Traveled to the future and brought back the future phone

This blog is funded by bets made from the future and placed in the past. Small investments can be sent in the present for your future prosperity. It’s a pretty much for sure thing.

Jayj

If I had a time machine, I’d go back to about 3 minutes ago

… because I really liked the song I just heard on the radio.

note: nobody wants a parsley, sage, or rosemary machine; always a thyme machine!

double note: actually if I had a time machine I’d go back to a few minutes before I took this photo, so I could wait until after the women who laughed at me while I took this photo had walked by before I took this photo.

http://humor-blogs.com/

Today’s Car is a resurrection from the Muscle Car Archives. The 1969 Baldwin-Motion 540 Camaro SuperCoupe is built by Time Machines, Inc. in Hudson, FL.

The car features hand-crafted steel body, a front/mid aluminum big-block 540, fully tubbed and incorporates a proprietary 2×3-inch tubular steel backbone/spine chassis running through the console and welded to the body resulting is an incredibly rigid platform, engineered for maximum performance.

The exterior features flared fender wells, widened rear fenders with functional brake cooling scoops and a extended hood inspired by the L88’s. The body is highlighted by traditional Baldwin-Motion badgeing and striping.

Under the hood an all-aluminum 700-hp Merlin/Motion big-block built by Bill Mitchel residesl. The blueprinted and dyno-tuned 540-cubic-inch powerplant has a World Products aluminum block with 4.50-inch bore, 4.25-inch stroke and 4.840-inch bore spacing. Eagle 6.535-inch H-beam rods, forged crank and 10-to-1 forged pistons are utilized. The roller-cammed engine is topped off with a Cross-Ram fuel injection system

To plant the power a specially-prepared Tremec TKO five-speed and a fully-independent rear with a Dana 44 Posi and hardened steel high-torque axles are used. Suspension is four-wheel independent with polished unequal length control arms and toe-in control links and fully adjustable coil-over shocks and sway bars. Steering is rack and pinion.

Courtesy of seriouswheels.com

This looks awesome.

How am I supposed to get a job??

-Reid

As promised, here is the third article in my list of failed Cracked.com pitches.  This was actually the first pitch I made to them.

Let’s be honest, time travel is bad ass.  Everyone would love to travel back in time and buy up shares of Microsoft or crates of unboxed Star Wars figures from back in the ’70s and then return to the present and live large like P Diddy.  We are all waiting for that moment when NASA holds a press conference and says, “HOLY CRAP, WE JUST SAW DINOSAURS!!!  I WAS NEARLY EATEN BY A T-REX!!  A F’N T-REX, PEOPLE!!”  Everyone on Earth is gonna lose their minds and there will be rioting in the streets like when the Lakers win an NBA Championship.  So when this announcement inevitably happens in the far flung future, what will be the rules of time travel?  What will the time travel vehicle look like?  No one knows.  Movies, TV and books have given us some ideas of what time travel MAY be like.  Let’s take a look at what I hope will NOT be what time travel is like when we all get to go back in time and play Marty McFly.

The Phonebooth from the two Bill & Ted movies – Despite what the movies show you, this is no good for sending teams of people back.  I know Bill & Ted fit like 20 people in it, but in reality, have you ever tried to fit TWO people in a phone booth?  It’s like a game of Twister.  To send several people back you’d really need like 10 booths.  Besides, AT&T stopped servicing and turned off all their phone booths, so are there any fully enclosed phone booths left?  Why don’t we just make the time vehicle out of a horse and carriage?  It makes as much sense.  And the flimsy rabbit ears antenna on top?  Is this booth traveling through time or trying to pick up grainy cable stations?  It’s BEGGING to be damaged by random debris in the time continuum.  Plus, who the hell came up with the phone book and dialing strings of numbers to get to specific dates?  A yellow pages of time travel?  What if you want to go back to ancient Rome to meet Socrates, mis-dial the number and get dropped in the middle of the Spanish Inquisition?  Hope you are fireproof cause you are gonna get burned alive as a heretic.  Time travel’s not so fun now, is it?

