Am I relying on the wrong information? Am I reading too much into what's in front of me? I'm usually speculating on all fronts. But sometimes the hunch goes nowhere. Then what was that feeling? Things have gone dark all of a sudden. There's something going on out there, but it's all passed or it's all back. There's a chance, there's an opportunity. Things have changed, or it could all be coming back.
What I find troubling in this day and age is crowdsourcing. I know everyone heralds it as the new wave of entrepreneurship and innovation, but at the heart of it lies a terrible issue. If people can't seek their own private funding, they open it up to the public in exchange for perks (the more you donate, the better perks you get). Ok, but essentially doesn't that mean you are seeking funds from individuals who could have spent that money on more charitable endeavours? All these people throwing away all this money on somebody elses vanity project. Cause if the idea was really good, they would be able to get the relevant funding. So as per usual, it's the poor people who suffer, because people will find excuses not to give to those less fortunate, and instead blow their cash on petty things.
I'm also not enjoying this recent trend in music where young, white female performers (Joss Stone, Adele, Lorde, Amy Winehouse, Pixie Lott etc. ad nauseum) who are lauded as the next big thing in music and are critically acclaimed for their vocal skills. The issue is that they all sound like seasoned, 40+ black performers. The issue is that while these women pick up the awards, album sales, and the millions of dollars, real seasoned coloured performers are still working their menial jobs and being underappreciated at their actual gigs. Where's the justice in that? It's all about marketing and advertising, so just be a bit more discerning about how you spend your money.
I recall a really wonderful event some years ago when I had stashed some birthday money (and other cash) into an envelope and left it in my drawer at home. Then I left it for a couple of months and totally forgot about it. Then when I was reading old birthday cards I found like over $100 in cash! Hahaha it felt like all my Christmases had come at once! I've never had that sort of luck since then.
Oh you don't want to know what my biggest ambition is. I'm looking forward to reading when I get home, and also returning to the gym. Just been too tired to do anything in the morning these days.
Le sigh, still 3 hours to go until I can get out of here. That is unless I leave early. It's an option....hmmmmm! I've done a fair bit of work today but I don't feel like doing anymore.
Just cop it on the chin and keep going, I say. But it still depresses me. It's a different world out there. One probably not for me.
The problem is that I wish I had more to say. Perhaps blogging everyday has killed my creativity. Perhaps it's like a well where you only have so much, and it needs to be replenished in order to be useful. It's been a busy day. Just 45 minutes to go until I can get out of here. And damn it! All this work is just coming out of the walls! I was meant to be making time for other crap now, and this is definitely not useful.
But where there's a will, there's a way. And I think there's a way. But is there time?
Joaquin out.
What a fallacy. There's a lot of darkness and stupidity and ignorance out in the world today. But the question I ask of you is what you intend to do about it? Or will you just let the status quo reign? What if I am waging war with myself, and it is actually taking a considerable amount of my will to actually conform to this kind of life? This kind of life I don't even want?! What puzzles me is that there's an entire sphere of influence that I am completely blind to and I wonder how that could be. There's just an entirety of a universe that I don't know and that I'm just not aware of. Everything is news to me.
Woke up this morning feeling dismal, so I didn't even bother going to the gym, and I'm feeling it now, that's for sure. But better that then go to the gym and get really sick. Probably been eating way too much lately. I don't like the idea of overindulgence. It doesn't speak well for you as an individual, but it's also a slap in the face of so many others in the world who cannot live as well. For those who say they could if they tried, I would call them liars. There are places in the world where nobody has a chance in hell of succeeding or living well, and you have no choice but to escape and live somewhere else.
But what is success? You look around and see all these ridiculously priced houses and apartments, for sale and rent, and you wonder just how many successful people are out there. By success I mean rich and famous, or maybe just rich. Fame doesn't really count for much. But how could there be such a market unless there were so many people who had all this money? And then how sick does it make you feel when you realise that for every one of them, there are like hundreds of people who are doing it tough. That's just not right. The wealth is distributed amongst so very few, and there is no justice or fairness or equality in that.
