This was my first real presidential debate. I didn't know it would be so emotionally charged, so full of self-importance, so integral to my 'breaking out' and being more politically charged and educated about what the candidates are discussing. Yes, I'm also a little bit emotional about the whole thing, but call me the drama queen of the political debates and you'll get what's coming to you ;-)
For years, I avoided the entire spectrum of politics. I was young, thinking that nothing I did really mattered at the polls, that both sides are basically the same - evil, corrupt, full of self-importance and not really standing for anything necessary - like saving the world from itself. While the environment we live in fell apart before my eyes, it always seemed that the politicians were somewhere else, playing some other game while real tragedy and horror continued to smother all life on earth. Corporations, greed, and human ignorance were wiping out the beauty and natural wonder of the earth, while its leaders fiddle-fucked around, played politics, shook their cocky little heads and evaded all of their real responsibilities to the human race.
I thought I was an anarchist, and so I tattood myself with symbols of anarchism and played the whole punk scene like I was some sort of educated dropout. While it felt vindicating, because I was hormonally-driven and prone to fits of anger and resentment toward the world of adults (which wasn't entirely misplaced), in the end anarchism was a fruitless effort (if you could call it an effort) for me. While the idea is often tittilating and luscious, especially after a night of watching all 3 mad max movies back-to-back, ultimately it fails to be an ideal that can exist in this overestimated reality.
At one time, the Libertarians seemed to have a thing going for me (they sent enough snail mail, that's for sure). While I am a champion of more equal rights, less political power over the lives of its subjects and what they put into their bodies, and more environmental policies, it appears that the majority is suckered by the two-party system. And as much as I'd like to continue to support the libertarians (I voted libertarian in the 2000 election, and we got Bush), I have thus bought into the idea that Bush is the greater evil, and therefore Kerry needs all the help he can get.
It's an easy buy; it appears to be true, but I know in my 'heart of hearts' (as Bush likes to say) that this is not always a good reason to vote the other way. One honestly should vote what their heart and mind calls them to do, no matter the odds. If America's about anything at all, it's about taking risks, embracing personal visions and manifesting them in the world. I know that if I vote Democrat just to keep the Republicans out, I'm going suffer the slings and arrows of the democratic party and their not-so-much-better antics. So fucked if you do, fucked if you don't. It seems as much.
However, after tonight, something really nags at me and tugs. Kerry was on form, and he kept the president constantly on defense. This is a great sign for me; it shows that Kerry really has his shit together, that he is truly interested in knowing what's going on and at least presenting creative solutions. He has outsmarted his enemy without resorting to underhanded tactics (not too many, comparatively speaking). He knows his material and doesn't sound like a broken record discussing his ideas. He can talk without going into spasms. Kerry doesn't have nearly as many freudian slips as Bush does. And ultimately, the guy just looks better when he talks. While Bush did nothing but repeat himself and turn several shades of pink throughout the night, Kerry kicked back, was simply cool but not too easygoing. He was smart and sly, and he didn't take any shit from the master of spin who is our current president.
Republicans have always represented the most vile aspects of politics (in my opinion), and Democrats just never resonated with me, simply because rarely can I find a difference between the two parties. In addition, voting Democrat in Oklahoma seems rather pointless. If I really wanted a democratic vote to count, I'd move to a more politically-divided state. Or so it feels once the results of the electoral vote come through.
Oklahoma - where we always vote republican for the president. Oklahoma, where oil money runs deeper than the blood of the indians we've massacred here. Oklahoma, where the biggest act of domestic terrorism occurred, but everybody stays pretty laid back. Oklahoma, where one of the largest tornados in recorded history wiped out hundreds of homes and people not too many years ago. Oklahoma, where apparently nothing interesting ever happens and the people are so laid back - much like our Texas president - all knowing, all opining, all shouting the same old tired mantras that our president keeps chanting. Yup, aw shucks, it's good to be simple where things are so simple.
The simple answers are rarely the correct ones. It's easy to give a 'yes man' solution to everything, and as long as 'we' can get a lot of plainer folks to agree with us, the more credibility our presentation receives. That's the impression I get with Bush. And in just looking at his eyes, I get a creepy feeling that I can't trust him any more than I can trust the constant lies and innuendo that are being sloshed out by the bucketloads. The media is too kind to Bush. And too many people get a pitiful chuckle out of his language barrier, when we really shouldn't be pitying him at all. After all, he's made it this far!
I'm looking forward to the remaining debates, and I really hope Edwards corners Cheney and really digs into the Haliburton 'conflict of interest' issue. Meanwhile, I suppose I ought to be content with the headlines for the next few days. I'm sure they will tell a much different story than the one witnessed tonight on C-Span. After all, they rewrite history at the flick of the wrist, anyhow.
Well, getting sleepy. Been a lonnnngggggg day!
posted by novachild @ Thursday, September 30, 2004,
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The World Has Gone Mad
I'm sitting behind my nice, sufficient frankenstein computer with a grimace, listening to Ultravox and singing along.
The more I read the news, the more I feel that the world is nothing but a circus freakshow, populated with trashy, Jerry Springer mutoids. This can't be true, can it? I try do do the intelligent thing, read all the news I can and make educated opinions, but do I really know what's going on? I will never know. If anything, I'm more susceptible to propaganda than the people who just don't care. Because I read the stuff. Because I subject myself to a barrage of confusing, contradicting lies and deceptions from every side. And yet I persist, because I think that amid all the smut, lies and agendas, some shred of truth will be revealed. But each day I feel I'm proven more and more wrong, as the papers rewrite history by the hour and the political parties influence the Truth As We Know It.
I wish I could be everywhere at once. I wish I could afford a trip to Iraq to see what's going on first-hand (without having to shoot people or support the shooting of people). I wish I could check out the touch-screen voting machines myself, see how easy it is to tamper with them. I wish I didn't have to rely on newspapers and news programs, even NPR, to spoonfeed me the news about our world. Together, they all make our planet seem so small, worthless and infantile, but ultimately I fail to believe this as a Truth. And the journalists, as a whole, have ultimately failed the country, perhaps because all of the high-profile ones are puppets for their respective, shady political parties.
I know I'm not the smartest bloke on the block, and I can't imagine that I'm in the top 10 percent of mindful people on planet earth. I'm just an average guy with probably average views on a number of things. All that I ask of the world is this: quit the bullshit, get to the core of things. What are you here for? What is the meaning of your life? Share that with the world, and stop wasting your time on lies and deceptions.
