So, I have been asked to start contributing to our drinking team race car blog. Go check out www.tmfopposition.com for an idea of what I was doing on Saturday. Yes, that’s me in the cowboy hat. Oh yeah. Very post modern.
Monthly Archives: September 2008
Gargoyles
So, I have been wanting to get a tattoo on my back. No not a tramp stamp… I have been thinking about getting a protector animal for a long time. The cliche would be the dragon because it’s a power animal as well. But I have this desire to get a gargoyle… If you didn’t know, read this.
A local legend that sprang up around the name of St. Romanus (“Romain”) (631–641 A.D.), the former chancellor of the Merovingian king Clotaire II who was made bishop of Rouen, relates how he delivered the country around Rouen from a monster called Gargouille, having the creature captured by the only volunteer, a condemned man. The gargoyle’s grotesque form was said to scare off evil spirits so they were used for protection. In commemoration of St. Romain the Archbishops of Rouen were granted the right to set a prisoner free on the day that the reliquary of the saint was carried in procession (see details at Rouen).
In contemporary fiction, gargoyles are typically depicted as a (generally) winged humanoid race with demonic features: generally horns, a tail, and talons. They are said to be guardians of the building on which they reside. These fictional gargoyles can generally use their wings to fly or glide, and are often depicted as having a rocky hide, or being capable of turning into stone in one way or another.
You will typically see these statues near the roofs of gothic style buildings. Some of them have open mouths (that were origionally meant to be water spouts draining rain water from flat roofs) but they are all usually sort of demonic looking. The legend says that they come alive at night and fly around the building to protect it from evil. Generally speaking they are awesome…
Thanks Eboun!
(click to enlarge)
Nerdy Podcast Prophets
I should preface this by saying that I know not all of this is fact. Some of it is flat out false but, it’s what the news I’ve seen lately would have me believe. So…
So, I have a strange mix of podcasts that I download. Everything from fashion related stuff to debate team junk that makes me feel smarter. This blog is about the latter.
A while back, I had a podcast that was audio from a debate on Russia, and whether or not it’s becoming America’s enemy again. If you have been paying attention, you’d notice that through the thick smoke of bull shit that is the presidential election that the rest of the world is dredging on without us.
On the first day of the olympics, Russia invaded Georgia. Since then, there has been a lot of posturing by the US, who Georgia expected to come to their aid. We didn’t. Russia has failed to withdraw most of it’s troops and the European Union is far too directly reliant on Russia for resources to really sanction it seriously.
As I see it, and in largely simplified terms here’s what is going on.
-Russia claims that Georgia is run by a dictator equal to Saddam Hussein.
Bush with the evil leader of Georgia
-Russia invades Georgia to take over several cities that wanted to seperate from it.
Regional map of Georgia
-The world reacts by gasping. That is all.
-We watch the olympics. Damn those 13 year olds.
This is just a distraction.
-Geogia screams for help and explains that America is obligated to help.
-Bush sends C. Rice to the region to tell them that food aid is all we can do because Russia is scary.
Yep, that’s why we sent her
-The US begs the EU to get involved “on our behalf”.
-The EU tells Russia in a strong voice to get out.
In case you didn’t know there was a European Union
-Russia says NO.
-The EU says we’ll make up some sort of punishment for you if you don’t get out.
-Russia says, FINE… we were done anyway.
-Everyone says, Russia, WHAT THE FUCK IS YOUR PROBLEM???
-Russia says, Hey, we’re a power here too. Remember? If the US can invade a country because they don’t like how it’s being run and it is about to pose a threat to the rest of the world, as a “pre-emptive strike”, then so can we. The precidence is set.
Map of Russia
-The US says, NO YOU’RE wrong. Your’e in no position to do what we do. We’re America. Fuck YEAH!!!
-Russia says, you wanna fight about it? The fact is, we CAN and HAVE and WILL. If you want another cold war, we can do that. Our people are allready dirt poor and suffering. We have nothing to lose.
Despite recent bumps in the Russian economy…
-We send our most serious and respected diplomat – Dick Cheney – to Georgia to calm things down a bit with our abandoned ally.
Oh yeah.
-Russian people have a new sense of strength in their country.
-The EU realizes that this banter between the worlds 2 largest nuclear powers is probably coming at their expense.
Nato – Russia
-America ignores it because we have to keep that black guy out!!!
Help me Obiwan Kenobi, You’re our only hope.
-Russia says that we engineered the conflict in Georgia to keep the black guy out.
I roll my eyes.
The truth is this. Russia wants respect. The russian president is basically a puppet of the LAST russian president and in my mind that makes him (putin) a dictator. So the dictator is tracking down dictators? I don’t think so. Russia is trying to assert it’s self as a world power again. I don’t see a problem with that. I really wish they had the common sense to do so in a way that was non threatening to the country that I live in though. I am barely old enough to remember the cold war but I do know that the front door of my moms house has a rating for nuclear fall out. Just saying.
Imagine we were to go against Russia right now.
A full withdrawal of troops from Iraq/Afganistan and immediate deployment to Russias borders.
We move in, Russia threatens nukes.
What do we say to that?
Or we threaten sanctions.
Russia threatens nukes.
What do we say to that?
Or we impose trade sanctions.
Russia threatens nukes.
What do we say to that?
I guess what I am saying is that there is no “winning” a war against Russia in the traditional sense. We have allready shit on their interests so we are again at odds with the only other country on the planet that has the same dirty nuclear power that we do. It’s a stupid dance.
Russia is absolutely right on one point. America has a LOT more to lose in any conflict with Russia. We have allready shown the world how to stop our military in it’s tracks and we have not had the pleasure of going against a country with a REAL military like Russia has. It would not end well for us.
Kinda like that scene in Alien
Google Chrome
So yesterday I was listening to NPR and they had a short story on googles latest and greatest. They just launched a new browser application called Chrome. It is meant to replace Explorer or Firefox. So I got home and downloaded it. WOW. FAST.
Go get it.
After about 10 minutes of use, it is definitely becoming my default browser. You can just plug in anything you want to search for in the address bar and it does a google search for you. Because it loads everything at once (not the script, then the java, then the flash, then the… etc) all those super image intensive sites you go to in your spare time load super quick. I’m not saying you have an adult site problem, I’m just saying that myspace is gonna show you tila tequila’s boobs a lot faster.
Comics taken from google’s chrome website – an informational site about the development of the browser. Google it for more…
Back to work
Well, after a long weekend of accomplishing basically nothing, I have gotten back to work. I am thankfull that this is a short week but wishing that I could have taken a couple more days. The thing that makes coming back really hard to swallow is that I have been so busy during my time off lately that I haven’t had a real weekend. So this weekend was a real weekend but it wasn’t enough… Is it ever?
I woke up to coverage of the “Anarchists” at the RNC. I am still holding to my plan to completely avoid going anywhere near downtown St. Paul until it’s completely over.
You may remember from a previous post that I stated I was proud of the reluctancy of our city’s businesses to get their shit together for this event. Well, here’s why; Reports are allready concluding that the economic boost that the RNC promised it would bring the city is not happening. No suprises there… There is NO benefit to our city or state coming from this thing.
At any rate, another one of my friends was just hired on accross the hall… Soon all of my friends will be here. Also, my brother finally got a full time job and my mom has started to show that she’s serious about job hunting too. Bout damn time.
Cheers.
