Are you ready seems to be the incessant question at the moment.  People are asking of course about Christmas, and they mean have I bought my presents/cards/new little black number, and all those other things that we seem to think are so vital for a “good” Christmas.

But that’s not really what being ready for Christmas is about.  Jesus points us in Luke, “Don’t spend all of your time thinking about eating or drinking or worrying about life.”  We should not spend the next four weeks worrying about eating and drinking and presents – fun as they are – but about Jesus coming into the world.  Coming as a vulnerable baby that first Christmas,and coming again in power and glory to bring God’s Kingdom.

Our preparation should not be queueing at the tills and maxing our on the credit cards, but watching and praying, looking for Jesus; seeing where he is in our world today – and looking for his eternal coming.

God is keeping his promise to give us a King, not a fallible human ruler, but a righteous and just leader, and as Jeremiah reminds us – that is what will bring safety and justice and peace to the world.

So our prayer this Advent, our hope for Christmas and for ever – in the words of  Charles Wesley:

Come, Thou long expected Jesus
Born to set Thy people free;
From our fears and sins release us,
Let us find our rest in Thee.
Israel’s strength and consolation,
Hope of all the earth Thou art;
Dear desire of every nation,
Joy of every longing heart.

Born Thy people to deliver,
Born a child and yet a King,
Born to reign in us forever,
Now Thy gracious kingdom bring.
By Thine own eternal Spirit
Rule in all our hearts alone;
By Thine all sufficient merit,
Raise us to Thy glorious throne.

Are we ready?  Not for turkey, tinsel and trimmings, but for Jesus, King of the world, to be King of our hearts

Or maybe just one truth with two kinds: To bike in Los Angeles requires dealing with cars. There are two kinds:

1. The first are the ones who don’t see you. They might be the ones talking on a cell phone, yelling at their kids, tuning their radio, late leaving work and looking to roll a couple stop signs on the side streets because all the arterials are clogged. They might be the ones who nearly right hook you because they can’t be bothered to look over the shoulder. I get mad about these people, but I don’t stay mad. There’s no point, because I realize that it’s not really about me. These drivers are the ones who merge without looking on the freeway, who get stuck in the intersection going the wrong way at red lights. They’re the self-centered ones who treat the rest of the road like so many video game dots and numbers. Out there, but not really enough to worry about. They’re fat and happy in their steel cocoons, coddled in roll cages and crumple zones like so many eggs in cardboard cartons. When they cut me off, I know it’s not about me.
2. It’s the second group that piss me off. It’s the second group that sees me pushing it down Westholme, heading south through the last roundabout before swinging left at Santa Monica, riding to catch the green light. It’s the second group with the driver’s side window of their white sedan rolled down and the driver peering through his thin glasses up the road to where I’m bearing down and still thinking it’s a good idea to swing out into traffic because he doesn’t want to get stuck waiting for the cars that are trailing me. It’s the second group of drivers who see me brake, pull up, raise my hands to ask what the fuck, then gun their engine through the light because they know they’re in the wrong and think they can leave me in the dust. It’s these second kind of drivers who think that just because I’m a little fucking cyclist on a dark single-speed that that makes it OK. And do you know what? It’s those second group of drivers who sit in their car waiting to turn right onto Beverly Glen at the red light, one arm dangling a lit cigarette out the window as I pull up to the intersection, then see me roll up to the light beside them.

The moral of the story? Your shit catches up to you.

Ride safe.

Mon Voyage

(For Elvis, Edith Piaf, and All Whom Paris and New York Have Swallowed Whole)   

11-23-09                         by Mark Nielsen

Some days I feel about as important as a single telephone pole–

That one! There. See it?

Covered in kudzu vines,

Just one in a string of a thousand

across flat, hot, desolate Mississippi.

How important is it to fix a broken bicycle spoke?

Does a lynchpin ever know it is the lynchpin?

Who ever said that by doing something I love,

and doing it well,

The world would come running to hear it?

The world does not need me.

In fact, the world never knows what it needs.

Until it finds it.

At which point it immediately spoils it.

And the journey to glory

Est un voyage court à nulle part.

And as for talent:

Are you listening to these words,

Or just watching the way my hair falls across my forehead?

What profiteth it for a man

to talk real purty?

Or for a woman to belt out a sad song for her father?

Or for a child set adrift to paint a starry night?

The ruts in this road are deep, though.

It will take more strength than I have

On my own, in these arthritic hands,

To turn right up ahead when we see the road home.

(That is, if I’m not asleep at the wheel when it comes).

On the other hand,

at least I can’t turn around, either.

So take the wheel, St. Therese.

Where are we going?

Typical Monday.  After a fun weekend, it’s back to the old grind. The only bright spot is that I’m only working three days this week plus it’s thanksgiving this Thursday, my favorite holiday of the year.

As typical as Mondays gets, I look at the calendar and the date stares back at  me — November 23.

Fuck.   As much as I don’t want to remember, it hits me.  A year ago was the first time we met.  And with my mind warping at full speed, I got sucked into a vortex full of memories…. from the awkwardness of that first date, to the easy banter thereafter…. the thrill of the first kiss… the tender unguarded moments…. to the pain and heartbreak of goodbyes.

Stop it. Stop thinking about it. 

 But I can’t. It’s wave after wave after wave.

Places. Things. People. It just brings back too many memories.

Damn.  Just like that, the pain I felt was just as horrible as it was months ago.  I thought it got numbed by time. I was at the point where finally, FINALLY I was moving on.

Then this. Great.

I have to yank myself back to reality. I have to shut my mind because just the thought of it is too much to bear. 