"When I was a boy there's a dream that I had
That a war if it's fought was for good against bad
And I woke up to find that the world had gone mad
And we'd all fall down
"And I feel like a child again sitting observing
You're toying with power, your fingers are burning
You're pushing so hard that the worms won't be turning
We'll all fall down
"While you try to pretend you're a god upon high
With your party ideals and your squeaky clean lies
When it comes to the crunch you're no smarter than I
And we'll all fall down
"If it's colour or creed or your old time religion
Well fighting for that shows a pure lack of vision
The fight that we strive is the fight to survive
And we'll all fall down
"Well look in the mirror and what do you see
An American, Russian, a soldier or me
When you've all pressed the buttons just where will you be
When we all fall down
"It gets harder to see just what future's in store for us
Hard to see through all the wool you pull over us
Words that you give are just words to console us
We'll all fall down
"And what will you do when you've pulled the release
When the sound of the thunder has drowned out the pleas
Cos after all that was your idea of peace
When we all fall down
"No sun for a world that once stood so tall
No wind's going to blow and no rain's going to fall
No flowers for graves, in fact no graves at all
When we all fall down"
Ultravox - All Fall Down
posted by novachild @ Tuesday, September 28, 2004,
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Death's Dream
Death dreamed a war of peace, a truth of lies
The soldiers are hacked and stabbed
with words of optimism
Skies full of trails
raining down some hidden purpose
A hidden parade of jets leave
their chemicals to wisp and fall
Souls are traded on ebay
Numbers racked up in PayPal
A Nation of Addicts crawling over
bodies for green dollar bills
Stealing watches from corpses
along the way
The bickerers, the steadfast and true patriots
with shiny pearly teeth in the front
and rotted pillars in the back
The cosmetic circus of marketable ideas
waltzing like pink hippos
leaving no child behind
leading the dance of death of minds
destroyed by lameness, starving
pathetically curled up like babies
behind game consoles
I saw the best minds of my generation
Doing not a fucking thing to make
the world a better place.
May the future look so bright
May the godzilla we have wrought
befriend the children of the apocalypse
That's how it works in movies
That's how it works in newspapers
Morphing words, twisting around
like four-dimensional rosebushes
last week they were something else
entirely, now no one is reporting the
accidental pearls. Instead, they hide in
recycle bins unavailable to you or i
Swept under the rug and everybody's happy
at tuesday night pizza buffet,
sipping on beer and watching the wives
of other men, complaining about spotty
forks and the sudden rash of obesity
and we all die a little every minute
Resistance is dying
It is yesterdays fasion to fight for anything
but the opinions of others like us
It's the wrong shade of red, the neckline is
too high, it doesn't show enough skin to
hide the person behind distant panoramas of lust
and greed, we suck needlessly on our own
unfulfilled desires, turning them over and
over in our minds, worshipping the sex of
the beast while it tears at our throats
with talons tattood with prayers
and steals our technology and turns us into
incubi and succubi always leeching and
destroying when instead we could be
at peace and womblike in a state of
being and becoming human evolution
put off for the sequel after the worst
has yet to come after the golden sun
of our godlike egos lights up the skies
and rains black poison on the land
this is the truth we want, but it is
not what is. This is the dream of
a harvester of minds that has no feeling
of its own because it isn't real
like you
or I.
posted by novachild @ Tuesday, September 28, 2004,
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Hypocrisy is not an Exclusive Right
9/26/2004
I've been blog-browsing on various political journals this morning.
One thing I tend to stumble on in these posts are endless black/white arguments. They are based on the either/or scenario - either you are the way we want you to be, or there is cause for violence and war. This perception of the universe as black or white makes it easier for people to betray their own beliefs, to segregate, and to hate people they do not even know. To believe that there is a justifiable reason to kill thousands of innocent people, one must put up some walls so that certain Truths can be 'concealed.' However, concealed Truths fester and swell in the mind, and eventually they must be dealt with.
Either/or drives both sides of a conflict to the battle line. There is no caution, no sense of obligation or responsibility to create peace, no desire that violence be a 'last ditch effort' to solve a problem. In the land of the free, violence is rarely the last choice in any situation. Just watch COPS, or any other prime-time TV show. We fetishize violence and build complex stories around these acts in order to portray them as justified. In Iraq, violence is in their backyards and in their homes. The difference is that our violence is mostly 2-dimentional, mental, and subliminal, while theirs is familiar, 3-dimensional, and happening right now.
The idea of either/or is the endless failure of logic behind the bombing blitz, the death, destruction and chaos in Iraq, in our government, in our lives. It is the same mental trickery that drives witch hunts, crusades, and waves of paranoia and fear, and it's easier to catch than the common cold. Eventually, either/or is the human impulse that we must transcend. Otherwise, we will annihilate ourselves and all life on earth for nothing.
Every action of this tyrant has become a reason for war in the minds of many americans. Citizen Frank points out another luxury item of the tyrant, a swimming pool, and it only serves to support his continued reason to fight this hypocricy and reinforce the American ideals. But, at the same time, America also has starving, poverty-stricken, suffering people, and yet our churches are expensive palaces of prefab luxury. Our christmas lights consume millions of dollars worth of electricity. We are less than 5% of the global population, yet we consume more than 1/4 of the world's energy supply. Hypocrisy is available by the truckload in any major supermarket. Our newspapers change their facts to fit their agendas every day. Nothing is truly reported; everything is sensationalized (Nothing is true; Everything is permitted). Politicians are paid more by corporations than by the american people, and their interests are altered by the pursuit of wealth.
Many people believe that - because Saddam was such a terrible man - the entire country of Iraq and over 12,000 Iraqi lives should be punished for their failure to demand better leadership. They pay the price for his tyranny. We are, in effect, telling the rest of the world this: if WE (the US) don't like your leaders, it is your responsibility to overthrow them, or else suffer the might of our bombs and our installed governments. At the same time, we want to be left alone as citizens. We don't want our neighbors telling us how to live, what to eat, watch, drink, how to train our children.
What we demand from others is not what we say that we want for ourselves, and this is the ultimate hypocrisy. More extreme, I would imagine, than another swimming pool for Saddam Hussein. We punish the people of other countries for not dealing with the sins of their leaders, yet in America, Dissent is considered to be UN-AMERICAN.