The quantum accelerator from Quantum Leap – This one looks cool at first.  You strip down to a white body stocking and stand in a room filled with wind and light as if you were some bad ass progressive rock star from the ’70s about to give a rockin’ performance to Madison Square Garden.  But that’s about where the awesome ends.  You have absolutely no control over this device as it sends you hurling through the timeline and depositing you into other people’s bodies.  Imagine jumping into a guy about to get gang raped in the Riker’s Island showers.  All of a sudden, not so awesome.  And you can only jump to dates within your own lifetime?  Lame.  I want to go back and hunt dinosaurs, not go back and relive being a dork in high school.

Time coaster from the movie Time Cop — A time machine from a Jean Claude Van Damme movie has a bad design?  I know, shocking, right?  This one is controlled by rooms of supercomputers which can pinpoint exactly where you are traveling in time and send you there.  Pretty awesome so far, right?  It’s about how I imagine a real time machine working.  However, it’s like the time vehicle was designed by psychotic monkeys…that are blind.  The “time car” is an odd, wedge shaped vehicle that shoots flaming jets out the back like the friggin’ Batmobile and travels forward on a set of roller coaster tracks at an extreme velocity towards a brick wall.  Yes, you heard me right, a BRICK F’N WALL.  When the time car reaches a certain speed it is supposed to pierce the fabric of the time barrier and disappear into the past before it hits said brick wall.  However, when the time machine has a glitch and the car doesn’t disappear into the past, it crashes headfirst into the brick wall and all persons involved are violently killed.  My question?   Why did they build a brick wall at the end of the track in the first place?  Why didn’t they leave the room open at one end?  That way, if there is a “glitch”, the vehicle just glides to a happy, bloodless stop.  No time vehicle to rebuild, no new recruits to train and nobody needs to die.  At the very least they could put some pillows or a giant net at the end of the tracks.  Yes, that would make everything look like a Road Runner cartoon, but DAMN, people!  Also, what the hell is the gigantic stone monolith at the end of the track?  Does that actually serve a purpose other than making this whole thing just look bad ass?

Cessna plane from the movie Time Chasers — This movie was skewered on a classic episode of Mystery Science Theater.  It involves this dorky guy building a time machine out of a Cessna airplane and an Apple computer.  You would imagine that when one is conceiving of a time vehicle, it should be inconspicuous.  At least try to make the vehicle somewhat easy to pilot and hide, you know?  Well, nothing like designing your time vehicle to “blend into the surroundings” by requiring you to land it at a friggin’ airport.  Also, how do all the time circuits and computer power needed to crunch your time traveling numbers get power in an airplane?  Do you have to get a generator?  With all the computer equipment, backup systems and electrical generators you’re stuffing inside the fuselage the plane is gonna weigh more than Rosie O’Donnell and cause it to sink to the Earth like a free falling chunk of metal.  Assuming it even makes it off the ground.  Also, I’m impressed that all the computing power you need to break the fabric of space-time is an Apple ][ computer.  Something that would be hard pressed to do your 2009 income taxes can easily hurl you into the future.

Time Displacement device from The Terminator movies – We don’t really get to see what the time machine looks like in any of the movies, but we get to see the result; the time traveler showing up bare-ass naked with scars and blood all over their body.  What a way to make NOBODY want to time travel.  I can imagine the scientists right before you go back in time:  “So just take off all your clothes and we’ll get started…oh, by the way, time travel is gonna f**k your s**t up.”  If this is how time travel is going to work in the future, the government won’t have to worry about anyone going back to the past trying to screw with the time stream.  I’m sure I’m not the only one that likes my body without all the sores and bleeding, thank you.

Storage shed time travel device in the movie Primer – This was a small independent movie released in 2004, but since I’m a sucker for time travel movies, I watched it.  It’s somewhat creepy that the time machine in this movie is kept in one of those rented storage rooms.  I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t want to spend a lot of time hanging around the creepy storage place trying to travel through time.  Hookers, crack whores and pedophiles (oh my!) lurk in every corner (at least every time I’m there).  Also, the rules of this particular creepy, storage room time machine are a bitch.  You got a pen?  You’re going to have to write this down (or look at this picture):  You can only go back in time as far as you are willing to wait.  For instance, you turn on the machine at noon and then kill 6 hours (I don’t know, dude, read a book).  Then you get in the device at 6pm and wait another mind numbing 6 hours in the device (I know, right? Hopefully you brought some porn).  Then, when you exit the device, it’s at the original noon.  I don’t know about you, but that’s a lot of work to wait 12 hours real time and only travel back six hours.  I have trouble waiting 15 minutes for a table at Red Lobster much less 12 hours in a storage shed looking like an idiot sitting 12 hours in a storage shed.

