Brazil has won the World Soccer Cup in what was, arguably, a brilliant game... The Germans never knew what hit them... Not that anyone here would know or care what soccer is, but still... It happened this morning, and I saw it. Congrats to Brazil... A country I've sworn to live in at some point in the relatively near future. Bear in mind, nevertheless, that in terms of the long lived, relatively near future goes a long way. In other words... Brazil, don't wait up...

For reasons which are not germane (get it? germane? LOL) to the current post, I've been asked to prove that I am a New Yorker. It's such a shame that the technology still isn't in the state that I envision it will be before too long. I would just love to encapsulate some of that indescribable smell, effluvia, miasma that pervades the subway undergrounds in NYC into this website. That'd prove I'm a native and know what I'm talking about. :)

Which begs the question... What is that smell? It's not totally objectionable, and in fact, smelling it after a long hiatus away from NYC is enough to bring a heartfelt tear to this (and any) New Yorker's eyes. There's a business idea! We could package it and sell it to homesick NYC ex-pats around the world...

Why are people so surprised at the shenanigans within Corporate America? Enron. WorldCOM. Martha Stewart. We all allowed this to happen. We created a system where companies were rewarded for their short term success by mindbogglingly high stock appreciation. Where analysts were remunerated according to their ability to place a stock on the market and trick people into buying it. Where auditors dared not go against the wishes of the audited company.

And then, suddenly, 'Oh, shit! Look at what happened! These people were lying and overstating financials...'

Has anyone ever heard of causality on this planet?

Someone please explain to me how setting up explosives with the sole purpose of killing 'wanted' Palestinians is any less of a terrorist action than a Palestinian blowing himself up amidst a crowd of Israelis. Is it just because in this case the Israeli(s) didn't have the decency of suiciding at the same time?

This is an attack on the freedom of the press and the public's right to know! I demand to be allowed to see the video! I insist they sell copies on DVD!

Today was my second day in my company's training course. It's a fascinating course. It really is. Without realizing I was doing it, I found myself, on several different occasions, smiling and nodding at what the instructor was saying, and murmuring softly, "How evil..."

Delaware, and this is probably true of most of the US, seems to be exactly the same as any other patch of land in this country. The access to fast and cheap transportation throughout the land has homogenized what used to be an infinite checkerboard of endless variety. It is now virtually useless to travel around the US for the purpose of seeing new things. Every place is just like every other place, the main difference being the exit number off the interstate. The US used to be eerily similar to what Robert Silverberg envisioned in Lord Valentine's Castle. Now it has lost its capacity to astonish.

As travel between the continents becomes cheaper and faster, this process will engulf the whole planet. It has already begun, but has been kept in check somewhat by the fact that the myriad elements which make up the plebe are still chained, for the most, to North America. The only way to avoid this is almost as bad as the problem, but looking all the more probable each day. I eagerly await, if only to see how the die will fall...

Now... I'm... off... to... De... la... ware.... Where.... every... one... speaks.... like.... this....

LOL Well, maybe not everyone... But seriously, the only Delaware native I've ever met spoke unbearably slow. Much like I typed above. He'd leave a voicemail 5 minutes long and that was just basically saying, 'Heeeeeeeelllllloooooooooo.... This..... is..... Bill.... De______............................... from..... Deeeeeeeelaaaaaaaaawaaaaaaaaareeeee'. At first I thought that he was under the (mistaken) impression that I was some sort of local, South American chimp who had learned English as a second language and so he had to speeeeeeeeeak slooooooooowly to me. All Americans (except me) think they can make others understand them if they just speak slowly enough. It's pathetically funny, and a grand source of amusement to the rest of the world. But I digress... I later had the chance to interact with this person more closely, made him aware that if anything, Spanish was a second language to me, but he continued to do it. I then compared notes with my boss at the time, as Anglo-Saxon as they come, the guy, and he also complained about Bill's mode of speech. Said it drove him nuts. We then decided that's how they all spoke in Delaware and left it at that. I'm now off on a field trip to discover if this is so. I will, of course, report back once I ascertain the truth. And hey! I'll even call Bill and say hello, how's that?