It is easier to cast the stone, perhaps, than to realize that we also carry our sins around with us. Even I am a hypocrite. I desire peace, but at the same time I entertain ideas of violence. I watch television shows, revenge movies, and kung fu action flicks, and I enjoy them immensely. However, these are real people we are bombing in Iraq, not actors on the screen. The ultimate ideal in Martial Arts is to know what to do in a conflict, and choose to do nothing. The state of Peace is easier to achieve when one can truly understand the outcome of violent acts. The battle is never without - it is always within. And only when it is necessary does the warrior use martial arts to embrace their 'opponent'.
I know that peace is a harder path, but once it is begun, it would be much more sustainable than constant war, and people would be on equal terms instead of caught up in class systems and games of one-upmanship.
Perhaps someone should send out free copies of the teachings of Christ to our christian leaders? Perhaps we should send out the teachings of Ghandi, and MLK Jr, and many other saints and leaders that have pointed the way? It would be cheaper than making bombs and dropping them on people, and people might actually learn something. I would willingly pay more taxes to send out literature of peace than weapons of war.
In reality, there is no battle line. In reality, we are all one people. It is in the minds of the citizens that battle lines exist. Minds can be changed with much less bloodshed than the borders of a country.
Is there any question that we are one people? When we are pricked, do we not bleed? If we blow up the planet, what will be left of to say that we are better than those lives we obliterated? And all for nothing.
posted by novachild @ Sunday, September 26, 2004,
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Sky Captain - What a Sweet Disappointment
Yes, it seems that the most anticipated movie of the season was a waste of my hard-earned cash. But I still enjoyed it, because not in several years has a big-screen experience been so ripe for riffing and heckling.
I'm a fan of old serials, classic science fiction and the past visions of the future. I leap for joy at the thought of giant robots, goofy ray guns and dashing 'sky captains' battling the forces of evil (usually communists or fascists). I've sat through hours of Flash Gordon, Phantom Creeps and more, and I've read Edmund Hamilton pulp sf and enjoyed every minute of it. Classic movies are also no stranger to me, even the really bad ones like Rocketship X-M and Lost Continent are not below the scope of my radar.
With that established, it's a strange occurrence that I simply loathed this movie from beginning to end. At first glance it's got everything, giant robots, ray guns, sexy female reporters, a dashing hero, really cool sepia tones and classic movie blurriness.... all mixed in with cutting edge CGI to give it a unique look. I admit that the style of this film is definitely unique, and I would welcome similar styles in future films. But there is no substance at all to this movie.
The acting is shallow, dull and wooden. I sometimes wondered if it was intentional, but in the old serials if they did anything it was OVER-act. Not so in Sky Captain. An army of giant robots are advancing on our hero, and the volume of his voice never changes from scene to scene. I would be screaming at this point, but our hero acts like he's dosed on valium. And Gwyneth Paltrow - what to be said about her character, aside from the fact that I wanted her to get squished by the robots, snagged by the giant creatures, or sent plunging to her death. It's a terrible shame to see such a weak female role in a movie this day and age. Ugh!
Ambitious, yes. Ultimately worthwhile, no. It's garbage like Sky Captain that makes me wonder if the over-saturation of genre filmmaking is watering down the creative spirit of the big studios. In the end, it's all about money, bringing in the young ones and pulling a sucker punch for the price of a ticket. I'm glad that indy filmmaking is taking a bigger hold of our multiplexes, but I don't think it will save us from the death throes of creative genre filmmaking.
Anyway, that's my rant. It is going to be a great movie to riff with friends, I will say that much. But I will never pay to see Sky Captain again - except in PAIN AND AGONY!!!
posted by novachild @ Saturday, September 25, 2004,
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A Quick Quick Slow Day
Caught this blog entry on Google News today, and I thought' I'd do my best to keep the momentum going.
TANG Typewriter: It was ROVE
And on that note, I actually ordered a bumpersticker from carryabigsticker.com (they advertise on the Nation web site). It's the 'What would Jesus Bomb' sticker, surely popular in bible-belt oklahoma. I used to have one that said "Doing my part to piss off the religious right." But that car died and was toed away (it was my rebuilt, never-quite-right VW Superbeetle).
Anyhow, not much else to ramble about today. Except that the Admiral Twin drive-in closed for the season (sad), and my wedding anniversary is this Saturday (happy).
Cheers!
posted by novachild @ Thursday, September 23, 2004,
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Not an Atheist
No, surprise suprise. I'm not an athiest. And to be more honest, I really don't have a predefined set of spiritual beliefs that can be easily smashed into a theological box for all to see. It's not a black and white issue for me. It's a day-to-day, moment by moment experience of life, and it constantly changes course and intensity. Why give all that up to be carried away by some ideology?
I do, however, enjoy philosophical conversations on occasion. Questions to arouse my intellect, make me 'think myself' into a religious paradigm, only to find that I usually do everything I can to crawl out of that rut. See, religion doesn't make me very happy. In fact, it makes me uncomfortable, perhaps because I was raised Pentecostal/Evangelical and it's so easy for me to dispise the whole thing based on my experience. But in the end, it really doesn't work that way. That's just what I'd like to see. All my bitterness tearing apart the already illogical nature of a religious institution. I've grown up to discover that I have better things to do.
What brought all this about, you ask? Went to the bookstore, headed straight for the poetry section (with a pit stop to the magazine rack to pick up next week's copy of The Nation), only to realize that it was being blocked off by a group of meetup.com participants. The Athiest group. Since I couldn't get past the anthologies and anywhere past the "B" authors (C-Z were facing the Atheist group, and they were taking up all the space), I decided to circle around occasionally to see if they were through. Needless to say, I discovered an old acquaintance in the crowd, Chad M., the former lead singer of Concept of Nonsense and The Kids Who Never Learned How to Color Inside The Lines. Great guy, though I've rarely had the opportunity to actually sit down and chat.
Needless to say, I couldn't resist eavesdropping on the conversations. There was a lot of political bickering going on, and a great deal of harsh, bitter monologues and agreements regarding the sad state of Christianity. And I found that I agreed with most everything that was being discussed. This, of course, was just before I asked what they were meeting for (Atheism). So I snuck over, said Hey to Chad, and asked if it was an open meeting. They cleared a seat, then people started talking. I could tell that they weren't ready to warm up to me.
