And heeeeeere's Eddie!

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Gloria Mundi

Nice to hear from Sunshine earlier - on a random email. Another of the fascinating creative people I have crossed paths with. Do you remember (did you ever get to see?) an influential punk/goth (?) band called Gloria Mundi? And hi to Eddie, too!

Sunshine at The Marquee

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Apologies to regular readers

I still feel quite bemused when people tell me they drop in here regularly, as I do think of it not so much as a column, but as a journal or notebook. Basically, I use a blog to talk to myself, and I go to the Academy Forum to talk to other people. I even use Trillian to chat live, occasionally, but I don't have that much time...

The Academy goes from strength to strength - and the Goddess course in the summer (by Patricia Monaghan the widow of Robert Shea, amngst other things) might just shift the balance from male geekdom a little bit. Male geekdom currently having a ball on Crowley 101 (which I gave a miss, as I find kabbalah and all that ritual completely uninteresting). Or perhaps you'd be interested in a course with The Dice Man (Luke Rhinehart) or Chaos Magick (Peter Carroll), or Douglas Rushkoff, or...

Oh, and the second edition of Maybe Quarterly has got published. It contains a lot, and who has time to read so much, but I liked the second excerpt of Zen Punkist's HOLeY BIBLE; Trimtabulous' Escape Velocity and Metachor's Dream Quest - and, if nothing else, you should read Kentroversy's piece on Bill Hicks, and his interview with Kevin Booth about Sacred Cow, the new book on Bill Hicks, and much, much more.

I didn't contribute anything this time, but Issue 1 remains online, so you can still read it, and my piece on the Illuminatus! online course.

No More Wars means just that

Anyone who knows me will know how much I hate fighting. Or even how much I hate friction, or resistance (most of the time).

Here's something positive for you. Mr Jules has (not quite single-handedly) organised a juggling convention in Slovenia. Not just (boring old) juggling, but street performers of all kinds from all countries. A one-off event you can't even imagine. Value you'll never get from one circus (not Cirque du Soleil, not even NoFit State Circus). I won't do the hard sell right now. I will try to be there. I attended the first European Juggling Convention in 1978, and helped organise one in Spain in 1986, but I fell away as the whole thing grew and I had other work, other interests, and only one short life to experience them in. I got to a few British ones, since (each nation has local breakaway conventions now). You don't have to be able to juggle to come - just to enjoy circus skills, camping, visiting different cultures, hanging out with interesting people from dozens of countries (including, probably, your own) and having FUN!

So no more Wars, please. Not even Wars on drugs, Wars on politically correct speech, Wars on smoking, Wars about imaginary gods. Just stop fighting...

If you think that's the 'unrealistic hippie dream', then that's why it never stops...because you don't believe it can. Forgive each other for mistakes, decide to share the planet, and let's get on with it...

G'night. I don't even kid myself with this stuff. People seem to LIKE fighting...

You'll be a long time gone

Ah me - I will take a rest from Academy activity, and try to catch up with my life. Keili's album is officially released, but Amazon UK don't seem to have got it yet...He's travelling again, I hear.

I have just heard confirmed that I will be going to Celebration III in Indianapolis at the end of April. This is the big Star Wars event - one not to miss, they tell me. Whether I'll get RSI from signing my name, is another matter...

Some of the Maybe Academy bods seem to be planning a meet in July in Ireland. This might just be the motivation to get me and Julie to get a holiday in Ireland...Cork and Kerry, and all that. Sort of depends on making money at CIII, for me, as I always live on rather tight margins when it comes to that mysterious entity "the holiday". Perhaps we'd both prefer Spain.

Hey ho. Star Wars events even affect performers with that 'if I won the lottery' feeling. The truth, of course, is that it was a couple of months' work, 24 years ago...with a buy-out clause, no residuals or royalties, etc. It's a nice perk if fans pop up now, to decide to pay us a bonus...but Indianapolis would not be my first choice for a holiday destination. I suspect this will also be hard work...Still, a chance to put faces to some of my online correspondents like T'Bone and the Jedi Bendu crew, etc.