Uncle Rico’s time machine from Napoleon Dynamite – Well, it’s on this list because it doesn’t work, but it doesn’t work in the most awesome way imaginable.

Sunday afternoon, Lake Michigan. Sitting on some rocks with Kimbo and Laura.

There is a family a few feet away. Three little ones, two boys, one girl. Their mothers in tow. Suddenly:

LITTLE GIRL: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGAHGAHAGHAGAHHHHHHAAHAGAieieieiei!

Her mother rapidly begins to remove the t-shirt the little girl has over her bathing suit; the little girl’s head becomes briefly entangled.

LITTLE GIRL: GoooooooUDHKJSFKHGOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
US: Man, what gives?

The mother looks at the t-shirt.

MOTHER: TeeeeIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGODGODOGOGODGOOOLEUUUUU!

The mother looks at us, because at this point, we are openly staring; we are all but poised to flee to the lady lifeguard who keeps walking past us, doggedly surveying the water for drownings and et cetera, to beg her for sweet mercy.

MOTHER: There is a bug–

[Here she gestures with her hands, making a circle shape with her fingers the size of a buttermilk pancake]

THIS BIG!

US: Aaaaaaaaaaiiieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
MOTHER: I will GET RID OF THIS BUG.

[She has a slight accent, which makes her sound worldly-wise as she says this, like: I stormed the embassy in '92 and the government had placed an embargo on shoe imports and on my feet I wore the leaves of a banana tree and a length of twine and in my heart I wore My People]

She walks down to the edge of the water and starts hurling the shirt into it, over and over.

MOTHER: Bug–you–water–sdfusdkihsb–

I kid you not: We see whatEVER was in that shirt landing on the sand. Yards away, we see it. A bug? You’d better hope, and I’d better hope, that it was a bug, because if it wasn’t, that means that someone has successfully bio-engineered a creature which is a cross between a stag beetle, a Gatling gun, and a bald eagle, and they put it in Lake Michigan, and it’s only a matter of time before you turn on the tap to fill the kettle with water to make your cup of Darjeeling-Oolong- what-have-you and GACK.

When the mother comes back, the shirt is a wet, ragged version of its former self.

ME: [joking, but not really.] Was it a crustacean?
MOTHER: [excitedly] Yes, perhaps a crustacean!

[She widens her eyes, bares her teeth, and curls her hands into claws to imitate what it was that she saw in the t-shirt.]

US: [reflexively recoil]

Shortly thereafter, they packed up their goods, and–with well-wishes all around–they departed.

I think we all knew that we had experienced something very special.

***

Bought chocolate pudding cups this weekend. Sure did.

***

So here’s something I haven’t really done, so much, in this blog-o’-mine. Katie sent me an e-mail, talking about what she called her

Top Five Desert Island Books

I’ve been having a few exchanges on this subject, lately; not necessarily about books of the Desert Island variety, but your general Hey! It’s Summer And Apparently That Means Book Lists For Beach Reading, For People Who Go To The Beach And Read Books Also Simultaneously Too.

I basically know what my favorite books are. My top five-ish, even.

So then I was like, “Well, why not share them?”

I mean?

I mean, when O Magazine and the New York Times both tell me what I, as a woman, should be reading this summer, what I should be pulling out of my artfully distressed straw tote, and I dutifully read the linked excerpt, NYT, and it reads like a pink-heeled lobotomy*–well, you know, uprise! I’ll make my own listy!

*Please note: Sometimes a pink-heeled lobotomy is exactly what you need

1. Bleak House–Charles Dickens

So, so, sososososososo good and many-colored and peopled with amazing peoples and funny and sad and triumphant and weird. A man spontaneously combusts. Also, smallpox! Also: Love.

