More Random Thoughts
I love my plants. I spend an awful lot of time watering them, talking to them and encouraging them to grow and not leak on the hardwood floor. But they still rebel. Those insubordinate little shits (well, one big shit).

Someone recently told me of these crazy stories about a guy who hooked up a lie detector machine to plants and discovered that they have incredibly human-like qualities. That they have apparant sensory control, they can feel and react to individuals and to situations. A sort of inherent, intelligent sensory perception.

I checked it out. There seems to be a lot of information out there about this guy, named Cleve Backster, who actually conducted these tests with some amazing results. Here are a few links, read up and make the call:

Pure Insight Website - very, very strange spiritual, cultist kind of site

The Skeptics Dictionary

Some Strange CedarCrest Site
- posted by Mark @ 7:20 PM

 
Laziness
Laziness can be beautiful. It is inherently addictive and unforgiving. But I suck at it.

everything I try to be lazy, I end up feeling incredibly guilty. Especially if it's a beautiful day out. And I start doing something. Something productive, something needed, something really silly just to convince myself that I am indeed not being lazy. Hmmm. . .some strange psychology there.

I do have some incredibly lazy friends. And man am I jealous of them. I hear all the stories of just enjoying life, smelling the flowers, hanging out on the couch and having no worries in the world. I am fluorescent green with envy. But I will still fault them for it. Like, "oh man. . .must be nice. I had to mow the lawn, do homework, work on the car, rehearse with the band, blah, blah, blah. . . ." Like I have no choice. They just snicker because they know I have a choice and I just can't help myself. I am compelled, obsessed. I like to call it my "OCD." You down with OCD? / Yeah you know me!

It's the Obsessive Compulsive thing and I think it runs in the family. Thanks, Dad. Now let me get back to the couch. . . after I finish one more thing!
- posted by Mark @ 7:13 PM

 
Psychology of War
It's not a huge surprise to me that the incidence of Iraqi abuse at Abu Gharib has suddenly come to light. It's still shocking, and a bit strange (who would really want to stack prisoners naked, then sit on top of them and take a picture?), but not a shocker.

This is the psychology of war.

It breaks people down to the barest primal being. It brings out the evil and anger in people. If you read about the conditions at the prison, the constant threat of being attacked, the constant threat of prisoner revolt, the stories of how the prisoners were murderers and sadistic rapists, you can start to see where the guards are going to view them as sub-human and then act out on abusive thoughts. You have to view your enemy as sub-human in order to rule over them, to control them, to kill them.

And most of the guards there are merely kids. Not aware cognitively enough to handle the environment and the situation. So they humiliate their captives.

I'm not justifying what they have done. I can just see where it stems from.

And now it feeds the Arab world with the notion that one tortuous dictator has been replaced with another. Not good.
- posted by Mark @ 4:55 PM

 
Small World
So I get this crazy e-mail the other day - from someone who obviously knows me, someone from my past, but I can't quite figure out who it is. And I get a little freaked out. "Who is this?" "How did they know about that?"

So I respond back, and it turns out it's Mr. Dennis Bodine. Db! Blast from the past. We used to jam in San Francisco. In a kick-ass band that he led called "Hitch." Wow. I was blown away. That was back in 1995-1996. How cool it was to hear from him. I had such a good time jamming with that bad. It was pretty hardcore. Unlike anything I'd heard before and mucho fun to play. It was extremely challenging to my drum skills and I busted out the huge kit to rock with these guys. It was hella fun.

And that's the beauty of the Web. I'd always wondered what happened to those guys. I split and didn't keep in touch. But this has opened up a door. Was good to get caught up. Hitch continued for a while and did some recording, but then disbanded. You can hear what they did right here. It's not me on the recording. . .wish it was.

But, we had one song that made rotation on one of the local stations, and I'll never forget driving down the road one day in like, Palo Alto or somewhere, and hearing the song. I had to pull over. It was raining and I just sat and soaked it in. Very cool.
- posted by Mark @ 3:03 PM

 
Marriage May-Day a Religious Mind Control
I don't get the whole push for the man/woman only marriage ammendment. I just don't get it. I mean, who cares? What harm are same-sex couples causing the hetero-marriage zealots? What's the damage being done?

The Marriage May-Day cult festival at Safeco Field on Saturday just smacks of mind control by the Religious Right. Did you see the front page photo on yesterday's Times? Ms. Horton and her bullhorn that she calls "O Magnify the Lord." Frightening. So, what she's really saying is that she's the lord because it's magnifying her shrill and ignorant voice.

I don't want to get belligerent. I consider myself to be a spiritual person, but I also like to think for myself. I don't want an organized group of people who believe that a document written hundreds and hundreds of years ago should be strictly adhered to in our modern society to tell me how to live. Tell me what's right and what's wrong. A lot has changed since the days of Jesus. We need to adapt and evolve. If we don't, we remain ignorant, lifeless slaves who follow a script that hasn't changed since before the dark ages.

I believe in some of the fundamentals of religion - forgiveness, love, understanding, sharing, equality. Shouldn't these elements let us celebrate all people? Be more flexible and tolerant? Accept people even though they may not have the same beliefs as us?

That's my goal.
- posted by Mark @ 1:06 PM

 
Birthday Blues
36. In two days.

Holy crap that scares me just a bit. Thinking about being that nearer to middle age is something a little unsettling. I'm sure these things are different from male to female. Men seem to measure successes by age; determining whether or not they are where they planned to be at that age, financially, socially, whatever. Women seem to be more worried about wrinkles and vericose veins. Not all, those are just the basic stereotypes.

But, I should be happy about a birthday. Gifts and attention and all that. Truth is, I can't seem to line up any type of party. And if I did, I'd probably crap out at around 11:00 pm. I just don't have the gusto for it anymore.

When I was in my twenties, I think I consumed more alcohol than is humanly allowed, slept only three hours a night, and was always in the midst of chaos. Attracted to the chaos. Now I want to avoid the chaos and be in bed by midnight (or working on my computer).

It's pretty sad, but I guess that's growing up.
- posted by Mark @ 9:59 AM