Author: foxtongue

We’ve been making our own all week

Miss Cellania found a Washington Post feature called Merge-Matic Books, where two-best-sellers are mixed into one. Here’s some examples, click the link to see them all:

“Machiavelli’s The Little Prince” – Antoine de Saint-Exupery’s classic children’s tale as presented by Machiavelli. The whimsy of human nature is embodied in many delightful and intriguing characters, all of whom are executed.

“Lorna Dune” – An English farmer, Paul Atreides, falls for the daughter of a notorious rival clan, the Harkonnens, and pursues a career as a giant worm jockey in order to impress her.

“Fahrenheit 451 of the Vanities” – An ’80s yuppie is denied books. He does not object, or even notice.

“Planet of the Grapes of Wrath” – Astronaut lands on mysterious planet, only to discover that it is his very own home planet of Earth, which has been taken over by the Joads, a race of dirt-poor corn farmers who miraculously developed rudimentary technology and evolved the ability to speak after exposure to nuclear radiation.

I’m just twisting inside, uncertain how I will ever sleep again

(I’m not giving up. I don’t feel like crying.) My restless heart is awake tonight. The love of my life so far called up from Los Angeles where he lives and works in Hollywood, tonight fixing the green screen behind a mechanized animatronic badger some pool soul created for a Wisconsin lotto campaign, because that’s just how the world is some times. He moved a few months ago, changed apartments, because his roommates were having a baby, and tonight she’s gone into labour. The father was text messaging him the scale of dilation as the news came in as he and his wife prepared in the same room Angelina Jolie gave birth to her baby twins in. Strings to my heart from his, I’m not sure how tonight I will sleep. David lives here like a knock-off imitation of the real thing, flushed with sleep in the bed behind me as I chatter, endlessly, joyfully, down south, a river of miles away. I wake him, briefly, when Antony’s iPhone runs out of batteries, and he’s grumpy with me, annoyed, red-eyed, and I wonder if he feels as displaced as I do. I still think of Tony as my boyfriend, my skinny mad lover too rich and too clever and too handsome for anyone to live up to. He’s a couple of weeks recently only a month begun dating a performance artist, some woman named Michelle, I think, with a mad friend he doesn’t like. He didn’t tell me before for gentle worry it would be cruel to send a note. Deliriously, he is right. (We are declawed, yet holding back our teeth, soft like cats, cinnamon and sweet.) He tells me that she isn’t very attentive, a whole week went by without a call, without contact, and I feel justified, while I laugh with him about fallacy, how we get caught in these dramatic traps like early twenties, just teens, just out into life. Before me, there was no-one for ten years, a decade alone, and all these details, streaming through my blood like jade in my arteries, not jealousy, but something more mundane, a sallow sadness, not very good at expression, that loves him like the sky, oh loves him still, and stronger than I care for anything else in my life, the one here I have been trying so hard to build, so keenly, like he’s a knife I hold in my hand to keep myself safe, the city nothing to me, the distance, the far flung dreams of walking, of taking one step after the other, until I find myself there, waiting at his door, flowers in my hand like a scream.

can I hear a whoot

http://freedomlovingrepublicans.com

Something’s wrong with my internet at home. It’s corpse blood sluggish, and flickering faster than an animated disco. Highly annoying. I left my computer to defrag this morning with the sense of offering candy to a belligerent child, for that extra just in case. I’m hoping by the time I get home, whatever is wrong with my ISP will have been repaired, that turning it off then on again will be the mercy cry to packet heaven that will sort it all out, and I will be able to use the great, wide internet once again without cursing or interminable waits and time-out errors.

Hallelujah.

In other news, apparently Nicholas is in town for the day, with no forewarning.
He’s hijacking my evening until at least six.thirty.
Sorry people who were mumbling about tea. He offered tasty, so he wins.
(That, and, you know, he’s fan-freaking-tabulous and never, never here.)

EDIT: internet is still completely useless at home. bugger.

are they even trying anymore?

Please compare:

Telegraph UK: George Bush surprised world leaders with a joke about his poor record on the environment as he left the G8 summit in Japan. The American leader, who has been condemned throughout his presidency for failing to tackle climate change, ended a private meeting with the words: “Goodbye from the world’s biggest polluter.” He then punched the air while grinning widely, as the rest of those present including Gordon Brown and Nicolas Sarkozy looked on in shock.

The Onion: At a special Earth Day event Sunday, Vice President Dick Cheney inhaled his first-ever breath of oxygen. “I am…proud to stand before you today and…breathe in the same gas used by…millions of Americans,” said a wheezing and gasping Cheney, whose body is accustomed to compounds of chlorine and sulfur dioxide. “One breath, however, is enough for me. I’m glad the stuff will be out of the atmosphere forever in a few decades.” Cheney then left the press conference to attend a cardiac health awareness dinner, where he feasted on human hearts.

next stop: hell (I’m planning to grayhound to Katie’s wedding in September)

CBC: Man stabs and decapitates sleeping passenger aboard Greyhound bus in Manitoba

“Garnet Caton, who was sitting in the seat in front of the victim, said he saw the attacker stab his seatmate, a young man sleeping with his headphones on. Caton said he heard a “blood-curdling scream” and turned around to see the attacker holding a large “Rambo” hunting knife above the victim, “continually stabbing him in the chest area.” “He must have stabbed him 50 times or 60 times,” said Caton.

CNN: “Everybody got off the bus. Me and a trucker that stopped and the Greyhound driver ran up to the door to maybe see if the guy was still alive or we could help or something like that,” Caton told CNN. “And when we all got up, we saw that the guy was cutting off the guy’s head. … When he saw us, he came back to the front of the bus, told the driver to shut the door. He pressed the button and the door shut, but it didn’t shut in time, and the guy was able to get his knife out and take a swipe at us,” Caton said.”

operation moderne baroque

The mitoWheel is a graphical representation of the human mitochondrial genome which allows you to browse the sequence or search for a nucleotide position, gene, or sequence motif.