2. Middlemarch–George Eliot

George Eliot may have the pseudonym of a man, but she’s all lady. She writes with sonar radar accuracy about the psychological viewpoint of women from any old era–then-era, now-era, you name it. I’m always all, “I HEAR that, Dorothea Brooke” or “Can I get a WITNESS, Maggie Tulliver” or “You keep on LOVING him, Dinah Morris”. My only problem with George Eliot is that she writes The Perfect Woman and then unerringly pairs her with a man comically unworthy of her amazing-ness.  It’s exactly like Charles Dickens, but in reverse. What’s the good word on this tendency? Can we get some equality up in here? [Sorry about saying "up in here" just then.] Anywho, “Middlemarch” wraps itself around your heart valves in a hurry. Class commentary and forbidden love. So fine.

3. The God of Small Things–Arundhati Roy 

This book heart-cracked me. It is covered in magical adjective vines. Please read it. It is too precious to say more.

4. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn–Mark to the Twain

Do I  really need to explain why this is one of my all time favorites? Also, I wanna be a river boat captain, circa This Book.  It is a true and cherished dream. But that would involve a time machine, and time machines are tooooo tempting!

5. Pilgrim at Tinker Creek–Annie Dillard

I quoted this book to everyone I knew for six months. They hated me. “Please stop talking to me about the reproductive system of a bumblebee”, they would say, but I would not, because they needed to know. This book melted me down in a straight-up steel forge. When I start thinking about things like the circulatory systems of maple trees, I understand that, ultimately, I have this book to blame. It is beautiful and nature and God and praying mantises.

You have your honorable mentions, too, when you make your little lists; like Waiting for the Barbarians and Winter’s Tale, which have writing, both, to burst the heart, and millions of others too numerous to mention, like Claire Messud is a really good writer,  and then David Copperfield is soooo lovely and…

The Fountainhead.

Oh, shut up.

***

Hey, did you-all see that Farrah Fawcett and Ayn Rand were buddies, after a certain fashion, and that Ayn Rand wanted Farrah Fawcett to PLAY DAGNY TAGGART in a potential TV movie of “Atlas Shrugged“ ? Do you know how totally super weird that is? I’m getting the weirds just thinking about this.

Dagny Taggart should probably be played by Angelina Jolie, push comes to shove.

You’re never gonna hear me say that again.

Well, maybe.

Chagrin

It wasn’t the life I would have wanted,
had I known what sort of life I did want,
as if anyone ever knew; though I

did know. Everyone had her shadow life,
her should-have life, the life she should have had,
all those thoughts sharp-sharking into her soul,

all those doodles on the skin of the day.
The shame, that this had been and this had not,
could-should, kowtowing to the life of should,

the shock, let’s say, of seeing it had passed,
the chagrin, let’s say, the savage chagrin
that this was what it was, et cetera,

who did I think I was, et cetera,
the queen of Sheba in her shantytown,
or Shirley in her temple (such a doll)

or Scheherezade waking to the day–
not Sylvia, not the sylvan huntress.
The whole shebang was a shambles, hello,

shanghaiing my wishes, shout it out, shout,
those stories of what was and never was,
love, voyage, give me succor–sugar–suck–

hushing the heart and shushing the senses.
Hello, day, shake the sheets out, wake the day.
(As I said this, I was choking up.)

The challenge of cheerfulness–hello, charm–
charade and charm, chameleon, cameo.
I saw the dawn and fell into a hush.

Sarah Arvio 

Once upon a time, there was this magical place called middle school. It was magical and hateful and stupid and wrong and happy and scary and huge and crazy and…well, middle school.
Once upon a time, in this very time, there was a boy. His name was Brandon.

You may or may not know the story of Brandon, so I shall tell you.

He was the first boy I ever “loved.” I use quotation marks, because I don’t know if I actually loved him or not. Sure as hell felt like I did. This is also before the horrible mood swings that I have now. Back then, I could like the same person and stuff over a period of time, and wouldn’t get angry or mad or anything with them. Just, the things I liked changed. They were around (the mood swings), but not so bad.

ANYWAY. BACK  TO BRANDON. AND HOW I LOVED HIM.

