New Year's Resolutions

I feel the urge, nay the need, to make some New Year's resolutions. I don't know why. I don't know why. Perhaps, it's because I'm living in a new state and working a new job. Perhaps, it is truly time for new beginnings and an end to old habits. In my life I've always cast off the old when moving, like a worn cloak in need of too many darnings.
Perhaps, too, I am of an age now when one begins to think of death and the fact that I have well and truely passed into the downward arc of my life expectancy. And I look at my accomplishments so far and wonder if I've really done anything worthy of note. I look at my past and wonder how I lived to be this age. I look at my family and friends and wonder what they would have to say as my pall was lowered from shoulders and placed onto the ground awaiting final internment. And I think, "Not enough".

So, with this in mind, I make the following resolutions:

1. From now on I will fire only warning shots from my rifle unless it's being done in self-defense.

2. As of tomorrow I will not drink before noon unless I began the night before.

3. Starting tomorrow, I will show my friends all of the respect I think they are due.

4. From this point on I will no longer leave the blinds open when I masturbate to internet porn.

5. Tonight is the last time I will call George Bush a bitch-ass knob goblin.

6. Tomorrow I will begin calling George Bush many other things.

7. I resolute that next year I will stop obsessing about Sandra Bullock having sex with someone other than me.

8. Be it resolved for 2006 that I will go back to obsessing about Liv Tyler, Uma Thurman, Penelope Cruz, Paz Vega, Samantha Morton, Joan Cusack, Milla Jovovich, Chinese chicks, Audra MacDonald, Bernadette Peters, Laura Dern, and Fay having sex with men other than me.

9. I will never again (from midnight on) say "never again" again. I promise. Never again.

10. I will work to love those around me who love me first.

11. I resolve that I will never resolve to do anything that I am not capable of resolving while sober.

12. I will try to be sober more often.

13. In about an hour and a half I will beginning calling the cat Wetto and that will be that.

george bush is a bitch-ass knob goblin. bitch-ass knob goblin. bitch-ass knob goblin.

sandra, you two-timing bad boy bitch hussy. i coulda made you happy...in an anne heche coming to fresno in a drug hazed sort of way.

never again.

UPDATE: (10;26 PM)

Resolutions For 2007:

1. 12 and 13.

Common Goals

whoopsie. it seems that the house of representatives is at it again. unhappy that the president's illegal wiretapping has not led to any uncovering of real live bona fide terrorists other than a catholic school group and a box of Quaker Oats, it has decided to try and make it a federal crime (punishable by up to 5 years in prison) for...well, feeding the poor. nourishing the sick. clothing the children. all of those things that Jesus yada'd about.
you remember Jesus. he was that kind of homeless guy with no paper identification, he roused the rabble, sometimes depended on the kindness of strangers, spoke out against tyranny and foreign occupation, loved his brother, talked of camels being more flexible than rich folks. you know...yada. communist crap. evil-doer pap. enemy comforter stuff.
so, now our elected representatives are banding together and making sure that no one of his ilk can get to us real Americans and poison our minds unless he was born here and has an SSN number and can be tracked in the event that another law is passed letting us excommunicate the homegrown variety.
because it's the illegals that threaten our democracy. all of those brown skinned undocumented aliens out there in the field pretending to pick lettuce and grapes, but really passing along secret plans about overthrowing our way of life. keeping their backs and eyes lowered in false humility as we drive by in our cars, but really fingering their vest bombs and sawed-off uzis. thinking bloody thoughts and waiting to eat our young once they've gotten their daily quota of oranges picked.
i sleep better knowing i'm safer than i was yesterday. i walk taller now that i know only a real American is allowed to kill me legally. now i can rest in the comfort of only fearing real Americans. i now only have to fear my neighbors. and the meth dealers. and the white supremicists. and the ultra-religious. and the bigots. and the narrow-minded. and the haters. and the government.
but it's all good, because if this bill passes all of my fear will be associated only with real Americans. and that is a relief. because real Americans are much easier to recognize. we're the ones waving real American flags. we're the ones driving SUV's. we're the ones supporting our troops. we're the ones processing household chemicals into addictive substances. we're the ones spreading democracy around the world while shaving away civil liberties at home. we're the ones who see innocent humans as collateral damage. we're the ones who create kill-em-all video games and then rate them M for Mature so only mature people can play. we're the ones who offer death bonuses to soldiers and the balk at paying off. we're the ones who promise armor for bodies and humvees and then don't do anything. we're the ones who speak of compassion for all, but excoriate the poor for being poor. we're the ones who break the law and then say that it's okay, because God's on our side. we're the ones who punish the dissenter and reward the sinner.
we're the ones who think a 70-year-old man has a natural right to an artificial erection. we're the ones injecting ass fat into our faces, because there's nothing worse than looking one's age. let alone acting it.
we're becoming the Romans. not that the enemy is becoming Jesus. i don't think that Jesus or God would want any part of what we as a world are becoming.
but we're becoming the Romans as we (more and more) fear ourselves and our ability to make rational, informed, common sense decisions about the immediate world we live in. so long as we blindly follow and do what we're told we will always live in fear. and that's exactly what our leaders and their enemies want.
i love being an American. i just wish i could be a better one.
"Churches, social service agencies and immigration groups across the country are rallying against a provision in the recently passed House border-security bill that would make it a federal crime to offer services or assistance to illegal immigrants."
"America is a nation built on the rule of law, and this bill will help us protect our borders and crack down on illegal entry into the United States," Mr. Bush said after the House passed the measure. "Securing our borders is essential to securing the homeland."