It depends what you mean by freedom

No doubt Shabina Begum should be allowed to wear a bit of black cloth around her head at school for religious reasons. Congratulations.

As a non-baptised child I would have loved to have avoided Christian hymns and prayers every morning from the age of 6 to 18, but I couldn't. In the school I went to from the age of 12-18 the Jewish kids did not have to attend these services, but I did. Non-believers in The Book(s), freethinkers, agnostics, atheists, non-theists, humanists and all the other groups that think of religion as a benign (or sometimes virulent) belief still had to attend the State religion's indoctrination sessions (and hear how bad it seemed that 'Communists' put their children through such sessions).

Can I still go back and sue my school (s) for 12 years of restricting my rights and imposing their (improbable and distressing) beliefs on me? I doubt it.

One of the reasons I dropped out in the 60s was that distressing half hour every morning. Instead of fighting my way through 3 changes of bus to arrive in time for ineffective, hypocritical indoctrination I eventually took to arriving late, and then going to sit with the Jewish kids. One term I arrived late every day. After you arrived late for 4 days you got kept in for one hour's detention at the end of the day. I did that for a whole term, in protest. Nothing changed.

They measured me as smart (to even get to the school) and then completely ignored my feedback. Their thing being that if you want to get to be (say) Prime Minister you have to claim to be Christian even if you in fact have no faith at all - and my school thought 'getting on in life' the most important thing. I don't think they had previously met anyone who wanted to remain true to themselves, at any cost...

There must have been a few more after me, as the Sixties rolled on.

I still resent that 30 minutes a day (of every day of my school life) when I could have been doing something more constructive than staying dumb, singing out of tune, making up satirical words, or just feeling severely depressed and persecuted. I could even have avoided the rush-hour where adults pushed in front of me because they might lose their jobs if they were late, and I would only get detention.

Trivial? I think not.

So I praise Shabina for her persistence, even as I resent the fact that she can win because she is using the force of another nonsensical (to me!) BIG religion.

A BIG HELLO to all the kids out there who already know the world doesn't work because of some god (whether Christian, Jewish or Muslim). I know what you mean, people. That doesn't mean I think I know better how the Universe came to be, or how humans evolved. I accept the mystery. I just don't buy a creator god. Darwin, chaos theory, complex systems, emergence, etc will do fine as approaches to (maybe) one day knowing more about our situation...

In the States they do have a Freedom From Religion site - maybe we need to start one in the UK.

Farewell, Hunter

I feel too miserable at this news to do more than publish this piece from Ratatosk:

'And so it is that we, as men, do not exist until we do; and then it is that we play with our world of existent things, and order and disorder them, and so it shall be that non-existence shall take us back from existence and that nameless spirituality shall return to Void, like a tired child home from a very wild circus.' - Lord Omar K Ravenhurst

Don't be sad, don't feel sorrow... This man shouted to the Universe "Sir, I exist", and in response, the Universe said to him "We know, you smoked our stash".

Hunter in his prime

For Gonzo... that was one HELLUVA circus. And in vision I saw and look, sitting at the left foot of Eris, a Jester, with little cardboard squares on his hat instead of bells. And he looked up unto Eris and said unto her: "Damn it, woman, why don't you get rid of all of these bats!" And Eris laughed, took a hit from his hat and said "I'm glad your back home, Hunter." And a chorus sang unto him, "Hosanna, Hosanna, Kallisti and LSD" and to welcome him home to the Void stood all of the Great Ones. There to hand him a jay, was Kerry Thornley. To freshen his drink, was Douglas Adams with a real Pan-Galactic Gargle Blaster. Then the great Shroom Pope himself stood and appointed Hunter as the Patron Saint of Alterations and Dry Cleanings of the Mind. And Hunter spoke and said "Damn Tim, you look silly in that big Pope Hat with the Mushroom on it..." And The Leary spoke saying "Wait till you see yours!" Then Eris looked into my eyes and said, "See, he's just fine. Now run along and be happy. For a new child of Eris has been born this very day who will raise above even these ones. Now, I am gonna take all these guys to my room... and you can't watch! SHOOOOO"... and in speaking she exhaled smoke, a cloud larger and larger, streaming from her mouth. My vision clouded, blurred and suddenly I came to, in the wrong lane of oncomming traffic on Interstate-270. And I swear I could hear laughing on the far range of my hearing.
Ratatosk, Squirrel of Discord

Another One Gone

We lost another warrior.