So, about the end of 6th grade, I start to like him. And then summer, no big deal. I honestly don’t remember that summer very well. No idea who I saw (like, saw with my eyes, I didn’t date anyone then, gosh), no idea where I was or anything like that.
7th grade, still liked him. A lot. It was bad. Really bad.
I thought about him all the time, he was perfect. Tall, dark and handsome. Cliche, but true. He had a nice smile. I never talked to him. Er, take that back, I did a few times. Not by choice, more like random phrases or something, I do not remember, it was weird.
Either way, I fell in love with him. If you can call it that. Whatever you wanna call it, it was there, for a very long time.
I figured out where he lived summer after 7th grade. Two blocks from my house. He had a younger brother (at least) for siblings – found this out cuz they were are the park together. I would go by his house all the time on my bike, hoping to see him, and only did like three times.
8th grade, still loved him. To the point of obsession. In language arts class, we were put in the same group to work on things. We barely worked – the other person in our group didn’t help that either – we all talked about…whatever it was we were talking about. A random girl in the class joined the conversation one day.
She said that him (Brandon) and I would make a cute couple. I wanted to say YES WE WOULD but didn’t.
I introduced him to Nine Inch Nails and Korn (for which I take full pride in).
We talked a bit more, but nothing ever out of class, really.
Later in the year, we talked more, random stuff. We rode the same bus, talked on there a little bit (short bus rides you know). He actually talked to me at Barnes and Noble once, too. I was horrified – I was NOT wearing something that was at ALL attractive. Did an *facepalm* in my head – if I had known what a *facepalm* was back then, that is.
Later in the year, we exchanged music. He burnt me something, I let him borrow a CD.
And then the end of the year, and still nothing.
Oh how I “loved” him.

Then we moved.
As in, me, my mom, and my dad. Up and moved. To the hellhole that is the Mapleton area.
However, I looked him up on MySpace (after a friend of mine told me about it, saying I “had” to get one). We messaged back and forth. Then traded MSN screen names. Instant messaged for a while, even.
I still loved him. Still wanted to be with him.

He had the perfect voice, and the nicest abs (oh if you had seen them – I had once, in P.E., without even meaning to, and it was gorgeous), the greatest smile. Other girls thought he was creepy. He wasn’t. He read Stephen King and he drew weird pictures – but he was good at it. He played basketball too much, but he was like the only white kid doin’ it. I don’t know how good he was, only watched him play a few times. He was tall, and he was very attractive, and he had good taste, and I loved him.

And this is into my freshman year, mind you.

After a while, we stopped talking on instant messenger. I do not know why. I was very sad, I remember that. He just stopped getting on. I attempted to message him on MySpace – no dice.

It took me a while to realize that I lived three hours away, a lifetime at that point, and nothing was ever going to happen.
I was very, very sad. I wore out my Pearl Jam CD because of it – never let a sad person listen to “Black” by Peal Jam unless they’re in the mood to get sadder. I wore out my Shinedown CD as well. Just crying and being sad.
Because there was nothing, and there was going to be nothing, and he was gone, and I’d never talk to him again.

Every once in a while, I remember this, and get sad.
Of course I get sad – I had multiple chances, and never took them.
Every once in a while, I look him up on Facebook, on MySpace. He doesn’t have a Facebook, that I can find. And his MySpaces are pretty much unused.

This may not seem like a bit deal to you, but it parallels current things, and it makes me think back, and it makes me go “wow, I was an idiot.”
I might have had a chance, had I not been so shy. I might have been able to…I don’t know what, but I might have.

I remember, the fall of 8th grade, laying at my Aunt’s house (spending the weekend there) and thinking about him. I wanted to be with him, so badly, so badly. I had the (stupid) thought that if I could just get him in bed with me somehow…could somehow…somehow…get him to do that, and then (cannot believe I’m telling you this) have a kid (yes I wanted children then; yes I wanted them to be born when I was young).
My rationale: if I couldn’t have him, at least have something OF him.

Just…sometimes…time machines could be handy.
AND NO I DON’T MEAN TO GO BACK AND GET HIM TO HAVE SEX WITH ME, GOSH.

It was the song. The NIN one that I told him to listen to, because it was good. He also got me this song on a CD. Well, that was after a misunderstanding, but who’s counting?! I also broke this CD and threw it away. I was angry that nothing would ever be between us, and did that. Now I wish I hadn’t…

Where are the whirls?