Right now I am hating myself.

Snap out of it! You remember how you were, how low you felt after all was said and done? Do you really want to go back to all of that?

Honestly, for a moment, I almost succumbed. The only thing that’s keeping me from doing it is that I don’t want to give him the satisfaction that there are rare moments when I think of him. Of us.

It’s not one of the great loves that books and poets write about.  But given the right circumstances, I think it has the potential to be one.  You know how they always talk about having the right love at the wrong time? Even Barry Manilow sang one about it. But is there such a thing as having a wrong love at the right time?

Or better yet, the wrong love at the wrong time?

So yeah, I’m ready for this day to be over.

And as typical as Mondays get, I hate Mondays. Always have. Always will.

Tuesday’s another day.

xoxo

I know, I know.. what are we.. five?

Moving on.

I am a chronic crusher. There is always a boy I dream of marrying and sometimes laying in bed before I go to sleep, I whisper my first name with his last and see if it sounds good. This is always changing. Rarely is it the same person between seasons, perhaps even months. It’s never serious (though it might come across as crazy: obsessional: demented: addicted) and usually is just something to think about when I run out of thoughts. My friend Shane doesn’t believe you can think about nothing, but I really do.

So. This crush thing, I am used to. You know what else I am used to? I am used to logic. There have been times when I have met someone, connected with them, and then one day (when I ran out of thoughts!) started to logically work through if we could ever get married or not. This game is fun. I’m a logical person and I like things like this: “You make me laugh and you laugh at my jokes. You don’t like crappy music, you are semi-musical, you love God more than anything…. this could work,” (by the way, I just described AT LEAST three boys I know, without putting much thought into it).

That is how I one day hope to stumble upon the person I will marry. Logic. In fact, if there was an equation with real life variables and stuff, and then… 4(xy+7)+ 12(s-6) = tl4e!! (thats true love forever, ps) then I would be oh so happy. No messy emotions or games or insecurity or any of that crap. Just logic.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t always work that way. And despite how much I hate emotions……..

there is a person that logically, does not work for me. I’m not going into details because who cares, really. The equation doesn’t work. Maybe in the future? But right now, no. That, for me, is usually peace out time. Insert a great friendship that is lots of fun and without any sort of weirdness or awkwardness because the equation doesn’t work anyway.

No no. That is not what’s going on in my head/heart? Poor little heart of mine, I hope it is just my head.

Really it’s stupid. The whole situation. Not the person. The person is fantastic (obviously). But somehow my emotions sneaked in before the evaluation of the equation could take place. So now I am stuck FEELING things, which is awful.

Last year after my heart got smashed, Ernie told me that I never let my guard down. I argued (Bee once told me I am always being difficult, which is true) that I did – and do – let my guard down. He said that I THINK I have, but really I haven’t. So after a year of evaluating the situation, I’ve come to agree with Ernie.

Right before my heart got smashed, there was a lot of this..

Me: Hey.. so you said you were going to call later last night but you didn’t.. let’s do something this evening!
Heartsmasher (4 hours later)*: I just got your text. I have somewhere to be in an hour, but what did you have in mind?
Me: Oh! Nevermind, maybe we could get coffee tomorrow before church.
Heartsmasher: Maybe. I’m supposed to meet a friend for coffee, I haven’t seen her in awhile.
Me: Don’t even worry about it.. have coffee with your friend, maybe after church
AFTER CHURCH
Me: Would you like to go to a movie?
Heartsmasher: No. I am in a weird mood.
Me: That’s totally fine. I’ll see you when I’m back next weekend.

90% of anything coming from my end was a lie. By the second text message exchange, I was all sorts of messed up/freaked out/paranoid/scared/crazy. Instead of being vulnerable and honest and admitting when things bother me or hurt me, I try my best to portray what I think is what everyone wants in a friend: casual, laid-back, non-confrontational, and fine with last minute changes.

That’s not me. At all. If you are five minutes late, I have already spent five minutes thinking you hate me and decided not to hang out with me. If the plans dramatically change, I get freaked out and want to go home and cry. I’m easily hurt by people but will rarely acknowledge it. THAT is me. and telling you about it still isn’t letting my guard down, because if you were to send me a message telling me that I am a pile of crap and my glasses are ugly and my nose is in fact as big as I suspect it is.. you’d either never get a response, or you’d get a response that was borderline apologetic. But deep down inside I’d be raging.

That was a bit self-indulgent, but there was a reason. Here is the reason.

I don’t like feeling things if the equation doesn’t work. The equation is like my safety. It’s my “Til St Patrick’s Day,” if you will (John Mayer reference). This is in all facets of life, not even just [romantic] relationships. If the equation doesn’t work, I form no bonds. This is great when shopping. Some people fall in love with a pair of $60 jeans.. and I never love jeans unless they are $20 or less. The equation works, so my love is safe. When feelings get involved, I tend to slowly inch towards learning to be vulnerable and let my guard down. There is nothing in the world I would love more than to be able to be like “YOU SAID LAST WEEK THAT WE WOULD GO TO THE ZOO THIS WEEK AND IT’S SATURDAY AND TOMORROW IS THE FIRST DAY OF NEXT WEEK.” and trust that the person I am saying that too won’t go “Woah, psycho… peace!” and walk out of my life. But I feel like inching towards that without the equation in place is setting myself up for disaster.. because when things don’t end well, it’s almost like my walls double in thickness. One tiny step forward, two giant steps backwards.