Shortly thereafter, I asked Chad what the group was about. He told me, and I promptly replied. "Very interesting, though I'm not an atheist." His response seemed to indicate that either he thought I was christian and I should get the heck away, or else it was a dire warning that non-atheists aren't particularly welcome in this group (of course, I could be mind reading - but it's not really the point of the story). Without the time or the mental resources to openly declare my pantheism (which is as close to I can get in describing my 'belief system'), I decided it was better to just get up. Most of the people in the group seemed to be in a great deal of pain and suffering, the way they went on about the evils of Christianity and a religious government....
Which I can definitely sympathize with. But I think I've finally reconciled my feelings for religion. No longer can I blame a religious institution for the ills of society, for it is people that run these institutions. In their hearts and minds, whether they are devout or barely keeping pace, they are human beings in the end and are as subject to negative impulses as anyone else. When any group, whether they are religious, polical, or worse, begins using their methodology to judge the rest of humanity against, we have a little problem. It's called eugenics, and it's the one thing that makes us more like animals than human beings. Eugenics takes many forms, but usually it's in the religious community. But apparently it exists elsewhere, because I really don't think the atheist group would have been as open with their thoughts if they knew they were being infiltrated by a pantheist.
However, if it's any consolation, the Catholic church considers pantheists to be atheists. But I don't really care, because it's all relative. Yes, the universe is sacred - it's groovy and I'm a part of it. So let's get on with the bloody ride and be done with the cries of heresy and contempt for others not like us.
On a side note, went to see two movies over the weekend. Both were good, but one was excellent beyond measure (Hero with Jet Li). If I have time, I'll post reviews tomorrow or later in the week.
Meanwhile, it's sleepytime.
posted by novachild @ Wednesday, September 22, 2004,
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If I'm really God, do I have the Buddha Nature?
Sometimes I get so alone that I think "Is there anything I do that's really worthwhile?" Why do I allow myself to experience the depths of utter dispair that I often feel? And have I even begun to start on whatever it is I was put on Earth to do? (like I'm some sort of transplanted alien with something important to share to the world lol)
The truth is, I haven't been the happiest person in the world lately. I try to cover all that up by working harder on projects, distracting myself with an abundance of things unrelated what I probably ought to be doing. Like not taking so many things personally. Relaxing a bit and spending less time in front of the computer. Spending more time with family and friends. But still I persist in doing the very things that make me feel lousy. Because it's easier to retreat.
The Dalai Lama says that happiness is the ultimate goal in life. What he doesn't say is whether it's an attainable goal. Or did I just read too fast over that sentence?
And what about friends? Yes, I'm married, so I have one dear friend for life (or at least for as long as I am tolerable). I wonder if I'm even worthy of that much, as frustrated and frustrating as I have been the past year or so. My boss once said to me "You're lucky if you end up with two or three true friends in your lifetime." And I'm beginning to believe her, simply because I really don't have any other consistent people in my life. Sure, I have my parents, in-laws, sibling. And sure, there are a few people that I truly, dearly want to spend more time with. But lately nobody really has time, myself included, or situations are just complex and scheduling is difficult.
Then there's the whole issue of getting angry at people and feeling betrayed just when you think you've got a friend. This has happened to me twice in the past several months, and I'm beginning to see a pattern: me. Perhaps I expect too much from other people? Maybe a certain level of respect and common courtesy? But these are high standards to live up to, I suppose, and I've had trouble with them in the past.
I've never really been good at having long-term friends. All through my childhood, we moved so much that I never made solid friendships. Now that I'm older, and supposedly wiser, I'm beginning to think that maybe the whole thing is overrated. Perhaps I should be content with my lot in life and let go of the idea? Call me a hedonist, but I think there's more to life than that.
Perhaps some of my current state has to do with decisions I made long ago? One in particular involved my friend Mark and the rather shameless way I rewarded his friendship to me. I hear the mantra "Regret Nothing," yet I have been as callous as the worst of them, thus making this very bold and elitist phrase seem farciful and utterly unattainable. There are other friends that have diverged from my path in life, and perhaps the time will come when the paths will intersect again? But in the meantime, I've got my uptime, my down time, and all the soul-filled moments in between. Hopefully, I will take advantage of all the time I have on this planet to achieve whatever it is I'm here to do.
And hopefully I can cleanse myself of the need to search for purpose in the first place. It's really more of a Zen koan, I suppose, to define one's purpose in life. Ultimately unanswerable. So why do we do it? I must say, however, that each Koan does have an answer, albeit usually an unexpected one.
The sound of one hand clapping, for instance, is basically a palm-heel punch into the space before you. The 'one hand' is the combination of your illusory 'avatar' hand and the universe in and around you. This sound is unique to everyone, I suppose. I wonder how Jesus would have answered that very same Koan?
Ramble ramble ramble.
posted by novachild @ Monday, September 20, 2004,
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Album Schmalbum and Poetic Revivals
I've been working on remastering the album a bit today. Some of the levels aren't absolutely perfect, and I'm attempting to make the whole thing more uniformly mixed. However, I'm not an expert at mastering, although I've learned quite a bit through experience. Some day, when I can afford to send my albums out to a mastering house, I won't have to fiddle with it anymore. But chances are, by that time I will have learned everything I need to know about mastering.
Went to Barnes & Noble last night, bought The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry for $25 plus tax. So far, it's an enjoyable ride, especially the ultra-vulgar yet profound poetics of D.A. Levy. I'm a big fan of most of the poets in this book: Diane DiPrima, Jack Kerouac, Philip Patchen, Michael McClure, the rest of the beats, the meats, and the antiwar poets.
Poetry is the ONE THING that has been a constant in my life, and it is the ONE THING I'm most passionate about. Poetry and music go hand in hand; to me they are the same thing. They both come from the same firey place in my stomach and bloodstream. The last four or five years I have neglected my poetry, and all of my life has suffered because of it (like when I stopped taking Tae Kwon Do and became more angry because I no longer utilized a positive outlet for those violent energies). I probably would not be so angry all the time if I kept to my poetry, but then again I will never really know.
I've developed mixed feelings about poetry over the past decade. I love expressing myself with poetic thought, and I love reading and listening to others. But so many poets are out to 'look cool,' play the fool and satisfy their social urges, instead of actually writing what is genuinely their thoughts - what is in their hearts and minds and what is burning, coursing through their bloodstream. It's a fire in the pit of the stomache that travels through the blood. I haven't felt it for a long time, but the more gently I pursue the world as 'poetry' (as opposed to purely logical and mathematical ideals), the more in tune with things I seem to be.