So things got weird! As you can probably tell from last night's formatting and time of the post, I've gotta use blogger+ for the time being, because the phone line at home has died. What's strange is that I can ring the home line, but my phone doesn't actually ring. It just rings out. Then when I dialled my mobile from the home line, the number came up as completely different! How strange!! Something isn't right. What's even crappier is that Telstra (the service provider) can't fix it until the 9th! That's like an entire week! Oh well, I can live without the internet, and life is much simpler without the trouble of social media and procrastination. The only thing I can't stand is paying for services I can't use. Might have to make a complaint about that. What really makes no sense is privatising an entity that previously had a monopoly on all the relevant infrastructure. Telstra (or Telecom as it used to be known) was a government owned entity that was responsible for all telecommunication setups in Australia until the 1990s. They then privatised Telstra and allowed competition, but Telstra still owned all the physical infrastructure in place. So this has basically screwed everyone in terms of new providers having to pay exhorbitant fees to access the infrastructure, and not being able to upgrade outmoded equipment. That's not real free-market competition, because the incumbent wields all the power. It's also not helped by my crappy Optus reception in my apartment which means that my 3G internet (as well as phone coverage) is spotty at best. So without wireless internet I'm pretty much cut off, but that's ok, I'll deal with it.
I love it when I'm able to come up with a solution to a problem because I feel like a genius! Especially difficult, finance related ones. I just need time to think through the problem, and I can get there. You just have to visualise a way that makes it work for you and you'll get there.
I'm trying, I'm really really trying not to be lazy. The question is what the hell am I going to do with the 2 hours I have left until I can get the hell out of here? There's just not a lot going on in my life right now. But hey, at least I can focus on finishing my book and getting started on the next one. I really have nothing to do, which sort of kills the motivation a bit. The problem is that instead of using my time fruitfully, it's been wasted, and now I actually have big work to do. So that's going to keep me busy until the end of the year. Great. That's a perfect allegory for my life right there. Wasted time, chances blown. All over. Great. Don't get me wrong though, I'm not exactly bored.
I was reading on xkcd today that a total of 110 billion people have ever existed. Wow, that's a staggering figure. I want to know them all. What are there hopes and dreams. What were they. Did they have regrets when they died? It's a crazy question. Hopefully one day, though.
I'll keep it there for now.
Joaquin out.
But what do you do when there's nobody to blame, not even yourself? I write (or I type) and the signals tell the monitor what characters to display, and where they should be. I can write (or type), and delete words and add others in. This is all very artificial. Everything you read on here is artificial. I am the holder of truth. The narrative is controlled by me, and you have to take what I say as gospel. Because if I maintain what is truth, you can be alienated and placed on the outer for not believing in my truth, or what I claim it to be. Isn't that somewhat troubling to you? It is to me, and I'm the one in charge here! So I can't even imagine what it must be like for the readers of this fine blog.
And I don't want to win the grand prize, I'd settle for the consolation prizes. There's just too many unknowns and I don't think I'm trying hard enough. Existence itself is taxing enough without having to actually attempt anything. As always I'm in the wrong place. There's nothing to test me because I want to pass with flying colours. But I know everything is just attrition and probability and chaos. So you put yourself back in the ring to duke it out with everything that comes up against you. One day you have to be victorious. That's just the law of nature. Do you want it so bad, it hurts? Hmm the question is do I know enough? It's all a matter of aliveness.
Democracy is a flawed system. Of this you should already be aware. My favourite quote is "democracy is two lions and a sheep deciding what to eat for dinner". How very apt. But it's true. Let's take the recent election of Clive Palmer to Parliament in Australia. For those not in the know, Clive is a mining magnate, worth a few billion dollars who has no real political acumen, and has espoused really troubling views that border on insane conspiracy theories. But people voted him in! He goes on variety shows and talk shows and makes a real ass of himself with his stupidity, but people still want him to represent them! What does this say about the people? I guess if you can buy yourself into Parliament, people will take any bait you offer, hook, line and sinker. But here's the thing - educated people will say that it's up to the citizenry to vote and the biggest numbers win. But the citizenry won't educate itself, they like to believe in easy fixes, and they want to espouse the conspiracy theorist views because they are not living the lives they want (ie. where everything is handed on a silver platter to them without having to work for it). That's the issue. The idiots will rule. There's simply more of them because they keep breeding and dragging everyone else down with them. That just shows the system is untenable. It's gotta collapse sooner or later. Or else educated folk will be a thing of the past, or they will be marginalised, and the idiots will believe they are operating under an infallible and perfect doctrine. And you know what the downside of that is? In order to change how the world works, you'd need to have a revolution, and the dumb people would riot and probably win. Smart people don't fight, they don't fight wars because it's not logical. So we're pretty much just doomed. Unless someone out there has the guts to change the status quo and really make the world better for everyone, not just those who think they are entitled.