The gunpowder mess in my house continues to melt away, impasse by impasse. As money comes in, so do solutions. More shelves will be next, maybe some IKEA knock-off for the front closet that will let me clear space elsewhere. Once that’s done, I’m hoping to have a hall again, an effortless way to walk in to the rest of the apartment. As is, we clamber slightly past boxes stumbling tall full of unwanted things we’ve sorted out – culinary extras, cheese graters, emptied spice racks, plates, bowls, and home supplies we have no need of, as well as books, CD’s, and movies we’ve seen too many times – and do our best to stay confident that victory will soon be ours.

I was given a mirror this week, three feet by two. Heavy glass the colour of water and lead, framed in greasy, porridge white plastic lined in dental blue. I’ve been painting it a mild, warm gold the same tint as Tanith‘s eyes, and expect to put it up in my room this week. High, too high to work as a mirror generally should, striking, yet off in a corner. I expect when winter comes, it will capture the wholesome light that drips in from the window and help drown the SADS, another change for the better. As it goes up, the spangled sari above my bed comes down, as will the lights at my window, and the french-style Czech absinthe poster. I want to air out my room, shake it, change it, clear it out. I’m going to see what I can do about shuffling the cards of my decor, queen of hearts, jack of trades, and finally placing the thick collection of art and photographs I’ve been collecting in a drawer. Aces, all aces. Frames will be needed, glass, hooks, and drywall screws. I might paint the top of my chest of drawers gold, too, depending on how much paint I have left. I am tired of cozy. Now I want light.

Astronomers have uncovered an extreme stellar machine – a galaxy in the very remote universe pumping out stars at a surprising rate of up to 4,000 per year.

r.i.p. randy pausch

via neat-o-rama:

When Carnegie Mellon University professor Randy Pausch learned that he only had months to live, he turned his last lecture in September 2007 into a lesson on life. The lecture, titled Really Achieving Your Childhood Dream, became an Internet sensation. It was viewed over 3.4 million times on YouTube

Randy Pausch died of pancreatic cancer today. He was 47.

In his honor, let’s take another look at Randy Pausch’s last lecture, where he talked about life lessons he learned and gave advice to students on how to overcome obstacles and achieve their own goals:

renegade lantern festival

PASS IT ON

The Illuminares Lantern Procession will be happening this evening.

pretty typical

6 pm -11:30pm at Trout Lake at John Hendry Park.

Twenty years ago, Illuminares started as a thirty person house party that made lanterns, walked them around the park, then burned them at the beach. The next year, there were double the people, the year after that, even more. Now it’s an annual event which brings wonder to over 30,000 people. People show up with custom lanterns of all shapes and sizes, ranging from simple paper bags with a tealight candle to large complicated structures. Stilt-walkers, costumes, fire breathers, and topless wish-faries are de rigeur. As Public Dreams is not hosting it this year, we’re going back to basics. The audience, once again, are the organizers. Performances will be spontaneous and lanterns will be brought from home – technically, we are all just enjoying the good company of friends.

Because this is not an “official event” please be extra responsible. All of the things that require funding – like floodlights, vendors, fireworks, emergency personnel, outhouses, and, of course, permits – will not be happening this year. As there are no permits, it is almost certain that the Vancouver Police will show up to shut us down, so if you see anything that is of concern, call people on it, and make sure to use camp-ground rules: leave everything better than you found it. Remember, too, this is a family event with lots of children, so try to keep it dry.

introduction innoculation


Jhayne at the Folk Fest, picture by Jon.

Dee Harding says: “Do you know, I wouldn’t be surprised if you turned out to be the internet version of Toxoplasma gondii. I wasn’t saying that you had it, more that you were easily transmitable, impossible to eradicate, and with a string of poorly understood psychological side effects.”

And he’s a doctor, so he should know.

Twice a year I do a shout out, I ask that everyone speaks up, even if they otherwise stay silent. Like a good house party, it’s always fascinating to see who turns up.

So, please, tell me your names, post your picture, introduce yourself, tell me why you’re here, how you found me, and what inspires you.

I want to know who’s on the other end of my screen, what fun and fantastic people are out there, waiting to be met. Even if I know you, introduce yourself to others, and tell me what you’ve done lately. Explain a piece of your world with something beautiful, make something new, or dig up the grave of an old favourite. Anecdotes are welcome, as are pictures, job descriptions, inspiring links, stimulations, titillations, and your pretty hidden treasures. The name of the game is networking, so share what you want everyone else to know.

You are artists and scientists, nihilists and dreamers, comic book illustrators, archeologists, hackers, retail managers, photographers, teachers, librarians, hair dressers, and submarine captains. You are novelists, derby girls, musicians, and accountants. Optimists, pragmatists, magicians and politicians, fencers, film addicts, home owners and homeless. You are lighting designers, poets, animators, and lawyers. You are glorious, fabulous, interesting creatures, rich in colour, thick with story – and I want to hear from you all.

For those new, my name’s Jhayne. I’m a writer and photographer currently trapped in Vancouver, Canada. I live on the internet, work for a media company, and occasionally get paid to set off fireworks. I’m also an amateur taxidermist/cryptozoologist, play french horn and the saw, and edit other people’s novels. Last year I started a global initiative to save a local turn-of-last-century theater and turn it into a new multimedia venue called Heart of the World. It fell down, went boom, but oh well. Time to try something else, I guess. Welcome to my journal, a mixture of wonder, pointlessness, isolation, and community where I talk about life, love, art, technology, and try not to hate the world.

Now it’s your turn. Spill.