Hunter S Thompson has died of a self-inflicted gun shot (although I don't know if that means by accident or design).

I loved his sheer fierceness, and savagery - it made my own sarcasm sound pretty tame and British. Of course, he might sometimes have been difficult to hang out or work with - but I can't tell because we never met, and I don't know how to decide what aspects of his public persona might also have formed part of the private man.

Either way - another of the great people who I thought of as one of 'my team or karass' has gone when we really could have done with him still doing what he did so well.

Kick those White House bastards in the balls!

That's just the way it was...

I have neglected additions to the autobiography I call my website - and even the updates (this here blog) because I have been doing online courses with the most magnificent bunch of people at the Maybe Logic Academy. Mostly younger than me, though Bob himself has reached 70+ years.

I don't suppose anyone younger can really quite understand how I hitched all over the USA for 18 months without a penny in my pocket (followed by 6 months in Mexico, busking). We have become a much despised 'hippie' generation, but we helped each other out, that's how. These Country Joe lyrics might give you a glimpse of how me and Nelly got from place to place, as like-minded people helped us on our way, and protected us from rednecks and other bizarre people...

Flying High

I'm stuck on the L.A. freeway,Got rain water in my boots,
My thumbs done froze, can't feel my toes,I feel a little destitute.
Wheels throwing water all over my axe
And Mr. Jones won't lend me a hand.
Up come two cats in a Cadillac
And they say, "Won't you hop in, man ?"

I went flying high
All the way — all the way.

The one that's driving's got a bowler hat,
The other's got a fez on his head.
They turn around and grin and I grin back
But not a word was said.

So I took out my harp and I played 'em a tune,
I could see they were diggin' it,
Then the one with the fez, well he turns and he sez,
"We'd like to help you make your trip."

And I went flying high
All the way — all the way.

He said, "We can't leave him out in the rain,
He just might freeze and die,
So why not put him on a plane
And send him home in the sky ?"

So they took me to the L.A. airport,
Laid twenty dollars in my hand.
Well, I paid my fare, I'm in the air
Flying back home again.

And I went flying high
All the way, yeah, all the way, all the way,
You know I went flying high all the way,
Don't you know I went flying high all the...

Clan greetings

As ever, I seem to neglect my family. Yo was quite right that if we didn't meet up straight away then months would pass (and now they have).

Thanks to Julia and Eleanor for the card (and a happy birthday to El - fellow Aquarian).

K's music seems to have got a delayed release, but March 1st doesn't seem that far away...

I can feel extended family out there, too - Noh's dad and Dorothy both had birthdays around about now...and it's our Tom's tomorrow...

Big hello to everyone I have chatted to online recently, or who sent me emails, Ian Tregonning, Tuula, Hadass and all the gang at the MLA.

Now that must be the most boring post for any other people passing through - but tough! You can always leave me a comment....

Kung Hei Fat Choi!

And the Chinese celebrate New Year’s Eve today – tomorrow the Year of the Rooster starts (the Green Wooden Rooster, to be exact). Their calendar uses the moon, and this will be the second new moon after the Solstice. There seems to be some dispute as to whether the coming year should be called 4702 or 4703 – but I guess after nearly 5000 years of civilization it doesn’t matter as much as it does to those Millennial Christians. And 2005 may make them seem like a relatively young religion until you realise that one day later (February 10th) will be New Year's Day (Al-Hijra ) on the Islamic calendar, for the year 1426.

Take your pick.

The Chinese New Year will officially begin on Feb. 9 with the New Moon and end 15 days later with a celebration called the Lantern Festival.