Right now I am all kinds of messed up, and I think I need to publicly declare it. The equation doesn’t work; the many variables involved don’t equal TL4E.. or even TL4N (true love 4 now!).. but somehow that’s not deterred my feelings. It’s stupid and it’s so dangerous and I don’t like it. It’s beyond my ability to understand, because I believe in mind over matter.

The matter is overpowering my mind, though. and now it’s messy.

Side note. You probably don’t know the person, and unless we have talked otherwise.. the person is not you. He knows who he is. I thought of putting a flirty winky there, but weighed my options and decided NO.

*I hope to one day rename everybody who has tortured a little piece of my heart into borderline superhero villian names.

The Mirror, Vol. 13, No. 639

Apologies for the delays, which may continue for some days, as I am attending the UN Internet Governance Forum meetings in Sharm el Sheikh/Egypt with a busy schedule, in a different time zone, and then traveling back to Cambodia. I try to be on time as much as possible.

Norbert Klein

“According to a news source, at least three disabled veterans, poor citizens, were arrested between 14 to 16 November 2009, when they resisted armed forces and police of the Kompong Thom authorities, coming to enforce a notification to confiscate land, where the authorities claimed that those citizens live there illegally, in Banteay Rou Ngieng village, Kraya commune, Santuk district, Kompong Thom.

“The source of this information claimed that there is an association with more than 1,700 families of disabled veterans, living there since 2004, and that the association lives on more than 10,000 hectares of land, where each family was provided with 3 hectares by the head of that community, for housing and for growing different crops, since 2005. But on 14 and 16 November 2009, about 50 armed forces and other authorities came with machinery to remove their houses, and they arrested three people.

“The disabled veterans said that the authorities burnt their houses, shot at them, and even arrested some people and hit them with riffle handles, in order to evict them to seize the land for the Tan Bieng company [a Vietnamese company].

“Responding to the accusation that the authorities ordered armed forces to burn their houses, shoot at them, and arrest people, the Kompong Thom deputy police chief, who had gone himself to conduct the eviction, Mr. Nou Thany, told Deum Ampil on 18 November 2009, via phone, ‘The accusation is not true. And if there is anything true in it, the authorities used only their right to self protection, because those disabled people used knives, sticks, and gasoline bottles to burn the machinery of the authorities and to chase them away and to hurt them with knives.’ He added that the action was taken following a notification to confiscate the land for the Tan Bieng company, which had received the right from the Royal Government to make some investment on that land. For evictions, the municipality has a policy to offer each of them a plot of land in the nearby Thma Samlieng area, but only somewhat more than 100 of them agreed to register to take this offer of land at the new location. The rest protested, rejecting this policy and they used force against the authorities who went to enforce the eviction order.

“Mr. Nou Thany emphasized that the disabled veterans association does have the right to create an association at that area, but not the right to control the land. Therefore, there was a notification, ordering them to leave. Before they would have to leave, the municipality had set the deadline of 25 November 2009 for them to accept new land; however, they turned to resist strongly on 14 to 17 November 2009.” Deum Ampil, Vol.3, #340, 19.11.2009

Newspapers Appearing on the Newsstand:
Thursday, 19 November 2009

Deum Ampil, Vol.3, #340, 19.11.2009

• Three Were Arrested for Preventing the Implementation of a Notification to Confiscate Land in Kompong Thom
• Most Malaria Medicines Are Fake and No-Quality Medicines [according to expert officials of the Ministry of Health]
• Tragedy as a Boat Sunk [because of strong wind] Resulting in the Deaths of a Man and of Three Children while His Wife Survived [Kandal]
• Two Young Men Died Immediately after They Were Hit [while riding on a motorbike] Behind a Bus of the Capital Company [Battambang]

Kampuchea Thmey, Vol.8, #2102, 19.11.2009

• [About 300] Staff and Workers of the Royal Railways of Cambodia Stopped Protesting after the Ministry [of Public Works and Transport] Promised to Pay Their Salaries on 27 November 2009
• More Than 600 Square Kilometer of Cambodia Are Still Mine Infested [according to the Cambodian Mine Authority]

Khmer Machas Srok, Vol.3, #533, 19.11.2009

• Mr. Sam Rainsy and Ms. Tioulong Saumura Attended the European Community Parliament Meeting about Cambodia Yesterday [in Brussels]

Koh Santepheap, Vol.42, #6809, 19.11.2009

• The Red Shirt Demonstrators Announced to Conduct a Large Demonstration on Sunday [29 November 2009] to Dismiss [Prime Minister] Abhisit Vijjajiva’s Government
• Special UN Envoy [in charge of AIDS in the Asia Pacific, Dr. Nafis Sadik] Met with a Group of Most Vulnerable People in the City [drug addicts, people infected with AIDS, and orphans - Phnom Penh]

Phnom Penh Post [Khmer Edition], Vol.1, #49, 19.11.2009

• Court Started to Question a Thai Man about Spying [he had copied flight documents of Prime Minister Hun Sen and of Thai ousted fugitive prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra to send the copies to Thailand]
• Cambodia Is Still the Country with the Most Corruption among the Countries in the Region [of Asia Pacific; according to a report of Transparency International, Cambodia stands at the 158th position among 180 countries affected by corruption in the public sector, while in 2008, Cambodia was at the 166th position]
• Construction Investments Increased by 22% within 9 Months Compared to the Corresponding Period [last year; by the end of September 2009, there were 1805 projects amounting to US$1.165 Billion, while in 2008 there were only 1558 projects]

Rasmei Kampuchea, Vol.17, #5051, 19.11.2009

• A Robber Shot a Policeman to Death and Then after Half-an-Hour Siege the Robber Was Shot Dead by Police [if he had agreed to let police arrest him and not shoot one policeman to death, he would not have be killed - Chamkarmon, Phnom Penh]
• A Japanese Man [a staff member of the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA)] Fell from the Second Storey of a Building of the Ministry of Public Works and Transport and Died [police has not identified why he fell down - Phnom Penh]
• The Minister of Tourism Asked UNESCO to Help Create a Master Plan for Eco-Tourism around the Tonle Sap Lake

Have a look at the last editorial – you can access it directly from the main page of the Mirror.
And please recommend us also to your colleagues and friends.