Commodities (under which my company may be registered as selling in Virginia):

• Barge Maintenance and Repair
• Bra Clasps, Replacement
• Zoo Animals
• Creepers
• Misc. 18th Century Reproduction Goods
• Seafood, Freeze Dried (Not Entrees)
• Miscellaneous Services, No. 1
• Date And Time Machines And Parts
• Headbands, Installed
• Eye, Ear, Nose, And Throat Preparations
• Frozen Semen
• Fidelity And Surety
• Fish Locators And Shockers
• Whirls
• Goats
• Mincemeat
• Broomcorn
• Nipple Pails

How much does a little “surety” go for these days? And does it come in a fancy box? Mystery + Christmas List.

I’m just stopping by to share a tidbit of information. Oh, you know, how Jeff asked me out. 
Sure it’s fast. But oh well. Not really that big of a deal.

It’s weird, though, to actually SEE people and all. Considering I haven’t had a relationship that involves that in over a year. More like a year and a half. That’s a long time, don’t you think?
Long time.
Yes.

I still fail at staying up late if there’s nothing to do.
Which means that once I get my TV and in my bedroom, I should be able to stay up late just fine. Seeing as I’ll have video games in my room. And movies in my room. Well, I have movies in my room now, but only on my laptop.

No, we haven’t started moving yet.
I have no idea when that’s going to happen. Probably some weekend.
This weekend, maybe? I have no idea. Nobody’s telling me anything.
But that’s probably because there’s nothing to tell.  

I haven’t decided what I want to do, yet. I haven’t put much thought it to it really. 
More like, get a job when I get back from my Grandmother’s and go from there.

Though, I do have to go visit my aunt for a while. So then probably not get a job till August.
…that’s a long time from now.
It’s going to go really fast.
I should be busy most of the time till then. What with moving, then Missouri and then gahhhh.

I like not doing anything. And now…NOW…I’m going to have to do things.
Bah.
Growing up fails.
Of course.
Because you look forward to it so much when you have the “youth” and then when you’re done you want it back.

BUT NOOOOOOOOO.
I won’t do that.
I’ll make sure my “non-youth” is fun. Because I won’t grow up to be some bitter person,  stuck in the “better days”, wishing for a time machine. No, that won’t be.

Because that’s horribly boring and stupid and there IS no time machine.
And there is no going back, you know. Only forward. So why not make the forward better?
DUH. That’s the obvious choice.
Glad I found it.

It’s a RHCP song. And I was listening to it just now. So, there.

I found this video at stuff white people do; see here for the original post and insightful commentary.

I would like to think that among friends and neighbors my odd tastes are balanced by the acceptance that I know some of what I talk about – at least some of the time. So when I say unto you, dear people, do not listen to this album while driving, I am not merely engaging in some kind of erratic hyperbole, nor am I buying into some kind of homoerotic masculinist cult approach to “penile soundscapes” and the like. I am instead buying into the idea that distracted people moving a two thousand pound death machine are a hazard, both moral and physical.

I will go further than this – sensitive people do not mix well with this sort of music, especially if they are given to drug taking or nervousness. I spent enough time in my late teens and early twenties babysitting people who thought it would be fun to “trip out” but didn’t reckon on having to deal with their mind thrown up on a drive-in movie screen twice the size of the universe. Either they hadn’t been told, dealt only with the fratboy mindset or they’d simply chosen to ignore warnings from reasonable, responsible people, and as such got themselves into a corner with The Fear and had no way out. Not that it isn’t fun to tell someone that everything will be ok every two minutes for an hour and a half, of course, but – ok, I’m kidding. It’s not fun at all.

This piece of work is like The Fear in album form. Either you deal with it or it deals with you.

Time Machines came with six stickers to stare at while listening to the four tracks, ranging from ten minutes to half an hour. I transferred them to my MPC case a long while back, after I’d gotten used to watching them melt in a darkened room while cold sober and got a little bit sick – and scared – of having strange lapses of time. There is a definite mood to each piece, named after a different chemical compound of the more boutique entheogenic sorts, labeled by their chemical compound names, which you can go look up on wikipedia if you like.

It’s easy to dismiss the more lofty expressions of any musical group, even one so varied and life-altering as Coil was, but this truly is music that destroys time. That’s why you don’t drive to it, and it will probably never bring any kind of comfort. Back when I was more foolhearty I’d put this on and try to do some freelance work; I’d be left staring at a blank screen fifty minutes later, not really remembering what had happened. I’ve also found it makes a horrible soundtrack to a muted tv – a special kind of ugliness comes through. And pornography? Forget about it.