Actually China has used the Gregorian calendar since 1911 – probably about the time that all world politicians started wearing grey suits and ties - but they still celebrate this ancient festival.

And today - mardi 8 février 2005 vulg – is known in the ‘Pataphysical Calendar as

Samedi 14 Gueules 132 de l'Ere Pataphysique

Nativité de St Jules Verne, globe-trotter en chamber

And tomorrow will be celebrating “Alice au pays des merveilles”

Dimanche 15 Gueules 132 de l'Ere Pataphysique

Pancake Day

Regular readers will know what fun I get from religious calendars. Well, to be honest, most calendars seem religious in one way or another. So today is Shrove Tuesday, or Pancake Day.

In the UK Shrove Tuesday is known as Pancake day but in other countries it has other titles, in Germany it is called Fasnacht (night of the fast) In Italy it is called Carnivale (from the Latin for 'goodbye to the flesh') and Mardi Gras (literally 'Fat Tuesday') is celebrated in places as diverse as New Orleans, Brazil and Australia.

This was the day you used up all your rich food before the 40 day fast leading up to Easter. Interesting how people who claim that the church is infallible also manage to drop bits they find inconvenient. Christians act as though Muslims are a bit weird and fanatical to fast at Ramadan. They just gave it up (it's a bit uncomfortable) and went for obesity followed by chocolate eggs!

Enjoy your pancakes (same as every other day, a long stack with maple syrup, maybe...)

Rock On...

The Pentaphobe sent me this, and I had forgotten about it. It seems appropriate on several levels right now:

"What's money anyhow? A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and goes to bed at night and in between does what he wants to do." - Bob Dylan


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It's not whether they 'are' right, just the beliefs they act on, that scares me....

White House Contingency Plan For A Rapture

By James Donahue
January 2005

If you think his fundamentalism isn’t affecting the way President George W. Bush runs our country, consider this: The White House has a plan for keeping government operating if Bush and all of his Christian sidekicks get lifted up into the clouds with Jesus.

Apparently the Bible thumpers in high places believe the signs of the “end times” are so evident that the lifting of the saints, as described in Thessalonians 4:13-18, in which “the dead in Christ will rise, then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord,” is eminent.

They believe this wild story so fervently that a plan is being put in place for continued government if and when Mr. Bush and many of his key cabinet members suddenly fly off through the ceiling.

But who are the so-called heathen on the Bush team that will be still around once the Christians fly away home? And who is our government has the authority to choose which of our leaders got up with Jesus, and which stay behind?

Apparently Vice President Dick Cheney is considered a non-believer and consequently will be still around. But one recent story suggested that Cheney’s bad heart, and the shock of seeing his boss fly off through the office ceiling, might leave him incapacitated. Who governs us then?

The next in the presidential succession chain would be Speaker of the House Tom DeLay. But like Bush, DeLay is a Texas based fundamental Christian and his name is included among the “saints” expecting to disappear.

And that leaves the job to the Senate’s senior statesman, Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska, now 81 years old. Naturally there is concern that Stevens may not be up to the job of seeing the nation through the turbulent Tribulation, described in the Scriptures as a seven-year-long time of trouble concluding with a mighty war.

So there you have it. If Jesus decides to call home his followers during the next four years, we can expect to have a government run by either Cheney or Stevens, with a fragment of both the House and Senate left to keep things running.

This writer isn’t worried. At least about having Mr. Bush fly off into the sky. The Christian rapture is a fairy tale that is about as hard to believe as the virgin birth and the resurrection of the murdered Jesus. The stories stem from ancient mythology that has been passed down since the days of Nimrod.

What worries me more is the fact that we have a president who believes these stories so fervently that he thinks he might just fly away before his term ends. When a man believes like that, he is liable to do things that will not be in his own best interests, or the best interests of our nation.

For example, the Christians also believe a promise in the Book of the Revelation that after the wars are over, and after Jesus returns with his saints to reign over the Earth for a thousand years, there will be another time of trouble. This is caused by a temporary release of the elusive Devil.