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Cyber criminals have found on another job, they could not on two big "friends". Human nature to trust with its properties, credulity, and negligence and curiosity is certainly the most powerful levers in the arsenal of every hacker. Even in a world of perfect technology to use crackers to show the human weaknesses, otherwise secure doors. The technology is not perfect and technical "mistakes" in the software, computer and telecommunications systems offer many opportunitiesbe exploited. These technical flaws are, what we call "weaknesses".

Weaknesses in the entire World Wide Web are used all the time, gain control of computers and entire networks, and access to confidential data. The vulnerabilities are found everywhere, but especially in their Internet browsers and plug-ins, the web server and application software, and even in the core units of the underlying network infrastructure of the Web.

Unfortunately, the list ofInternet threats do not end there. Significant deficiencies are found and used in many other areas, such as Office programs (like the ubiquitous Microsoft Word, Excel and Outlook), all operating systems, mobile devices, platforms and applications, network equipment, to name a few.

All of these technical deficiencies are doors that can be used to find a hidden way around your security software, and "drop" is a small program that will "hook" your computer at a particular botnet. Onceconnected, your computer will not show a problem, and even silently to your existing antivirus and firewall software, sometimes for a long time. Actually, that is the main objective of a high-profile hacker: a perfect piece of software that is able to make himself invisible land and plant deep into a computer system, but ready to be activated as required.

Fortunately, more and more desktop software vendors are now disclosing, as they are discovered vulnerabilities at the same timeWhen releasing the so-called security "patches", ie a software rewritten to an "update" that are the problem. Viewed from the perspective of the user to stay up-to-date on patches has become indispensable. And so have the tools to make a thorough "Vulnerability Assessment".

You can not fix a problem if you do not know, you have one! But equally important is to have a sure fire "solution" to resolve it quickly and easily. Some of the best anti-virus and Internet security suites integrate "Vulnerability Scanner"a list of operating system and installed applications, has been released for a "patch" shows.

If it sounds like a race between you and tries to doors, and the criminals who try to get through it, it is because that is precisely what it is! You could try to find tired and install updates one by one fall behind and in accordance to your desktop or laptop computer up to date. The longer was the vulnerabilities that are likely to be higher on some maliciousSoftware links to malicious Web sites, the easier the way in. And do not assume that you must lead an exotic program to run into problems. Only just a simple video could be met by one of the most popular players such as Flash, QuickTime or Windows Media Player, the door to use the code open on your computer to one of the many botnets in the Internet underworld hook.

In the selection of anti-virus and firewall software, vulnerability assessment placed on top of your must-haveList. Together with an efficient and easy to manage desktop firewall software, it will break your day to day maintenance a breeze, and your computer a much tougher nut to!

Australian Earth Sciences Convention 2010,
Earth Systems: change, sustainability, vulnerability
4–8 July 2010, Canberra, ACT

    The Geological Society of Australia in conjunction with the Geological Society of America is calling on individuals, schools and community groups across Australia to visit their local graveyards—and measure the weathering rates of old marble headstones—as part of an international project to track shifts in world pollution levels climate change.

Read the press release
Visit EarthTrek: http://www.goearthtrek.com/
and the Gravestone Project: http://www.goearthtrek.com/Gravestones/Gravestones.html

    Australians urged to size up local graveyards in global project to track pollution and climate change

    Walking around an old graveyard may seem more like the stuff of horror movies…but it could actually help save the planet.
    That’s the message from the Geological Society of Australia, which is calling on individuals, schools and community groups across Australia to visit their local graveyards—and measure the weathering rates of old marble headstones—as part of an international project to track shifts in world pollution levels and climate change.

    The global Gravestone Project—which gets underway this month and will continue until late 2011—is the first scientific research project being undertaken across the world as part of the international EarthTrek citizen science program. The Australian arm of the project is being launched today (Monday). Other projects being discussed with scientists for inclusion in EarthTrek in some countries include earthquake monitoring and measuring the size of hailstones.

    The Geological Society of Australia, CSIRO Education and Earth Scientists from the University of Sydney are key Australian partners in EarthTrek, which is being led globally by the Geological Society of America. There is no cost for the public to participate in EarthTrek and participants receive rewards based on the number and scope of projects in which they are involved. Participants are guided in their work by local scientists.

    In the Gravestone Project, participants will visit their local graveyard (importantly, only after obtaining any required permissions to do so), determine its location using a GPS and add this location to a global graveyard map on the EarthTrek website (http://GOEARTHTREK.COM). They will also note on the map whether the graveyard has (or does not have) white marble headstones.

    Participants can then go a further step and select five white marble headstones that vary in age (including the oldest and youngest in the graveyard) and vary in the direction they face, record the dates of death shown on these headstones, and (while ensuring full respect and care is shown around the graves) measure the weathering rate of the headstones using micrometer callipers. Participants will log this and various other data about the gravestones on the EarthTrek website.