I feel like I'm back from a long trip to a darker place. But the funny thing is this: living poetry will take you to the same dark places, and darker still. But as long as one remains a traveller, a watcher and a poetic 'antenna,' things tend to go more in the right direction. Perhaps, like so many of these 'outlaw poets,' I'm destined to crash and burn and spend up my soul for a chance to immortalize thoughts on paper. But it's all I know, and it's all I can bear to do.
Meanwhile, back to mixing and mastering. This album is going to be pressed very, very soon. I was going to do it this weekend, but I'm about 100 bucks short of my goal. It's only a matter of time.
posted by novachild @ Saturday, September 18, 2004,
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Heat, Bugs, Money and Sweat
I want to know who invented
the whole idea of money
so I can
choke the life out of them
Bills, Pet Food, Groceries,
Services galore
The money keeps on slipping by.
Life keeps on
fucking
itself
Inside Out
Hanging me out like a hotwire
Ready to shock unwary citizens.
Fuck the money meat
Mysterious Earth
You are not so encaptivating tonight
The phasing out of senses
They become so much entertaining TV flicker.
The death in front of you is
Not as good as the other dozen flavors.
An orgy of sand and fog
Hungry worms stealing the beauty
from everything.
Money is quicker than
liquid suicide, especially
when other people are involved.
Fast-lane inspiration
Years swim by lightning fast
blinding the passengers holding
wads of bills and coins stuffed
in their pockets screaming to
change the fucking channel
Sleep is not soon enough,
and another day begins.
Hit
Snooze, then
Make
more
money
posted by novachild @ Wednesday, September 15, 2004,
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Movie Review: Son of Frankenstein
Often touted as the 'best of the Frankenstein movies,' Son of Frankenstein was highly anticipated viewing in my family of two. We finally settled down to watch it last night.
But first, a rant:
I'll admit to being a closet movie freak, which is why I've started posting these movie reviews on my journal. I own a rather significant amount of movies, most of which are still on VHS (I'm replacing them with DVD slowly but surely). While I can only profess to knowing every word to a handful of films (Clockwork Orange, Naked Lunch, and several Doctor Who episodes to name a few), I'm not as freakish as you might believe. At the least, saying that makes me feel better.
So why do I bother writing reviews in a journal that hardly anyone reads? First, I've always loved reviewing movies. It is a small passion of mine, and I cannot really explain when it began. As a film lover, I enjoy reading other opinions of movies, even when I don't agree with them. It's one of the ways I get in touch with the world, however ridiculous that may sound. Like getting to know a person based on what's in their spice rack, I can often tell a great deal about a person by their movie preferences.
I suppose it's an addiction, albeit a healthy one (unless I take too many trips to the multiplex, of course). I was raised by parents who loved to go to the movies at least every couple of weekends, and I cannot thank them enough for this habit that I've inherited. We were one of the first families in our neighborhood to get cable TV, and I remember the excitement of the early days of HBO - when great (and not so great) movies were suddenly accessible at home without commercial interruptions or expensive equipment rentals. I was a lucky kid at times.
Now that I'm a bit older, and I can afford to go to the movies twice a month, I'm a bit more choosy about what I go to the theater to see. And I don't actually have cable or satellite anymore, thanks to the invention of DVD rentals online. I also had a great deal of time to waste on movies as a kid, so the rare moments I get to see them now are highly cherished slivers of time.
Now onto the review:
Baron Wolf von Frankenstein (played by the occasionally brilliant but usually desperate-for-work Basil Rathbone) is the son of the original monster maker, Dr. Henry Frankenstein. His knockout wife Elsa (Josephine Hutchinson... grrrowl) and annoyingly acted son Peter (Donnie Dunagan, who goes on to later play the voice of Young Bambi), take a train to his late father's estate. Even in the midst of the bleak, hulking rubble of the English countryside, filled with smoke and craggly trees, they sense the adventure and the excitement of the unknown. Of course, it's all a foreshadowing of the 'bleak' events yet to unfold.
The villagers greet them with jeers and moans. After the doings of his father, they don't take too kindly to the Frankenstein name. And the son is also a scientist (how amazingly convenient), which only adds to their disdain. However, once the cutesy little family begin settling into the castle, they are visited by the charming Inspector Krogh (Lionel Atwill). At first, he seems stiff and fearsome, but as their patter continues we discover that Krogh is a very decent and understanding man. Everybody's just cozy and happy, but the weather's getting worse outside.
As all this fun stuff is going on, Ygor's little head pops up here and there. Ygor is genuinely creepy, but occasionally he comes off as a little campy (and flat as only Bela can be). Mix Zathras in B5 with Torgo from Manos: Hands of Fate, and you basically have Ygor, an awkwardly-speaking, slow moving freak with feral undertones. You don't want this guy hanging around your house.
The 'plot' thickens as we discover Baron Frankenstein secretly harbors great sympathy for his father and the same undying obsession for 'science.' He stumbles into the old lab, meets Ygor, finds the monster, and somewhere along this short hop he turns from respectable family man to amoral necromancer. It's a huge credibility jumb, which is why the plot sort of fades into the background at this point.
Inspector Klogh comes round occasionaly, giving the Baron a chance to let his niceties show. We find out that Klogh's lifelong dream was to be a soldier, but when the Monster ripped off his arm years ago, his future career was ruined and he was stuck being a police inspector instead. While Frankenstein is busy being terribly nice to Klogh, he's also hiding the fact that he's reanimated the monster. It's complicated.
We spend the next hour laughing and hum-hawing at the 'horrific' antics of Ygor and the Monster. Ygor is using the stupid monster to kill off everybody that had Ygor hanged years before, but the Monster is oblivious to the fact that he's being used (because he's stupid). Still, the monster thinks that Ygor is his only friend, and he goes berserk when Frankenstein shoots Ygor full of holes. About three minutes later, Inspector Krogh puts all the pieces together and meets the Monster with his gun. Of course, guns don't stop the monster.
Just when something dashing and exciting begins to happen, Baron Frankenstein knocks the monster into a boiling pit of sulfur. We cut to a scene where he's giving the estate to the villagers, and the fun is over.