Time Machines is an amazing work, both my most and least favorite Coil release. It is unforgettable and unique, but not to be taken lightly.

“Telepathine” – A foyer, simultaneously nostalgic and alien.

“DOET/Hecate” – Ground between two flat pieces of stone over a million years.

“5-MeO-DMT” – Buzzing, invokes rage.

“Psilocybin” – Long, slow trail.

I’m going to sue my former self.

I’m not sure if I should go with the mental anguish or the physical neglect angle.

I never used to look and feel like this!    Someone is responsible!

I figure there isn’t any statute of limitation about this sort of thing, and my former self had a bit of money in the bank.

note: if I had a time machine, I could go back and steal his identity.

double note: I’d sue my future self, but he’d probably counter-sue me.

triple note: I’d probably file in the U.S. because … if an idiot who spills hot coffee on themselves can sue McDonald’s and win, I should have no problem.

quadruple note: if you like the image, there are some other works from the same artist here.

quintuple note: Money Making Scheme #1 and #2 and #3 and #4 and #5 and #6 are still scheming.

http://humor-blogs.com/

hello nice reederz its dennis the vizsla dog wel it luks like this is the end for us dogs as the dinosawrs are closing in so i skratch wun last messadj in the mud before we git stompd or eeten or — hay wot is that???

ohmygosh luk its trouble coming to reskew us!!! and she fownd my old ship the gofer broke and rewired the flux capasitor to mayk it into a time masheen!!! gud kitty trouble!!! ok evrybuddy into the gofer broke kwik!!!

whew that shoor wuz a close wun but now we ar back home and evrything is the way it shood be!!!

wow trouble the kitty realy came thru for us dogs this time not only did she reskew us but she also fownd the gofer broke so that i can wunse agin rezoom my kwest to find the undergrownd kingdum of the gofers!!!  hay trouble i gess we wer rong abowt yoo yoo ar a gud kitty i am sorry i told evrywun how yoo embezld al my munny and tried repeetedly to dispoze of us dogs in varyus ways and tried to tayk ovr the doghouse of justiss frum now on i wil giv yoo lots of hugs and kisses evry time i see yoo!!!!! ok bye

I will tell you that I don’t like any aspect of dead animals. They’re depressing, they smell, and they usually come along with some sort of moral issue (huntin’, meat eatin’, road killin’, medical testin’, etc.) that must be addressed… But then if you happen to stuff the aforementioned dead animal and turn it into something wonderful and maybe hilarious, I will tell you that dead animals are the best.

Case in point, Chuffy the mouse. Driving his time machine. Which happens to be a guinea pig. Wow. Big spenders with creepy houses can find it at Top Hat Taxidermy. Or why not try and make one yourself? (Don’t try and make one yourself.) Via BoingBoing.

Because you can never get enough of taxidermy (you can very easily get enough of taxidermy), here is the video for George Harrison’s “Got My Mind Set On You.” And I know I’ve posted this in other blog incarnates, but nothing rivals it in terms of the best possible use of taxidermied rodents on film:

George Harrison is clearly the best Beatle.

I was in Victoria for the better part of this last week, and I suppose this entry is my triumphant return to the blogosphere. I have been pondering all familial relations while I was in my family home on the island, but the relationship I wanted to discuss today was sibling/parent/sibling triangles.

I can’t help but feel like a bit of an ass in writing about this, because I am sort of the “Golden Child” of my older brother, J, and myself. This entire subject is a loaded question in terms of taboos, and other less nice facts about attachment and behaviour. The taboo of a parent “loving” one child more than another, or perhaps “loving” them equally, but being able to connect to the personality/interests of one child over the other. It’s not fun, or pretty, or right, but I’m sure it happens all the time. Personally, I feel quite bad, because I know that I relate more to my younger brother B, than my younger sister S, and I try to make up for this by spending equal time and care on each. However, my relationship with J is just, erm, slightly FUBAR.

Obviously, I was visiting family, and therefore I got to see all of my dear siblings. I mostly saw B and S; I tried to show them that I cared in the small space of time that I was there. I played catch, listened to what they had to say, baked cookies with them, and just hung out. I gave positive encouragement, and lots of hugs. I told Dad off again for being so negative about B’s ball playing, and teenage mood swings. I thought I was doing alright in the sibling relationship department, at least until Saturday and J rolled around.