After this, God is supposed to rebuild both Heaven and the Earth.

Since the fundamental Christians believe everything written in the Bible is the gospel truth, and the infallible Word of God, they don’t worry much about taking care of the planet. And there lies the flaw.

The only way for us to save ourselves is to reject these false religious beliefs and turn back to Gnosticism. We need to recognize the Mother Earth as a living sentient entity that provides for our every need.

In return, it is the duty of all humans to cherish, protect and do everything in our power to restore the Mother to the wonderful garden she was when it all began.

Failure to do this means that instead of rewards, the human race can only expect a doomsday scenario. Human extinction looms if the planet dies.

The Great Man

Not that he would have cared much. It would have been W.C.Fields' birthday today...

Sucker: "Is this a game of chance?"

Fields: "Not the way I play it, no...."

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I hate to ask

but when are you Americans gonna start paying off the 26 grand that each and every one of you owes the world at large (as of today, that is - the meter is running).

It's da noyse!

K's album is already for pre-order at Amazon but they seem to have mis-spelt the easier word

Go figure

Oh, and Amazon UK, here.

Why they can't spell Metamorphosis I have no idea (I've asked them to correct it).

"Sa'Iyr a Tribal Metmorphosis" (sic) - but search under Pentaphobe, and you'll find it.

I just noticed they put a capital I in Sa'iyr, too, but I'll leave that correction to someone else!

Oh and 'noyse'? Just a word I came across - I have no idea if anyone uses it, but on Bob's 73rd birthday, with my 59th in the wind, being uncool could be the most fun on offer for us older critters... Happy Birthday Bob! Hi Lilikoi! Big up to Yo and Tilda! Hey, crap slang could be the new brown... James Brown that is! Wheeeeoooow!

G'night.

Jottings

The cold/flu has almost left my system (almost!) but I still cough as though it is trying to turn me inside out at times.

Back at work, however - the old Stoic training from my mum.

Just heard from another Star Wars fan site, which will be updating to include my Jabba work, etc - thanks to Leah for the care she has put into this. Nerf-Herders Anoymous.

The Quantum Psychology course has started with a bang...feels good to be mingling with brains I don't have to explain my weirdness to...

I hope you are all OK out there...big Hi to family, especially Yo and Tilda (I worry about the Atlantic on your walk into town) - Julia and all her 'spin-offs', and the Pentaphobe - long-lost friends and fans and family everywhere - whatever calendar you are on - whatever festivals you celebrate...

Good Will to all critters everywhere!

Up and Down Days

Phew - been down with a cold since last week. Very tiring, coughing.

It has cushioned me a little from the horror of nature at her wildest...maybe a blessing in disguise for a 'sensitive' empath. At least buying shelter and reconstruction bits for Christmas presents looks like a good idea right now - I am glad I did it, and encouraged others to do it, too.

One of my fellow students was ill for the week before the earthquake, as she is much more sensitive than me, and retains the pre-warning sense of earthquakes that animals display.

Or we are kidding ourselves.

Whatever.

Perhaps these events could work as an evolutionary driver - and push us in the direction of spending our wealth on livingry rather than weaponry. But I am not holding my breath, so long as phoney websites are being set up to scoop charitable donations from the gullible, and the wars grind on.

Happy New Year!

I forgot to wish you all a happy 2005 (Gregorian) - there I was thinking it was still the Year of the Monkey until February 9th, when it will be the Chinese New Year of the Rooster 4702.

"The legal code of the United States does not specify an official national calendar. Use of the Gregorian calendar in the United States stems from an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom in 1751, which specified use of the Gregorian calendar in England and its colonies. However, its adoption in the United Kingdom and other countries was fraught with confusion, controversy, and even violence. It also had a deeper cultural impact through the disruption of traditional festivals and calendrical practices."

According to a recent estimate, there are about forty calendars used in the world today.

According to 'Pataphysics, today is simply
6 Décervelage 132 de l'Ere Pataphysique
6 Décervelage 132 EP