    Rain contains more than just water—it also contains dust particles and acid from air pollution and chemicals.
    Given the acid in rain chemically erodes marble gravestones (and the more acid the rain contains, the more it erodes the marble) the rate of weathering of marble gravestones can indicate changes in pollution or climate between locations and over time. In this way, the Gravestone Project can help assess whether some regions of the globe are experiencing higher pollution and more rapid climate change than others.
    Two methods can be used to measure the weathering rate of marble gravestones. The Lead Lettering Method measures the erosion of a marble gravestone in comparison with the lead lettering used on it (as the lettering is not eroded by the acid in rain but the marble is). When marble gravestones are created, they are polished smooth so the lead letters and marble surface are flush. By measuring the distance that the lead lettering sits out from the eroded marble on weathered gravestones, and relating this to the date of death on the gravestone, scientists can determine by how much the gravestone has eroded over time.

    While not as accurate as the Lead Lettering Method, the Thickness Method can be used for marble
gravestones that do not contain lead lettering. It assumes that when the headstone was made it was a
constant thickness from top to bottom—so by measuring any subsequent differences in the thickness of the headstone between its top and bottom, and relating this to the date of death on the headstone, scientists can determine the rate of weathering of the headstone caused by acidic rain over time.
President of the Geological Society of Australia, Professor Peter Cawood, said: “The terrific thing about EarthTrek is that it will engage the wider community in a whole range of exciting scientific research while also providing enormous people-power to greatly assist the scientists undertaking the research. EarthTrek projects across the globe will be focusing on critical research into key environmental issues such as climate change, pollution, the spread of noxious weeds and tracking endangered animals, just to name a few. By actively engaging the wider community in their work, scientists involved in EarthTrek can substantially increase the amount of data they collect for their research, dramatically raise the profile of their research in the broader community, and provide younger people with a first-hand opportunity to experience the wide range of fascinating work that a career as an Earth Scientist offers.”
   

   Director Education & Outreach with the Geological Society of America, Gary Lewis, said: “EarthTrek
has already received a very positive community response around the globe with participants signing up from the USA, Canada, Germany, Malaysia, Spain and Australia. It is terrific that so many people want to get involved in the project and help scientists with some fascinating research while also spending time outdoors using current technology and having fun. We have also had a great response to EarthTrek from scientists across the world, who can see the real benefits to their research that will stem from this project. We continue to encourage the support and partnership of even more scientific agencies and professional societies across the broad spectrum of science in making this program a powerful experience for both the scientists and the wider community.”
  

  Associate Professor Deirdre Dragovich from the School of Geosciences, University of Sydney, said: “It
is amazing to consider that, because marble headstones are freshly cut when they are placed in a cemetery, the weathering ‘clock’ is effectively set to zero. Gravestones are also very accurate indicators of pollution levels—in places where pollution has increased the weathering rates of marble headstones have increased too (and, conversely, weathering rates have decreased in places where pollution has decreased). The Gravestone Project provides a unique opportunity to gather important information about this weathering from different countries, climates and pollution environments—and it is also a great way for the wider community to contribute to cutting-edge research on pollution and climate change.”

    Manager of CSIRO Education, Ross Kingsland, said: “EarthTrek is already proving to be great fun for the wider community while also providing an extremely useful framework for undertaking projects that directly support real scientific research. CSIRO Education has organised many Australian-based projects for family and school involvement and a number of future projects will be run in conjunction with EarthTrek.”

It doesn’t matter where you begin—the beautiful, the remote or the undiscovered.

A beginning is just as it’s name implies: a starting point. They aren’t built on the extraordinary–the extraordinary is just the sequence that happens to follow. Good beginnings are crafted through attention to detail and a certain humbling component that connects the reader and writer through a mutual investment in the story.

Effective intros engage. They tease the reader’s imagination and senses. They transport to the new. They provoke an emotional response, like empathy, pleasure or fear. They ignite. They confuse. They enlighten. But they do so in small, unassuming ways.

Now, how to put these value-added frameworks into practice is a whole different story.

Well to start with, they’re all action verbs. Humans have a tendency to conceive of beginnings and endings as static points in time: you begin in your car and end at the grocery store; you begin at airport security and end in a beach chair; and you begin on page one and end on page 205.

But life doesn’t work this way. You don’t start in your car–you start in your bed, asleep with the lights dimmed. The sunlight creeps in through the blinds, and your alarm sounds—long steady bumps of radio wavelengths on KISS 108. The movements continue, into the bathroom—back and forth, you brush. In the shower, you scrub in circular motions—a more discreet pattern to discern. Lather. Rinse. Repeat. Breathe.

And you change—not just physically, but internally, your body fixating on monotonous routine and the fact that you haven’t yet made a shopping list, and this, will leave your upcoming grocery trip in quite a challenging position. You wouldn’t want to let down your refrigerator, so you reach for the magnetic note pad on your night stand and begin to scribble: eggs, milk, garlic, zucchini, parmesan, mushroom, ground turkey.

Meanwhile, you have managed to put on your under garments but are nowhere near suitably dressed for an outing. The radio is still blaring from the 7:20am alarm setting, and a song comes on. You turn it up. Suddenly, you are dancing in your underwear, waving your shopping list in the air and forgetting all about the omelete you planned to fry up with those eggs. But you are at peace, dancing without pants. Vulnerable, but at peace. You’re ready to head to the store, turn on the oven, pack your suitcase, and board your train.

Beginnings move, too–like a whirlpool of frantic action.

And in this continuity of motion, the story becomes both relevant and irrelevant. The reader is left in suspense and wanting to move forward. But the first few paragraphs also move forward themselves—so much that not only is where you begin extraneous, but it also doesn’t matter where you go. A good beginning makes the reader invested in the story, despite his or her unknowingness about the course it will take.