I had actually this previous week or so been pondering the dynamics between J and myself. I always seemed to get things that J wanted as a child. I mean I was cute, sunny and somewhat precocious, but I’m pretty sure J was sort of the same. He did get pushy over things that he wanted though, which is why I got to feed the orca at Sea World instead of him, and maybe even why I got to ride the elephant at the circus instead of him (poor animals…no life for them). These were pretty neat things, but they weren’t necessarily things that I wanted, yet I got them anyways.

(Yes, I know it’s not an Orca, but it’s a Victoria landmark. Anyways, Victoria’s Sea World is long gone…)

So it was in my mind lately-this sort of inequality, and yet I was still slightly taken aback when J threw it in my face.

Specifically, we were discussing my Dad’s negative coaching abilities, and J concurred that Dad did indeed smash his dreams of being any good at ball, and he felt that Dad was trying to live vicariously through his and B’s dreams. I said I was sorry that I couldn’t be there to be a positive support like I am trying to be for B (showing him that you have to work really hard and try harder…; don’t let mistakes, or Dad’s negativity get you down, etc.). He then stated, in a rather bitter tone, that I wasn’t there because I was too busy being half a country away, living with our mother.

To elaborate, a bit of back story; my parents divorced 1983; J and I lived with our Mom ‘til about 1988; then we lived with Dad until 1991, at which point, I got to stay in Ontario with our Mom and J lived with Dad in Victoria. Staying with Mom on the farm was the only thing I really ever asked/begged/threatened to run away over. I loved the open spaces, the animals, the cool things I could go out and explore (owl pellets, creeks, old orchards), and it all made me feel so alive. I never really expected to be allowed to stay, but I got my wish.

J was devastated; I think he loved/loves Mom more than me, to be honest. We both ended up with our own special brand of emotional damage. I got to learn to hate men (Thanks Mom!), and not believe in my own talent; and he just got to not believe in his own talent. I think out of the two of us he got the better deal in a way. He’s married, and on the up and up now. I’m still slogging (ha, and blogging) through my own shit. Although, if I’m going to be completely honest he probably ended up feeling like I was picked over him, which isn’t a nice thing to ponder at all.

This whole separation has set us up for our current sibling inequality. I’m sure it seems to him that I still get everything that he wants, which, I would put forward, is our parent’s attention. As an angry bitch (teens), as a lost twenty something (still going), and as the current black sheep of the family, I’m sure it seems to him that I get more love, attention, and acceptance than he does/did. He never gets to witness them taking my legs out from under me, but I would like to assure him (and you, my reader) that they most certainly have over and over again. I don’t enjoy it, yet I don’t know if he’d believe me if I told him about all the negative, critical bubble popping lectures I have been given. Why bother?

He’s more spiteful than bitter now, so how do I even begin to make it up to him? I haven’t a clue where I left the plans for the time machine I was building. I can’t right the wrongs of the past, and there is simply no way a small child could have realized the damage that was being done by simply wanting something. I don’t know how to make it better, except my supporting his current plans, and trying to remain positive with him and my other siblings. I can only hope that B and S don’t end up like their older brother and sister.

I don’t really have a conclusion for this topic. I feel really badly that my brother and I will never see eye to eye. I feel badly that he was perhaps made to feel like a less desirable child to have around, but I don’t know if that is entirely my fault, or even if I am to blame at all.

I have a lot to think about, sigh. Thank you for reading. I will try to have more upbeat topics for the next few entries; I know that you all enjoy them far more than my drama. Can’t fool me, kittens!

And she’s a computer geek.

Another reason why time machines should be top priority and not this global warming business. I’m talking to you Al Gore.

Time Clock: what a cool name for something so …… dull.

Doesn’t it make you think of cool things like time machines, time tunnels, time passages, and time travel?

Time clocks only transport me to the penal colony called work.

I’ve been “transported“.

note: Punch in, Punch out: probably what Ralph Macchio is doing now.

double note: inspired by S. Le’s  http://ifeelunusual.wordpress.com/2008/06/18/is-your-life-like-this/

triple note: I’ve been time warped.

 http://humor-blogs.com/