I was reading in the paper that phobias may be genetic memories at play. Genetic memories are essentially where traumatic experiences from your ancestors are coded into their DNA and passed on to the next generation. These memories aren't latent, because they are altered somewhat by chemical changes to DNA over time due to environmental changes, as well as increased exposure to radiation. Who knows? Maybe this is the basis for the belief in past lives? Haha, yes this does hark back to a post I made earlier on the topic of atoms and matter and what not. But what an interesting concept! Of course it only works if the traumatic experience happens before you can conceive children. But wow! Can you really code your memories into your DNA? How gorgeous. Because that technically means you could die and the matter that comprises you would still have bits of your memory coded into it. If you go deeper, perhaps all our ancestors and all of us are joined together at the core of all matter, where all the rules break down. How romantic and ironic!
So I'm pigeonholed and stuck now. Nowhere to go. Walking in the night, the darkness envelopes me and I become one with it. I am blind to my self, blind to my own thoughts. Instinct becomes reason first and foremost. There's no need to question it. Act and react. That's what it's all about.
Women are obsessed with dick sizes! They say they don't care, and that's what they'll tell their partners, but as soon as a man acts like a jerk, they will say he must have a small dick and he must be compensating as a result. Therefore you could say that they really do actually care!
Wow, this has really taken on a whole other life. I don't think I have any more to say. Hopefully I get this weekend to myself where I can just relax and let loose.
Am I motivated by anything? Not really. I just want to go home and go to sleep most of all. Nothing grand. Who wears pants on their waist? I have always worn them on my hips. They're just far more comfortable. Which makes it all the more surprising that something like hipster pants actually exist.
How can you feel homesick when you are not attached to any place on Earth? It's weird. I need to see what else is out there. There's no groove to my melody. Guitaring is going well, but I should return to my own stuff, not play other people's music. Now that I've fixed up my soundcard issues, I should work on recording my stuff and adding some dubs in.
There's nothing out there for anyone. I'm getting crazy and tired. Just fatigued, like my body is coming apart at the seams, and my mind is imploding on itself, and anarchy reigns everywhere. What else is there? Ahh man, I gotta make it 2 more hours before I can get out of here?! This is nuts! It should all end earlier.
The thing about the internet is that it has attracted a new breed of complainers. They feel good about complaining on the internet because they feel so powerless in their real lives, and they feel that by complaining on the internet that they are actually doing something about the problem. But this also means everything is a problem.
On the advice of Randall Munroe (creator of xkcd), I checked out OGLAF, and I have to say it's brilliant. It's subversive, it's hilarious, it's random. All the hallmarks of a really good webcoming. Check it out, but warning it's not safe for work or for polite company. It's almost bordering on pornographic in places, but still utterly hilarious.
Maybe it's all about establishing rhythm and momentum. When I die, I just want to be buried in the ground. No real grave, totally unmarked. Only those that know me should be able to find it, and when they're gone, that's it, my body will be lost forever.
Do you ever find that some people look very similar? Even across different racial groups, you'll find people who look exactly alike despite their skin colours (or even genders). Why is that? I think it's a cellular/DNA link to common ancestors. It shouldn't really come as a surprise that people will look like common ancestors when you realise that of course we had less people at the start of humanity's evolution, but as we have more people, of course people's appearances are going to become more and more diverse, but through it all, you'll still see traces of those ancestors.
I'm done with today. Hope you've enjoyed the jump.
Joaquin out.