Son of Frankenstein has an impressive lineup of stars and a surprising level of character complexity (for 1939). However, I wouldn't call it a significant classic, and I don't agree that it is the BEST Frankenstein movie. If anything, it's a passable B-movie with some charm thrown in (the Baron and the Inspector's dart-playing scene, for instance). It's a genuine attempt at taking the Frankenstein franchise in a different direction, but they could have done better. Next time I watch this movie, I'll probably be riffing it, and writhing in pain when Bela comes on the screen with his scraggly-tooth, bearded, broken-necked stooge antics.
Out of 10, I'd love to give it a 7 for originality, but because of the goofiness of the Igor/Monster relationship and the hammy acting from Bela, it's got to be a 6.
Until next time......
posted by novachild @ Thursday, September 09, 2004,
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I've Always Been a Video Junkie
I've always been a video junkie, at least beginning at the point where I could buy my own things. And it all began when I started taping episodes of Mystery Science Theater 3000 off of Comedy Central.
With the advent of the DVD, I've managed to increase my vid collection significantly, while also reducing the amount of old, big VHS tapes on my shelves. I can barely stand to watch the old tapes anymore, and when HD DVDs come out soon, I might be torn between two formats for awhile.
It's really sad, but I'm a Netflix junkie, as well as a Greencine junkie. I do Netflix for the more mainstream titles, and Greencine for the more risque, hard to get, and over the top stuff. Greencine also has a few Region Zero discs floating around their collection, which gives them an edge on obscure material. I just wish they would carry Region 2 DVDs, but it seems it is illegal to rent or sell them in the States. This is sad, because most of my shows are British in origin, and most of them will never see the light of day in Region 1. The whole industry treats its customers like potential criminals, which irritates me to no end. But the more 'value-added' the formats become, the more control they will place on them. The bastards.
And the real criminals are the politicians who seemed to think it was a good idea to cut spending on the one program that saved my life: now the State of Oklahoma does not send those little license plate reminders every year. This is pathetic because they make us pay them in the first place, so they should feel obligated to send us a reminder. If the State of OK can't pull ten cents out of the money I'm already forking out for taxes and tags, then they need to get a better accountant.
Anyhow, I'm a video junkie. But some people are worse, much worse, than I am. In fact, when I was in high school, one of my best friends had an older brother (who had to be at least 30). The guy still lived with his parents, and he had rooms upon rooms of videotapes, more than I could ever possibly imagine owning. And the guy wasn't particular; he rented everything he could get his hands on and recorded it. Sad, really. And I'm NOT that bad!
Going to veg now. Got some old Universal Horror movies to watch, then it's off to beddy-bye. I know, I might sound a little pissy and grumpy, but really I'm in a swell mood and will be better once I get my feet propped up and some popcorn in my mouth.
posted by novachild @ Tuesday, September 07, 2004,
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Ranked-Choice Voting in SF - Is It Possible on a National Level?
Dig this: Ranked Choice Voting in San Francisco - (flash)
If you're too lazy to click, basically what it means is thus: You vote for a first and a second choice. If the first choice is eliminated, then your vote goes for the second choice. Think of the impact this would have if we had this built into the national voting system. Nader would probably receive a significant amount of votes that he otherwise would not receive, simply because people are 'afraid to throw their vote away' and vote Democratic instead. The changes would be significant, and we likely would see more people on our voting ballots each year.
But it doesn't stand a chance in hell, because the only people that would probably go for it would be the naderites and the libertarians. I'm sure the Democrats don't want their votes going to Nader if their candidate loses, as some of the same companies funding their party also fund the republican party. Conflicts of interest would create even more shady situations, and ultimately we would be back to the same issue we are in. Conspiracies, fraud, and lies.
Still, it's an idea worth fighting for. If it becomes an issue, sign me up.
posted by novachild @ Sunday, September 05, 2004,
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Flesh, Bone, and an Overflowing Genre Collection -
I turned 30 this year, and the rest of the world continued doing what it is doing regardless. Next June, I will be the more insignificant 31, and hopefully some things will have changed for the better in the world. Hopefully, I will be further down the path.
Why life doesn't turn out quite the way you thought it would in high school:
This post is dedicated to my friend Scott and his wonderful mother. They are two amazing people who are at a nexus point in their lives. Scott turned 16 last weekend. His mother recently had cancer-related surgery and is still undergoing treatments. Before this all happened, she was the most kindhearted person I have ever met, and during the treatment rollercoaster, she has shown unbelievable courage, resolve and inner beauty unmatched by anyone or anything I have ever seen.
Someone once said "Love has erased all of my concepts." This is the evolution of a person to a parent, something that I have never experienced. But I've witnessed it here, in the lives and actions of my two good friends.
When I was a love-struck teenager, I was convinced that it was going to happen soon after high school. I would get a 'foot-in-the-door' job, a little apartment for starters, and me and my future wife would make some babies and start a family. Well, my life went a completely different way than I had expected.
For starters, I didn't marry my high school sweetheart. Instead, I spent the last year of high school beginning my long descent into adulthood. After some rather traumatic experiences, we split up, and I spent the next few years roaming the city and looking for something to believe in.
Intoxication was something I experienced early on. Then I found another outlet through the influence of my friend Jason: Poetry. We wrote poetry with our very blood. We stayed up for days writing long, drawn-out and hopeless theses on life in free form. We ranted and raved and worshipped the flesh of all the women we met and touched and struggled against the world of conservativism and politics. Poetry was not something I ever planned on. About the closest thing to poetry I wrote in high school was a few lines in a violent and gory poem about cannibals and freaks.
Along with poetry came a veritable smorgasboard of lifestyle choices. I picked up the coffee habit, because it helped keep me up nights to write poetry. I smoked more than a pack a day (Camels, Chesterfields, then later picked up the pipe). Cigarettes were always there - they were there during high school, and they continued to be there until I quit smoking over a year ago.
After high school, celibacy was one of the things I used to keep from getting emotionally involved with women. It is easier to feel close to someone when you share personal space. And although my heart and soul craved that kind of closeness, my mind was terrified of going down that path. After the traumas of high school, I wanted to see what the world was about. Everything I had known up to that point was dissolved, gone, unattainable, and who really knows what they want at that age? I thought that being close to someone else would blur my world view, and so I detatched from the need for companionship. That lasted a couple of years.
At some point, my raging male hormones ate through the wall of sensibilities I had created. I opened up to the idea of 'dating,' and the next few years were spent being social, getting drunk a lot, having my heart broken in large and small ways and writing more and more poetry. My friend Mark and I began performing noisy poetry/guitar sessions every Tuesday night at the poetry bar, and I had an alter-ego that frequented the underground nightclubs as well.