Well. I'm flabbergasted (I'd always wanted to actually use that word for real). I think I am about as close to Heaven as a man of my unique attributes, beliefs and past actions is likely to get. First I discovered I now have a humongous discount on books because of my new job, and my new client. Way cheaper than buying on, say, Amazon. Way, way cheaper... But then, I had already expected something of the sort, so that didn't actually gast my flabber. What up and gasted it was being led to a cubicle jam packed full of books, all kinds. And being told I could take as many or as few as I wanted, to keep. And furthermore, to check back frequently, you know, cause they're always bringing more in. Oh, and do excuse the lack of material in this other cubicle, as we haven't replenished the free movies in a while. Check back next week. I about dislocated my jaw when it bounced off the floor.

Even I couldn't afford to buy every single book I wanted to read before, there being so many, and me being such a fast reader. It's enough to make a guy actually start liking New Jersey...

There was a bus crash in Texas today, killing 5. It was full of children being sent to a Church group's summer camp. Amazing. Not the crash, you understand, but that there are still parents out there who entrust their kids to the Church. What do these people talk about at cocktail parties? "Oh, my kids? I sent them off for two weeks to be raped by priests. All their little buddies went, too"

The senile old fart in the Vatican is urging peace on to the Jews, Muslims and Christians in the Holy Land again. I guess all the fighting is preventing the priests there from banging all the little kids...

As a related aside, it seems the Israelis are about set to kill Arafat again... Once they do it, I wonder how long it'll take them to realize that Arafat's death won't change anything. They honestly seem to think it's Arafat sending in the suicide bombers.

You've just got to start admiring these guys... I mean, they have chutzpah... And, to be fair, at least he wasn't banging some 8 year old male child...

I've been doing some thinking on the lack of common sense, courtesy and honor present in today's world. The fact of the matter is that all the laws mankind has put in place in the last few centuries have disenfranchised those that had an ample supply of the characteristics I mentioned, while empowering those with an utter lack of them. While at different points in history the Code Duello has been abused, it served for a long time as a means of accountability over men's actions. In today's world, I can be a stupid, rude, dishonorable son of a bitch and for the most I am untouchable.

- If I am hurt as a result of my lack of common sense, I can sue for damages. Witness the many (successful) lawsuits by people hurt through their own stupidity yet who seem to think their stupidity should have been taken into account by the rest of us. Thus, it is to my advantage to be stupid.

- If I am rude, I either get my way because the rest of the people do not want to risk my further reactions if they disagree with me, or someone takes violent action to stop me/teach me manners and almost certainly ends up in jail because of it. Thus, it is to my advantage to be rude.

- If I am dishonorable, I get to take advantage of people, benefiting greatly in comparison to others who still obey the conventions of honorable behavior. Like the Enron management, for example. Thus, it is to my advantage to be dishonorable.

Behavior that is to one's advantage is passed on to subsequent generations, just like genetic traits.

This is evolution in action... My only problem with evolution is that it works too sloooooooooooooow...

I feel for the Smart family, and hope their little girl appears safe and sound, though I doubt it. I do have to take notice, though, of the gross unfairness of the coverage given their case. The media grasps on to one of these stories and builds it up until everything, it seems, must relate to the case. I don't have the time right now to research it, but it seems to me that many little girls must suffer through similar situations every week. Or every month.

Why does the media only give coverage to those cases where a) the little girl is an appetizing, little morsel or b) the family is loaded or c) they can create another circus like with the Ramsey girl? Are the other girls who disappear worthless pieces of shit? Is their parents's plight any less dramatic because they're not photogenic? Are the general viewers so callous that this has become their version of the soap opera? How is one case more newsworthy than the other? And who decides? I'd really like to know...

With that, I bid thee all adieu with my new catchphrase: New Jersey sucks big time!

Have a good weekend...

The Supreme Court has forbidden, listen well, the execution of the retarded. I didn't know our leaders, movie stars, newscasters, upper management and Southerners in general were in any danger of being executed. I wonder how I could've missed that?

In totally unrelated news, it seems a 'surprise' asteroid passed 'extremely close' to the Earth last week, but remained undetected until it had gone by. The aforementioned asteroid is about the size of a football field. I wonder if CNN is suggesting that the Interplanetary Soccer Championship is being played there simultaneous to our own, more modest effort. What strikes me as hilarious is the tone used throughout the article, one trying to induce a mild frisson of fright within the reader by using words such as surprise and extremely close to refer to what is a very modest sized piece of interplanetary crap which passed at 75,000 miles of the Earth. Geez, we might have dented a fender if we'd been just 74,999.5 miles closer, huh? It never ceases to amaze me, the lengths newscasters will go to in order to turn an insignificant newsbite into potential front page material.