Anus Horribilus?

"it is the very nature of a democracy that it not only does, but should, fight with one hand tied behind its back. It is also in the nature of democracy that it prevails against its enemies precisely because it does."
i love that quote. the rest of the article is here.

Have A Cracking Good New Year

(best of? not so sure about that. but then most of mine are dubious. so, i will leave you to greet the new year with my special smile. in hindsight, it makes sense.)
so, i work in an engineering lab. i've been doing this for 5 years now and have become way too proficient in the knowledge of soils and concrete (what it is, does, doesn't want to and shouldn't under any circumstances). if you land safely on an airport runway or arrive safely after a long or short road trip; if you survive an earthquake, because your building didn't collapse...you can thank me in part).
but it wasn't until i came to my current employer that i began to really learn about the black stuff your wheels grip. with that in mind, i present to you this pictorial tribute to my current passion. the stuff that keeps you safe. the road of happy returns: Ass-Fault. because no man should drive there alone.
HNT is a good thing. visit all of them. now, dammit!

Heidi-Ho

Rep. Norm Dicks gets an introduction from me to let him know that i live in his neighborhood now:

Dear Mr. Dicks, I write to you in a state of confusion. It's always been my understanding that no one is above the law. That is supposed to include the president of the United States. Perhaps, that should especially include the Prsident. And not too many years ago we proved that to former President Clinton. He was impeached for lying about an extra-marital affair. This time around, however, President Bush seems to be skating away from a much bigger lie. To wit, he had been approving unwarranted wiretapping in secret even as (and long before) he issued the following quote: "Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires - a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so"- George W. Bush April 20, 2004. This is not sex in the Oval Office. This is not parsing the definition of "is". What Bush has done is lie baldfaced to all of America about breaking a federal law. And he then continued to break it up until the present. He didn't just state the law, he told us he was following it. My confusion stems from the fact that you call the Republican party the Moral Party. Remember when your party said it was going to bring morality back to the White House? Why aren't you now going after Bush and holding him accountable for his lie? Democrats and Liberals (and, yes, there is a difference)alike would applaud you for sticking to your higher agenda. To not do so will bring you back down to where you were before gaining control of our government. As a representative of the people, you either stand firm for what makes our country great or you hide behind the colors of your party. You can choose to be an American or you can choose to be a party liner.It's your choice, but voters like me will remember your actions or lack thereof.

(this is not part of the letter)
also, Sen. John McCain wants high school students to decide whether Intelligent Design should be taught in their schools. Normally, this type of thinking would be considered an extremely liberal way of life. those colleges that let this happen tend to not be taken seriously by any other. evergreen state college comes to mind. but, if we let them decide on this, then i think it only fair that we allow them to vote on the drinking age, the voting age, the driving age, letting military recruiters on campus or not, condoms in the cafeteria...well, you see where i'm going with this. in short, it sounds like a political move by mccain to continue straddling the fence until he knows for sure who he needs to truly appease when it's voting time. not that i don't think children can't make an informed decision. i just don't see how the parents will stay out of it.

Oh. Did We Tread On Your Italian Loafers?

oh wow. the chicago tribune is reporting this. a serious mainstream newspaper is telling us just how bad the CIA fucked up. i mean, this is bad. i knew about the operation. i knew about the indictments. but this is the first time i got to read exact details of how it went down and just HOW BADLY THE CIA SCREWED IT UP. unfortunately, it could lend credence to the white house when it says it relied on the CIA for pre-war clearance. all in all, a mesmerizing read. almost straight out of a bad james bond book.

MILAN, Italy -- The trick is known to just about every two-bit crook in the cellular age: If you don't want the cops to know where you are, take the battery out of your cell phone when it's not in use.Had that trick been taught at the CIA's rural Virginia training school for covert operatives, the Bush administration might have avoided much of the current crisis in Europe over the practice the CIA calls "rendition," and CIA Director Porter Goss might not have ordered a sweeping review of the agency's field operations.

and this one made me laugh out loud. huzzah for harry holimas!