At some point, I realized the futility of all this time-wasting and started to focus more on my creative abilities. Music has always been a motivating force in my life. So has spirituality, so I started reading about world religions: Buddhism, Hinduism, the Taoist philosophy, Ceremonial Magick, everything I could get my hands on that was not rooted in Christianity. I developed an intellectual smorgasboard of religious and occult facts, figures and ideas, but I never 'became' anything. I never tied myself down to one system of thought because that simply goes against everything I am. A nomad. A traveller. An independent spirit.
So what happens when an independent spirit meets a girl and discovers that he's loved her for years? I struggled, danced around the idea, played with the what-if's, and at some point broke down and realizes that, if I'm ever going to do the marriage thing, the family thing, then T is the person I really ought to be doing it with. So I got married, after all.
Along with this relationship has come a number of influential factors. Through living my life with T, I've discovered that kids can definitely grow up differently. Everything I didn't do, she did. Everything I did do, she didn't. While my parents were moving us all over the country, she was staying on the same dead-end street we are living at now. It's interesting, rich, and ultimately the most meaningful decision I have ever made. And I'm still learning things from day to day.
One thing I wasn't prepared for, and this is something that my parents demonstrated all the time (and I thought was exclusive to my parents): Marriage isn't like a trip to the Land of Oz. While it can often be the best thing, it can often be very difficult. I suppose it depends on what your mutual goals are, but money also plays an important role in any long-term relationship. Since we don't make a lot of money, our resources are limited and we can't always do what we want. But we push on, and we get done what needs to get done. And we enjoy what we can. It isn't always an adventure, but when it is.... nothing can beat it for sheer thrills.
I'm glad I married someone that can put up with my eccentricities. I simply do not know anyone else on planet earth that could put up with my media collection, my obsession with music, my computer uptime, my occasional lapse in hygiene. I can also be as weird as I want to be without fear of too much criticism, which is what every teenage boy wants out of life. We married in 2000 - the dawn of the century, standing at the foot of Sandia Peak with a Religious Science minister. Our marriage vows incorporated many traditions and religions, much like our relationship. And while it's been a little rocky here and there, I appreciate and enjoy it all -the good and the 'bad.'
Life is not what it was supposed to be. Especially when played from the hip, not by the book. Yes, a good christian boy might do the right thing, finish school, get a good job, vote republican and marry a good christian girl. But how predictable does life really need to be? Who do I need to please, myself or everyone around me? And I don't even know the half of it, because I'm not even at the halfway point of my life. I have no idea what will happen tomorrow, but it won't be scripted, that's for certain.
posted by novachild @ Sunday, September 05, 2004,
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Anime Invasion
I love lazy weekends. They happen so rarely, it seems, so I try to enjoy them as much as possible when they come around.
I've spent the bulk of my Saturday watching anime on my computer. Sounds geeky enough, I suppose. Rewatching the first 10 episodes of Evangelion, then heading off into RahXephon territory (a very similar series, perhaps even more artistic than Eva).
We were going to drive to Branson 2nite, catch a hotel, and hit Silver Dollar City early tomorrow morning. But no preparation has really been done, and we haven't even done laundry. So we're waiting until the morning, leaving as early as possible to take advantage of the full day.
Still have no AC in the front room, so it's a little toasty in here. But not too bad. All in all, a rather laid back day, full of welcome relief from my over-busy lifestyle.
posted by novachild @ Saturday, September 04, 2004,
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Things and More Things: Movies that Don't Matter
Last night, my wife and I went to the drive-in to see the Exorcist/AVP double-feature. My not-so-brief reviews follow:
The Exorcist: The Beginning:
I'm a huge fan of the first movie. Heck, I can appreciate the follow-up sequels, especially the one with George C. Scott and the granny that crawls on ceilings. But this new prequel lacks something - the sheer creepy hopelessness of the other films, but this can be easily explained away by the trend of religious (read: Christian) pandering that has become more or less the standard in everything "United-States" these days.
Heck, God runs our country, our leaders, our minds, so why not Hollywood? Except that the God of the US is not the God of the New Testament. This is a different entity altogether. The God that runs the US is on our side in the war. The God that runs the US says it's ok to exclude people because of their sexual orientation, their color, their sex. The God that runs the US makes sure that all the movies have a religious overtone, so that the Christians can be constantly frightened into strengthening their faith, so that they will feel more justified in pushing their product to others and bringing about the end times.
Damn, christians find the most mundane things terribly frightening. There is one scene, for instance (and I promise I will get back to the movie now), where a priest is 'worshipping' a small cross on the wall. He gets distracted and turns away, but when he looks at the cross again, avast! It's upside down! Forget for a moment that when St. Peter (one of the 12 desciples) was crucified, he asked to be UPSIDE-DOWN so as to not be crucified in the same way as Jesus. This was supposed to be a nod to the majesty and importance of the Christ (we're not worthy!), but NO, thanks to teeny-bopper and hollywood-esque devil worshippers, the inverted cross is now the most profane symbol - even worse than Barney, The Last Temptation of Christ, and playing Lynn Anderson records backwards. It's called exploitation - which in and of itself is not BAD, but in this case it gives me existential heeby-jeebies because there is something so frighteningly sad about religious fanaticism running so rampant in society.
Really, that's about as rediculous as you can get. Two bloody sticks intersecting each other. One happens to be longer than the other and the shorter one is connected closer to the top. Turn this symbol 180 degrees, and half of the US population is in widespread panic because you just violated everything that they hold sacred. Now they want to preach, to get on a platform, bomb somebody to smithereens and bring about armageddon just to tittilate their fear-soaked brains. Reminds me of the panic of adults when they see a kid flipping off another kid. Or when kids first learn 'cuss words' and everytime one gets used, the little holier-than-though blonde girl says "UMMMMM! I'M TELLING!" This sounds about as nuts as the many ideas people have come up with to 'prevent' arab soldiers from entering heaven (shooting them with bullets soaked in pig's blood, for instance). It's the same fucking thing, and it makes us as bad, or worse than, those the Christians persecute for the exact same reasons.
The 'tension' of this film (if there is any) plays more on these sad religious fears than anything else. Yes, the first one did this as well, but much more effectively because the point was to SCARE people - not shove religion down their throats and portray Christianity as the last, best chance for humanity. Occasionally, it showed signs of strength and artistry, but I suspect that the good scenes were yanked from the original Paul Schraeder cut and the 'gore-fest' was created later to appease the higher-ups. Why do Hollywood Studios fear real drama, real plot, anything that doesn't require gallons of goo and headless corpses to achieve? Greedy bastards.