I don't understand why this surprises or offends people. I'm slightly (fashionably) overweight myself, if that helps, but I can still easily fit within the confines of my chair on the plane. I have been extremely pissed off, complained and gotten an upgrade to first class several times when some fat piece of shit who can't fit in the aisle, much less the chair, sits next to me. Why should I have to suffer because of somebody else's excesses? And before someone says that in some cases, it's a disease, well, hell, that's not my fault either. They should be given a double chair to themselves. And if so, why should the airline have to give them two seats for the price of one? Nobody complains when they have to pay more for excess baggage, right? It's accepted. This is no different. Most of us Americans have become whiners and have somehow gotten the idea that life has to be kind to us... Wake up, folks... Smell the flowers... And guess what crapped on them, causing the smell you're experiencing... LOL

This is awesome (awesomely stupid, I mean)! The hero of the Korean team's win against Italy in the World Soccer Cup, Ahn, happens to play in il Perugia, an Italian Soccer Club. They've announced, in no uncertain terms, and with some pissed off language, that the Korean player will never set foot in Italy again! His contract with the Italian team will be cancelled. Talk about bad losers...

The Japanese and Koreans are poisoning the water and/or food and/or air that the good soccer teams get. There is no way in hell the U.S. should have been able to beat Mexico, no way in a million hells that the South Koreans could've managed to defeat Italy... And Argentina eliminated in the first round? Come on... Give me a break. Now we'll see the U.S. defeat Germany.

It boggles the mind...

New Jersey, I have found, is a nice, secluded, outdoorsy sort of place. Lots of woods, lots of lonely roads, and lots of highways with idiots whom I've already started to teach that I am a meaner driver than they are. I still don't know if I'll like NJ, or if it will feel like home. Very few places feel like home, or have felt like home to me. I don't even know whether I'll like the natives, or decide, on a whim, to stamp them out. So far, they haven't given offense, so maybe they'll survive.

I am convinced that totally new lifeforms are springing into existence in the Hudson River. One of these lifeforms consists entirely of smell...

Let the contest begin... I'm about to hit the road... Girls! On your marks... Get set.... GO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'll be driving up to NYC tomorrow, at some time, from Raleigh, NC. Why don't we have a Spot the Necromancer Contest on the highway? First cute chick that spots me gets to take me to the nearest motel for sex. How's that? Honk like this to let me know you think you won... HONK HONK HOOOOOOOOOOOONK And remember... Only cute chicks need apply...

Today's my last day on this particular job. Day job. I'm still a necromancer at night... I'm still evil...

While having lunch in the office cafeteria, I saw a woman I used to work with when I was in another group, and I called her over... Shit eating grin on my face, I said, 'Goodbye! It was good knowing you...' She looked at me, tears started welling up in her eyes... She totally lost it and started crying. I had no idea I was so important to this woman, whom, by the way, I hadn't laid eyes on in months.

That's when she told me she'd just been kicked out... Oh, well... I'm happy I'm out of here. I guess I can't expect everyone to be happy at once... LMAO

And that was a true story, kids...

Yesterday, a great, wonderful man died. One who taught me many things. One whom, I hope, will look down upon me from Heaven with pride. He leaves a great legacy, although I fear his successors are not up to the task. So sad...

Part Two of my prior post, for some reason, Blogger seems to hate my long posts...

And the fact that the U.S.'s security forces managed to capture this José Padilla person should not fool anyone into believing that this means we are safe. As Dick Cheney said recently, it is only a matter of time. There is no valid defense against a determined, terrorist fanatic who does not care if he is killed or captured. 99.9% effectiveness in catching them will not be good enough, and I doubt we can ever reach even that percentage of success.

Two solutions make themselves immediately apparent at this point. The first would be a massive decentralization of everything. Certainly the country is big enough to allow us to spread out a whole lot more than we already are. We would have to abandon the great cities, the New Yorks, the Washingtons, the San Franciscos. Only a big metropolis, or a massively important one where something valuable is concentrated, like Washington, D.C. (you are free to wonder if by this I mean our government, or the treasures in the Smithsonian) are attractive targets to this sort of terrorism. To do something like this in a small city would hurt, of course, but we'd just evacuate and go somewhere else. And I have to admit that I don't like this solution.

