovered the attached victim. They brought him back to the dock, where I helped the police pull him out."
• " A tiger-striped full body pillow still in its plastic wrapper."
• "10's of thousands of mylar balloons. On some passages it starts out as a game to snag them out of the drink with a net, but after a while you realise that it's a waste of time as there are probably millions of those hideous friggin mylar plastic balloons floating on the ocean. I've never bought one, and I never will."
• "A couple of dead bodies and compressed-gas tanks of various sizes."
• "A very large and rather ramshackle toolshed (30 feet long or so), lashed to a set of equally large logs. South of Prince Rupert, 1982 ish. I'm guessing that it floated down the Skeena River."
• "A dead moose. Racing to Castine up East Penobscot bay. The thing must have been dead awhile as it was floating pretty high. It was huge."
• "Dead deer, a big screen TV, a sectional couch, a dead dog with a tennis ball right in front of it, too many telephone poles to count"
• "A 6ft flourescent light bulb, 160nm offshore."
• "A dead cow in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico. As we approached we were upwind, but once we passed it the smell was incredible. Damn that shit smelled."
• "All kindsa crazy shit out in the Ches Bay after Hurricane Isabel.. large kitchen appliances, a coke machine, several large (100gal) propane tanks, the light cluster from atop a police car... the list could go on"
• "Dead body - jumper - 'fresh' - hit the water under the Forth Road bridge within spitting distance of a bunch of kids in sailing lessons"
• "Dead cow in tri cities washington. all bloated. we hit it on the starboard hull and it rolled the length. tongue hanging out, eyes bulging."
• "Dead body - Jumper off the Aurora bridge."
• "238 packs of Marlboro cigarettes in a box."
• " A plastic Wal-Mart shopping bag, in the middle of the Pacific, about as far from land as you can be."
• " One dead cow. One dead dog."
• " A German Shepard puppy in a plastic bag."
• "Cuban rafts (spooky) off Eastern Shore of VA coast"
• " A dead cow up near Eastport Maine. At first thought it was an unmarked rock."
• "1 dead body, 1 plane that killed said body, 1 cutoff head floating in Miami bay"
• "Saw a mostly submerged container just SW of Conception once. It was dawn or dusk (long race.. don't recall), pretty calm and it looked like we were coming up on the obelisk from the 2001 Space Odessey movie."
• "In SF bay once we saw a bunch of ballons tied together floating, we grabed them with the boat hook and put them in the cockpit, my buddy started to stomp on them to pop them, we found notes inside saying 'to grandpa in heaven, we love you'. my buddy felt bad about thrashing the ballons after that."
• "In the Hudson River near Tappazee I saw a Barn Door. Yep it was painted Red had the white trim and about 12 feet by 20 feet in size. Right off the farm."
• "An airplane. Rowing back from the mooring I saw what looked like a submerged capsized canoe. Getting closer it turned out to be two canoes - WTF? Closer still it was the floats of a capsized and sunk seaplane. I swam down to take a look and make sure no one was still in it."

A note on the high number of dead cows reported: One commentor had this to say:

"I used to sail as an engineer aboard containerships and tankers, and I was constantly amazed at the shit that was perfectly legal to dump overboard. We were transporting live cattle from Hawaii to Oakland, CA and every once in a while, espically in rough seas, one or 2 of the cows would die. The cattle were basically packed shoulder to shoulder in these special cattle containers, and the ones on the ends would sometimes get crushed to death from the pitching motion of the ship. In order to avoid spreading disease to the other cattle, the deck crew had to winch the dead cattle overboard.

We used to dispose of anything that was considered ‘biodegradable’ overboard - that included massive hunks of steel trash, wooden packing material and dunnage, empty 55 gallon drums (no longer legal since they have oil residue in them, however it was permitted as recent as 10 years ago), food waste, unruly Mass Maritime cadets, anything except plastic. And yes, that included the aforementioned 6 foot flourescent light bulbs, and they wouldnt always break."