THE good news today is that the great 2005 war on Christmas, the conflagration that launched a thousand op-ed pieces and nearly as many battles on Fox News, is now officially over. And yes, Virginia - Christmas won.

and then i find this article on a major corporation trying to whore in on street taggers and graffiti artists. evidently, t.v., billboards, newspaper flyers, junk mail and random spam mails just earning the bread for Sony investors. now, the giant is tagging walls in violation of local law. to declare that the target consumer is too busy playing Grand Theft Auto to pay attention to its newest toy is basically saying that Sony sells to morons. however, what Sony is trying to sell us is that its consumer base is the street tagger, the hip guy on the street, the next wave in fashion. and this is the very guy who would tell Sony to stick its "lollipop" up its ass and call him/it a fag based on the imagery.
"gee willikers, beav, i think the retard's fallen in love with his dad's swat stick."
also, the kid on the wall looks positively stoned out of his mind. perhaps the gameplayer was swabbed with one of those mayan toads for visual enhancement.
by the way, has anyone else noticed that the more mature rating a game has the lower i.q. it takes to play it?
"Marketers are desperate to find ways to reach people," Garfield said. "Especially young men, who are far too busy playing Grand Theft Auto to notice, say, a 30-second TV commercial."

All The King's Men

i can't vouch for the article, but it does fall in line with arguments i've made here and in newspapers. depleted uranium (DU) is a nuclear weapon. in the first gulf war, we left behind between 500 and 1000 metric tons of its dust. i have no legitimate numbers concerning this war, but pre-estimates were in the range of 1000-2000 metric tons.
the thing is DU makes a great weapon point, because it begins to burn extremely hotly and can pierce tempered steel like that which is used to plate tanks. the only problem is that it continues to burn. forget what it will do to the skin if it makes contact in that state. the real concern is what it can do in particulate form (after it's done burning). DU is depleted uranium, a radioactive substance. it cannot be thrown away by nuclear power plants. it has a long half-life and must be stored for lengths of time that greatly surpass our own lifetimes. if it is ingested through the lungs it can and often will cause fatal cancers. more often, it causes organ failure. and immune system deficiencies. and birth defects. but, because we tip our standard armaments with it, we can claim we are not using nuclear weapons or weapons of mass destruction. you see, a little bit of this stuff in your lungs might not do anything. standing near it will not cause your testicles or ovaries to fall off. but live around it for any extended period of time and your chances of serious or fatal disease becomes very likely. besides malnutrition, DU is blamed by many health agencies as the leading cause of death and birth defect of iraqi children since 1991.
there is and will continue to be argument as to whether using a depleted radioactive substance counts as nuclear warfare. one, the government would have to admit accountability (legally, morally and financially); two, 1991 was the first time this weapon was deployed (so there is no precedent). three, we think of nuclear warfare as mushroom clouds and thousands dead in an instant.
i think that this use falls into the weapons of mass destruction category. why? because it is more insidious and subtler. and will affect many times more people than a nuclear bomb ever could. and no one will know until it's too late. at least, the people breathing the stuff won't. those of us on this side of the ocean should. but we're content to wave our protest banners and shout out slogans about how we've been against the war since the beginning. sort of like putting a magnet ribbon on a car to invoke patriotism. words and slogans. while hundreds of thousands of people are exposed to possible cancer and worse.
isn't it about or past time to demand that our leaders hold themselves to the same standards that they do other leaders of other countries? i'm not against war per se. sometimes a country has to stop another for the greater good. that's our history as a species. but how can we justify force to stop "evil" if we participate in the very acts we accuse the others of doing? we found no weapons of mass destruction in iraq, but we are leaving the mother of all WMDs in our wake.
any of you reading this can call me to task by asking for stats backed by reference. and i can't give it to you. because there are none. not for the illnesses. not for the iraqi children (and, by now, adults). the government does not accept that DU causes illness. no independent groups have been (to my knowledge) allowed unfettered access to those people affected. the news is all anecdotal. the stats are anecdotal. even the scientists and doctors who back my claims state that we may not know the total truth for decades, because radioactive illnesses can take a long time. as for the iraqi children... no one keeps track of how they die above noting time and probable cause of death (which normally looks like malnutrition). not to mention that most iraqi families have no access to doctors. the children grow sick and die. the family wails and buries within 24 hours. where have i been going with this? well, it just seems that all sides of the so-called debate about this war of ours has concentrated itself within the guise of "liar liar pants on fire" or "it's our god-given duty". no one in the mainstream is looking at this from a humanitarian perspective and what the future holds for all of those who are actually there.
well, harry holimas. i and my mimosa (which i drink in the relative safety of my house) salute you and yours and hope you have a SSM-curmudgeon-free weekend.
cheers!