Intros plant the seed of engagement, and are absolutely key! And so, here is how to go about writing an effective one:

1.) Put yourself in the moment. Use every sensual detail you can pull from your virtual experience. Take the reader somewhere other than a library.

2.) Show your vulnerability. If your reader percieves you as a know-it-all, they will resent you. State the obvious: this is what I’ve seen, not what I know for sure. They will appreciate your honesty.

3.) A Professor once told me to begin with an assumption. Something the reader knows to be untrue: “All men from Kentucky hate oatmeal”; “Downtown, everyone runs red lights”; or “The only thing that grows on farms is anxiety.” Keep it simple, but give the reader a reason to argue. Make them wonder the story behind this possibly offensive or false statement. Make them ask the inevitable “why?”

4.) Furthermore, do something unexpected. If you are describing an ocean, end the paragraph in the desert. Leave your reader guessing and perplexed.

There’s certainly no wrong place to begin.  As a mentor once told me, Don’t get it right, get it written. Often times when asked what to do, we can frame our answers with the ”what not to dos.” Here, it’d be a big mistake to do the same. It’s your memory, after all; only you can choose where and how to craft it onto the page. The only “not” I can offer is this: don’t feel compelled to not break the suggestions listed above. In retrospect, they themselves are only a launch pad–an intro of sorts–on how to write effectively.

She nods to the god in her bed,
And then looks back at his son,
Hermes, borne of another.
“I love him,” she says quietly,
Clouds swirling in her soft eyes.
The messenger of the gods nods,
Takes her hand in his and kisses it.
His voice is midnight-soft; “I know.”

So, I did watch Hannibal tonight. I am very fond of the film, but it certainly isn’t as well made as Silence of the Lambs. The story is subtler, slower, more classy and while the acting and set design, etc. are all fantastic, the problem was that they included all of these flashy filmic techniques: badly done, unnecessary slow mo, etc. The film doesn’t need it, you don’t need to keep us interested with these little tricks; the acting, story and script are all enough to keep us thoroughly enthralled. Less is more in this case. Not always, but for this movie it certainly is, there is so much quiet menace that Silence of the Lambs tapped into. This one still had that, but it shouldn’t have nearly as much action style filming.

Still, amazing film in most ways. Tomorrow night is apparently going to be a movie night with friends, so unless I watch Red Dragon then, it will actually have to wait until almost sunday since I have, shock horror, a social life for the rest of the week. As for the movie night, I hope we actually watch something good; we quite often choose something entertaining over something good, which is fair enough, I suppose. We’ll see.

So, on to the quote of the day: “The man who has no imagination has no wings.”

Now, on the subject of quotes, should I start saying who said each of them? I’ve been tending to leave them without context as I believe the best quotes don’t need context. Some great quotes do, but anyway. So, again I’m speaking as if people read this, but give me some feedback on this and reasons why, etc. Part of me wants to respect the person who said the words, part of me wants people to look at the words, not the mouth.

On the subject of imagination, vaguely, I had a brief discussion with a friend of mine, whose blog can be found here: http://cerasi.wordpress.com/

We were talking about war. She stated in her blog that we should celebrate the soldiers, not the war, which I mostly agree with, but I replied, “depends on the soldier, depends on the war” then she asked for an example of a war to celebrate, which isn’t something that I could do, either because of my weak knowledge of history or because it is impossible. Regardless, it moved me onto the idea of fiction vs reality, something I’m quite fond of as an escapist, a faker and a hider. I maintain that war is a beautiful thing when viewing it as a story, as art. All the brutality and horror in the world can be beautiful in this context. If it makes me weep, shake and retch then it is valuable to me. To feel is the best thing I can do.

I am a strong believer in catharsis through art, through the viewing of some kind of trauma, though not necessarily at all. Example: a film you might know about, Irreversible. Now, I don’t suggest you watch this film, unless you 1) know that you can handle some fairly strong stuff, 2) can appreciate what a film is trying to do when it makes you hurt and 3) are willing to submit yourself to something horrible and really wallow in the emotion, you should be prepared to feel horrible for the rest of the day, to just sit and think that you can never feel good again. A lot of people won’t like that, for obvious reasons, but I really appreciate it, possibly because I’m emotionally masochistic and enjoy being unhappy, but mostly because if someone can choose an emotion, try to get the audience to feel it and succeed, then that is amazing. Making an audience happy is easy, making an audience amused is easy. Making an audience upset is harder, but still not the hardest thing in the world. Making an audience frightened, fairly easy. Making an audience angry is hard, and there’s only one movie I can think of that isn’t a documentary that has done it: The Assassination of Richard Nixon. Very good movie, I recommend it. Anyway…

What Irreversible does is it aims to make the audience physically uncomfortable, the film is designed perfectly to induce nausea, to upset, to frighten, to anger, to disturb. Now, it doesn’t do these things cheaply, it doesn’t just throw in a surprise horror scene to frighten, the panic and distress builds up over time, from the very first scene.

I’m rambling and probably ruining the movie, so I’ll stop, but the point that I’m trying to make is that it is important to know that you can feel, it is important to put yourself out there, to be vulnerable for a film or any kind of art. If something distresses you, then go with it, let the emotion grow and billow because that is what is supposed to happen, you are supposed to react, to feel. So, war as fiction can be celebrated; it may be horrible, it may be wrong, but I am drawn to it, the possibilities darkness and violence open up to me. War as reality, I don’t think can be celebrated. I’ll have to think more on the idea.