I really wish Frankenheimer would have lived long enough to finish his version. However, I really want to see the original Paul Schraeder cut, the version of the film without the added 'gorefest' that makes it so sappy and pointless. And while I can laugh at the christian paranoia (ooh! They turned a cross upside down! I'm soooo scared!), and even relate to it to some extent (I was raised Christian), the whole thing just reeks of 'Propaganda Machine.' As the closing credits rolled, I felt I had been completely duped.
My final theory is thus: religious fanatics all across this great Country are really coming out, peddling their opiate in small doses at a time. They know the 'END IS NEAR,' and they want control over the hearts and minds of the people. They want to make sure their little wanking prophecy comes true, so they inject everything with a small dose of preaching and turn their ideology (which is supposed to be one of peace and being nice to people) into an excuse to be brutally violent towards one another. This is nothing new; it is the nature of people in generaly, and Christianity allows people to do this AND feel quite all right about it. Makes me angry.
In the end, it's just another crappy summer movie. If you want character development and real drama, look elsewhere. If you want cheap thrills to tittilate your religious fears, you'll find some of that here, but ultimately it will be a forgettable experience.
Aliens Vs. Predator
I will be brief this time. First, there is absolutely NO character development. Second, there is absolutely no story. Third, there is absolutely no point to this movie except the special effects and seeing two bad-ass action/horror monsters going at it. What more do you need, you ask? Well, it's boring. And we've seen it all before. Everything here is utter stinking garbage, and it is definitely MST-able. The Aliens were terribly weak, and the Predators were not convincing enough as 'ancient gods' that taught humans how to build pyramids. Stargate does the whole myth-meets-scifi thing much more effectively, and they actually have a story to go along with it. AVP is just so much recycled comic book garbage, and it likely has decimated the Alien franchise. Or at least one hopes it doesn't get any worse than this
Of course, stinking movies are the reason one goes to the drive-in instead of the indoor theater. Who wants to miss all that THX or Dolby sound on a good movie? Plus, I love the open-air movie experience, no matter how horrible the film is. I've seen Manos: Hands of Fate TWO TIMES and survived, for crying out loud, so these dullard hollywood movies are no big challenge for me. Yes, I take genre films a little more critically than others. But I'm a fan. I LOVE The Exorcist, and comic books, and Alien movies. I hate to see things I like used to no effect, or used to promote a religion that is so sad, so hypocritical, and so destructive to people's hearts and minds.
So do I get the longest journal enry award or WHAT?
posted by novachild @ Saturday, September 04, 2004,
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Orwell wouldn't just Roll in his grave...
After a rather humdrum day at work, and after coming home from a screening of a left-wing documentary at the library, it was rather disconcerting to hear yet another stream of lies and deceptions from our 'leader'.
There's this feeling in my gut, a knotted-up, pulsating anger and disbelief at the number of people who actually support Bush. His faith-based initiative is an embarrasment to our entire system of government, and his comments about his opponent, John Kerry, were entirely misleading and spun all out of control (here are just a few of them). I cannot imagine another four years of Bush that would not end up in the utter collapse of our reputation and our liberty, and I can only hope that the american people are wise enough to see around the conservative media blockade and the lies of the Bush administration.
"After 9/11, America has to think differently." Perhaps, but when that thinking doesn't just border on fascism, but embraces it the way a long lost son embraces a crying mother, then we might have a little problem.
posted by novachild @ Thursday, September 02, 2004,
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Another Day, Another Urge to Find Something New
What a relatively uninspiring day. Not to sound terribly pessimistic, but nothing significant has happened, aside from going through the motions and waiting out the summer doldrums. I did go shopping at Borders, a mortal sin in and of it self, but I purchased a single CD: Mira Calix - Oneonone. I must say I'm relatively unimpressed with this Warp Records release. It's the wife of Autechre member Sean Booth, apparently, and I'm not the world's greatest fan of Autechre. There are times, however, when nothing else will do but Autechre. But on the whole, I don't spin their discs on a regular basis like I do Boards of Canada and a handful of Magnatune artists.
The first two volumes of Neon Genesis Evangelion arrived today fron Netflix, as well as the first disc of RahXephon. I have been away from anime for so long, so I don't know if I will be able to appreciate it like I once did. Once upon a time, the world wasn't completely and utterly saturated with anime girls with huge eyes and annoying, squeaky voices. Now every major television network in the US has an anime title on Saturday mornings, and the thrill and the exotic nature of the medium has lost its charm to the mass marketing and artistic butchering of american consumerism. Of course, all things go this path eventually, and what is left is recycled a decade later for the fasion police.
We have a mutant horde of fleas in the front yard. We sprayed yesterday, but they aren't dead and now I'm afraid to walk to the car. There's nothing I hate more than pestilence. Not rats (love em), spiders, roaches, nothing's as bad as fleas, ticks and mosquitos. I simply cannot exist along side these creatures, so they will be eradicated or I will simply go insane! We're picking up some stronger poison tomorrow, and I can only hope that our pregnant outside cat (a wild cat we sort of adopted) will stay away from our yard.
Well, it's getting late and the living room is an oven. I still don't have a replacement AC unit for this room, so it's no wonder my journal isn't getting the attention I really would like to give. Plus I've been on a rather nihilistic kick the past few weeks, and I don't really feel like documenting the bulk of my thoughts. They simply aren't worth the effort lately. I'm very tempted to check out the poetry open mic at Gypsy Coffee house next Tuesday at 8 PM. I haven't read poetry to an audience in several years, and I'm starting to feel the need to tap into that outlet one more time. Between that and my eternal quest to release my second album, I'm just about to pop! Really, I was hoping that some pre-orders would come in so I could afford to shop out a small print of the album, say 100 copies. But no pre-orders have come, so it will probably be awhile before I can raise the money to print the damn thing. I may just go with the homemade thing again, but this time I want properly cut inserts and a tray insert. And I don't want to use paper labels for the discs, because once they start peeling the whole readable media can come off with it.
I suppose if anybody out there has about 350 bucks they don't mind parting with, I can go ahead and have the CD printed and begin selling it! lol
posted by novachild @ Thursday, September 02, 2004,
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