Ah, Saturday. I should be cleaning right now, which is what I intend to do after I finish writing this. Let's see, what's gone on interesting here lately? Went to see George Carlin May, 1. Was a great show, but the memory that stands out in my mind is the incident we witnessed going to the show. Driving out of the parking lot, getting ready to head to the stadium to watch the show, I saw flashing blue and red lights on my right hand side. Instinctively, I think and say out loud: "Oh shit..." In the parking lot of an apartment complex that is close to our own sits a fire-truck, two ambulances, and several police cars. I wonder what's going on, so when we stop at the gas station just down the road from us, and I inform the attendant there as to what's going on. I know this guy, have talked with him several times, find out he's MCSE among other things, and know that he lives in the apartments where the incident took place.

So, he calls up his family. At this point I should mention that the attendant is Indian, and as he was talking to his family, all that I could make out was a blur of nonsensical syllables. (I should really learn to speak a second language, the time is coming when I could make use of it, I think.) Turns out that his family has heard what's going on. There was a shooting, or so it seemed. So, I sat through George Carlin, enjoying the show while this incident was flopping around in my subconscious. At one point I was thinking about how violent Americans as a lot tend to be, and where that viciousness stems from. On a similar not, if you haven't seen it, Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine is definitely recommended by myself for you viewing pleasure. It's a great movie, but this is off the point.

I wait up for the local news, to catch the report of what had happened in greater detail than the Attendant and his family could render. This is a copy of the news script for that episode that I dug up on the net:

An E-M-S crew responding to one emergency tonight in -------- was confronted with another. The incident unfolded outside an apartment complex on ---------- Road. A report of an injured child brought emergency medical personnel to the scene. Once they arrived, a fight broke out between an adult male and a teenager, and police say the 14- year- old pulled a gun. AMIE SHEAFF: THEN ABOUT THAT TIME THE EMT WAS STANDING THERE AND THEN HE KIND OF WAVED AROUND AND POINTED AT HER. AND SHE JUST KIND OF PUT HER HANDS UP AND SHE RAN BEHIND THE AMBULANCE AND IMMEDIATELY CALLED POLICE I GUESS. Police were planning to charge the adult with assault... the teen with brandishing a weapon. The gun turned out to be an air pistol, but police say it looked like a more lethal firearm.

I wish I knew more of what had actually happened, but I think the story is fascinating. There's an injured child, someone calls 911, the ambulance shows up. Just to give you a better picture, I'll describe the parties involved as I saw them on the newscast. The 14 year old was a black male, dressed in some sort of foot ball jersey, with a bandana strapped around his head. The older guy was a white male, who looked like he would fit in better in a trailer park than anywhere else, looked to be about 25-30ish. he had long black hair, he did not have a shirt on, was wearing blue jeans. I'm not sure, but I think he had a bandana on his head. So these two get into a fight. The 14 year old pulls out a fucking AIR PISTOL, and I guess threatened the EMT with it. Apparently he didn't like the EMT that well. I'm assuming at this point that it was not the 14-year old who was the injured child spoken of to 911. It says that the fight broke out after the police had shown up. Can't help but think back to something a guy said in passing after overhearing the attendant and myself's conversation. He said something to the effect of: "Heat's bringin'um out early. I'll tell you what though, If I have a problem, I'll handle my own."

One a related note, the thought of moving to Canada once again took hold of my mind this weekend.

Wed, April 30, 2003
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Drugs? Sure, why not. :)

Seriously though, why does the vast majority of the public (or at least that's the way the government wants it to be represented) vilify the use of drugs? It wasn't always like that, you know. Go back to our roots as a species... the early primitive societies. It won't take you very long to do a search on google and turn up a lot of credible sources that will tell you about how early societies utilized psychoactive plants in a variety of ways. Actually, Hyaluronic you go, I did the work for you already. Consensus: Primitive societies engaged in psychoactive use primarily for religious ceremonies, though there is evidence of early recreational use also. Widespread, use is known in all cultures that have walked the earth.

So, why are some drugs considered evil/unsafe for general consumption? Personally, I think a lot of the views that modern society has in regards to psycho actives comes from the Holy Roman Church. Look at what the church did to vilify competing religions (the pagans) in order to convert the masses and spread it's brand of faith/power. Part of that propaganda included identifying sacred substances used by the pagans for millennia with satanic worship.

Decided to start this blog because I have always want to keep some sort of journal, and at least this way someone might stumble along, read it, and maybe look at something I've written about in a different perspective. First thing to address, I guess would be myself.

I am, as of this post, a twenty year old male living in Virginia. I am married to the love of my life, live in a one bedroom apartment with her and our two hamsters, and live, what many would call, a counter-culture lifestyle. But when you think about it, there is no one culture in this country, or on the world for that matter; making the term "counter-culture" kind of irrelevant. Sure, when the term was coined communicated was limited to word-of-mouth and point to point telephone calls for the common person, they only people with the power to reach a large audience were companies who reaped billions of dollars with the help of the FCC. It was easier then, I would think, to believe in the existence of a prevailing homogeneous culture that the good and decent folk of America subscribed to. Today, more and more people have had the ability to communicated to mass audiences, spread memes effectively, etc, etc... but I'm on a rant here. All I'm trying to say is that it's easier for people to see today, if they look at it, that there are more people who share their own views on a multitude of topics, which is the defining characteristic of a culture is to begin with.

So, what have I done today? Not much... Rode around town with my wife, who for the past two days has been deciding to go on the Atkins' diet then decided not to after we bought a bunch of meat, and only meat, at the grocery store (I guess the reality that she'd have to eat nothing but meat, no bread/vegtables/pasta/etc, for the next three weeks. We smoked a blunt, then I fucked around on the internet, found this free web host in Romania, started the blog. I wonder if the host will be pissed or not if they ever see this page and find out that I don't speak Romanian.... Also stumbled across this site via slashdot: A guy working on a completely ASCI version of Star Wars (Episode IV). hmmm. Oh well, tomorrow will start the first real postings, this is just a kind of warm-up excersize.