Anyway, moving on from all that serious stuff.

I approve of seeing photos of my friends as kids. 21st invitations are amusing, I highly recommend putting pictures of yourself as a kid on yours when you have one, if you haven’t already.

I had something to say but now I’ve forgotten. Maybe a good sign to say goodnight to the blog.

Goodnight,

Your winged cannibal,

TDE

Hello all, after a while of not updating my blog, and switching blogs, I decided to finally make a new post after all.

This post will be a review on the video tutorial series “Buffer overflow primer” by Vivek Ramachandran.

Vivek Ramachandran is a security evangelist and has been working in computer security related fields for the past 7 years. In 2007, Vivek spoke at world renowned conferences Defcon (WEP Cloaking Exposed) and Toorcon (The Caffe Latte Attack). The discovery of the Caffe Latte Attack was covered by CBS5 news, BBC online, Network World etc news agencies.In 2006, Vivek was announced as one of winners of the Microsoft Security Shootout contest held in India among 65,000 participants. He has also been a recipient of a Team Achievement at Cisco Systems for his work on 802.1x and Port Security modules on the Catalyst 6500 switches. Currently he spends all of his time maintaining Security- Freak.Net , SecurityTube.Net and is the co-founder of Axonize. Vivek, is a Bachelor in Electronics and Communications Engineering from the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati.You can contact him at vivek[at]securitytube.net

So, to start off the review with a short description:

The Buffer Overflow Primer Series are a series of 9 video tutorials about buffer overflow. The author will take you through various slideshows and practical examples, including the code and a fully detailed explanation about what each function does.

Some things included in these tutorials are:

• analyzing the stack
• exploiting the stack
• converting complex c code to a simple assembly code
• creating shellcode from this assembly code
• using this shellcode to exploit a program

In other words, in just these 9 video tutorials, you will learn a lot. Even if you have no idea what buffer overflow is, the author explains everything step by step in the greatest detail I have ever seen.

The links to the different parts:

Part 1 (Smashing the stack)
Part 2 (Writing exit shellcode)
Part 3 (Executing shellcode)
Part 4 (Disassembling execve)
Part 5 (shellcode for execve)
Part 6 (exploiting a program)
Part 7 (exploiting a program: demonstration)
Part 8 (return to libc theory)
Part 9 (return to libc theory: demonstration)

I hope this has been helpful guys, don’t forget to follow me on twitter: http://twitter.com/raykoid666

-Raykoid666

For most of my life, I have kept to my self. As a kid, I would climb trees, talk to animals, play in the creek, walk through the woods, whatever I had to do to make it. To survive. I didn’t realize that’s what I was doing at the time, but now I get it.

Middle school was really, really rough for me. I did such a good job of forcing myself to forget, that now all I could tell you is where I went to school. I vaguely remember what the front of the building looked like. I have no desire to go back and never will. It is the only school I have ever gone where I have no desire to return. To remember anything about it.

After middle school, I became slightly more social and developed a few good friends, but I still kept to myself a whole lot. This is about the time I discovered the band Of Montreal and then, the Elephant 6 Recording Company, which was just a bunch of friends making music. Elephant 6 quickly became my best friends and felt more like family more than my bio-family ever did. I couldn’t get enough and I horded as much of it that I could, all through high school.

Elephant 6 is all but dead at this point, but I often think back to those times and I really, really don’t think I would be here, today, without all of that wonderful music. What a fucking weird thing to think about.

Anyway, about a year ago, my computer, amung other things, were stolen from me. Ever since then, I haven’t listened to much music at all. I didn’t miss it at the time, but now I am going through the long process of re-importing all that music to my new computer and it is kind of overwhelming. I just want to curl up and cry and giggle, at the same time and never leave my house again. I have a lot of really amazing stuff and I can’t wait to re-discover it all again.

I have missed you, a whole lot.

I think what Elephant 6 meant for us is very simple: there’s something pure and infinite in you, that wants to come out of you, and can come out of no other person on the planet. That’s what you’ve got to share, and that’s as real and important as the fact that you’re alive. We were able, at a really young age, to somehow protect each other so we could feel that. The world at large, careerism, money, magazines, your parents, the people at the rock club in your town, other kids, nothing is going to give you that message, necessarily. In fact, most things are going to lead you away from it, sadly, because humanity is really confused at the moment. But you wouldn’t exist if the universe didn’t need you. And any time I encounter something beautiful that came out of a human somewhere, that’s them, that’s their own soul. That’s just pure, whatever its physicality is, if the person can play piano, if they can’t play piano, if they’re tone deaf, whatever it is, if it’s pure, it hits you like a sledgehammer. It fills up your own soul, it makes you want to cry, it makes you glad you’re alive, it lets you come out of you. And that’s what we need: we desperately need you.

-Julian Koster

The girl in the low cut frock, great tits, party girl, doing drugs in the toilets to get by. 
“Look at me Look at me!” she cries, hoping that no one will notice how empty she is on the inside.
Desperately lonely; desperate for approval, validation.
Just maybe if I am lucky enough and someone gets close enough, they won’t hate what they see.
They can take the blackness away.

Thank you cancer, for I can no longer be that girl.

My body has gotten tired of my mind and taken over the game.
No longer do I have the exterior to get noticed.
No longer can I enter a room confident of attention.
No longer can I wait for someone else to rescue me.
Maybe now that the fakeness is on the outside, I will have the courage to confront and accept the real me, without fear or loathing.
But what will I do if there is nothing of any substance or value?
Maybe it’s all fake?
I am an illusion through and through.
A mindless vassal, made up only of the reflection of others.

Nowhere to hide in therapy…
Dare I let my emotions take over from my intellect?
Relinquish my control on the game?
The stakes are high can she do it?
Be vulnerable; put herself out there, for even more rejection.
Finding my strength, in acknowledging my vulnerability.
Somehow, I will find the courage not to care about the rejection, my soul no longer diminished by each encounter.
Chip
Chip
Chip

Afraid of failure,even more afraid of success.
‘Cause god knows what I would do if somebody actually did love me.
That would be a challenge to accept.
Much more comfortable to yearn for the unobtainable, keeping myself distant from those around me.
Protecting myself the only way I know how.
Showing only the strong, cool, confident, me.
Can’t let anyone smell my fear.
But again my body has rebelled, fighting against my mind, allowing the tears to flow, when I least expect it.

Insight is easy, but change is hard, so much harder.
I have hope and sometimes on a good day, when I am not too busy beating myself up,
I can believe that salvation lies in the struggle, not the destination.
What matters is not forging ahead on the path in front of everyone else, but….
taking the time to hold the hands of those who walk beside me, those that are just like me, but not like me. 

Moment by moment embracing life.

Enrichment lesson No 13: It is our choice as to whether we travel our path alone.

There aren’t many places love can find me–home, the library, the store, and on my bike between those places–and I’m still cynical enough to think it won’t visit me in any of those places.  Could it have come and gone in the past year, unable to distract me from my pursuit of Julie?  I’m still cynical enough, too, to believe that that was the case.  Is that the way it really happens?  Is love all but bombarding us, looking for an opening in the emotional breastplate we each wear?  Somedays I leave the breastplate at home, hoping to be more vulnerable to at least the shrapnel of love, but I must be either invisible or naked without it, or my open hopefulness is a gaping wound of desperation, because the resultant inattention or outright repulsion seems entirely disproportionate to my presence.  It’s fashion statement I just can’t pull off.  Other days, I know that trying is the last thing I need to do.  Those are the days that women say “hi” to me, smile at me  and play with their hair.  Usually, though, my day is a clumsy halfway between the two, wherin trying is a running start into not-trying– not quite getting up to speed before flipping on the cruise control.  But I never know which day it’s going to be.  On which day will love find me?

You can see that I almost have faith.  I’m coming to understand faith as a force for freedom.  If I can depend on something else to attain for me my needs then I can apply the energy I used to expend in that direction toward letting me be myself.  That’s the most attractive I can, the most vulnerable to love’s bombardment, wherever I am.

Microsoft late on Friday confirmed that an unpatched vulnerability exists in Windows 7, but downplayed the problem, saying most users would be protected from attack by blocking two ports at the firewall.

In a security advisory , Microsoft acknowledged that a bug in SMB (Server Message Block), a Microsoft-made network file- and print-sharing protocol, could be used by attackers to cripple Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 machines.

The zero-day vulnerability was first reported by Canadian researcher Laurent Gaffie last Wednesday, when he revealed the bug and posted proof-of-concept attack code to the Full Disclosure security mailing list and his blog. According to Gaffie, exploiting the flaw crashes Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2 systems so thoroughly that the only recourse is to manually power off the computers.

At the time, Microsoft only said it was investigating Gaffie’s reports.

Then on Friday, it took the next step and issued the advisory. “Microsoft is aware of public, detailed exploit code that would cause a system to stop functioning or become unreliable,” Dave Forstrom, a spokesman for Microsoft security group, said in an e-mail. “The company is not aware of attacks to exploit the reported vulnerability at this time.”

Source: Infoworld.com

I led a retreat this past week end at the Hazelden Renewal Center in MN.  The topic was Cultivating Hope In All Our Affairs.  Twenty-eight of us gathered and gently moved forward in our thinking, our personal explorations, our willingness to be intimately vulnerable and open to the vulnerabilities of others.  It was miraculous, really.  I have discovered that these kinds of week ends are always miraculous, in fact, because perceptions become changed.  You can see it happening.  You can feel the shift occurring.  And you can see the body language relaxing, as participants settle into their willingness to help others heal as they, in turn, heal too.  Every gathering can serve as a blessing.  Every gathering.  Even those we dread.  Perhaps those are the ones that bless us the most, in fact.  Perhaps we may not see it at first.  We may deny it.  But we are always being “called to” the gathering we find ourselves in.  Trusting that there is a reason for our presence lessens our resistance.  Deciding to believe that “this we experience now has been selected on our behalf,” offers us comfort and relief.  We will never be lead to a place where the God of our understanding hasn’t also come.  Look around at your next gathering and be grateful for “the invitation.”

“Sometimes we put up walls not to keep people out, but to see who cares enough to knock them down.”

I am stuck in a world where people dare not to see what lies behind the brick walls. Well, maybe a few have tried to look. Some have tried to peak. And there are those who don’t seem to bother at all. But they all have one thing in common: they just don’t care enough.

I believe that everyone builds his own wall. Well, at least I do. I think I’ve been building my wall for two main reasons: fear and protection. Why? From whom? From what? I’m not even sure. All I know is that I don’t want to get hurt more than I am now. But thinking more about it, I think that was exactly what I got. To build walls instead of bridges was probably one of the worst decisions I had in life.

Now, I’m trying so hard to break it—little by little, or should I say, one brick at a time. But I fail every time I try. Maybe I’ve already built it too high and sturdy. And then, a thought came into my mind. Maybe someone would knock down this wall for me. Someone who would care enough. Someone who would teach me to be vulnerable. Someone who would show me what it’s like to live in a world free from these brick walls.