Part I

Well, this is a scenario that few envisioned during the Cold War. It's a sort of empowerment of the madman, similar to what Colonel Colt did for the common man. During a good part of the Cold War, almost everyone was certain that we would have a nuclear showdown at some point. The Mutual Assured Destruction, or MAD, doctrine was applauded. It's premise was that the population should be unprotected, vulnerable. Since both sides had enough nuclear capabilities to destroy the other many times over, whoever shot first would be assured of dying second. The remaining fear was that a sufficiently frightened/angry/dictatorial/insane government would care little about the assured destruction of its subjects and start a nuclear war anyway, or worse, that a computer malfunction (or even a meteorite hit) would trigger the launch of either of the two side's missiles, quickly followed by the retaliation of the other side.

Who, back then, seriously gave thought to the threat of a single religiously deluded idiot acquiring radioactive material and exploding it within a major population center, contaminating it for many years to come just to make a misguided point? This gives your everyday insane, religious fanatic almost as much power as the World Powers had/have, with none of the deterrents that kept them in check. And note that I'm not targeting the muslims only when I say fanatic, it is only a matter of time before fanatics of other faiths realize what a powerful equalizer this capability affords. Flaming sword, indeed...

And Part Three...

The second one is a radical one, and I know that few will favor it, but I have to admit I like it. Just let them do whatever they want to do. I don't mean relax our guard, by all means try to avoid it, but recognize that we can't prevent every single attempt. As soon as fanatic manages to get through, identify who he was, where he came from and what he was fighting for. He was a muslim, huh? Send a couple of bombers to some place, some shrine very sacred to the muslims. Level it. If people die, well, I guess it sucks to be them. Do not target Mecca, or any other place too sacred. We have to leave some credible threat standing in case an attack against us happens again. Yes, the rest of the world will be highly pissed off. I guess it sucks to be them, too. What use power if you don't use it? And what better use than in defense? I am sure that after the second or third time we blow up a sacred city, or shrine, or whatever, the Arabs will do a better job of policing their own people and rooting out fanatics on their own. This scheme will only work if it is applied with no exceptions, and with total callousness and disregard for anyone else. I definitely like it. Problem is, I doubt we, the country as a whole and the government as our representatives, have the guts to carry it off.

Therefore, I leave you not with a third solution, but with a very possible outcome of what will happen if none of the two solutions, or viable variants thereof, are adopted. Civilization will fall, yet again, and the barbarians at the gates will have their day once more. Since most of the unwashed, idiotic fanatics are incapable of supporting themselves without the West, it'll be a short day for them, but the damage will have been done. Let us hope the next civilization will do a better job of rooting out organized religion before it becomes a disease once more.

Lesson time, my children... Let's discuss Alchemy. I have read in numerous texts the proposition that alchemy is the forerunner of chemistry. That chemistry owes its start to the deluded alchemists of yore, whose succesors at some point realized the futility of transmutation and of obtaining the elixir of life, but did start noting and studying the properties of the different elements and their interactions. Bull-caca... Nothing further from the truth. Why does modern man insist on thinking his ancestors were retards? Alchemy and chemistry were both recognized as distinct sciences back in alchemy's heyday.

Mankind has, throughout the ages, discarded many fields of science, deeming them folly or simply sterile paths. And this was necessary. At that particular point in mankind's development it was necessary from a philosophical point of view that mankind make a choice. The mindset necessary for the advancement of rationalism and what we consider today as being science, required man to renounce certain beliefs as they were one the antithesis of the other. It is not necessary that thesis and antithesis be the one right and the other wrong, but it is easier on a developing mind for it to behave as if it were so. Mankind's mind was at such a point then. Had mankind embraced alchemy, it would almost surely have had to repudiate most of what we think of as science today. The world would be different, no doubt. And what we now consider mystical and arcane would be common and mundane. And viceversa.

Yet the alchemical knowledge has not been lost, and interest in these subjects is starting to rear its head, here and there. I feel sure there will come a day soon when some of the alchemical propositions will be demonstrated publicly. It'll be denied at first, of course. And subsequent instances will be dismissed as curious anomalies, proof that the universe can be eccentric. Slowly, mankind will come to see that matter does behave in an unnatural manner if it is heated in certain ways for very long periods of time. And that the effects of doing this in the dark are different than when done under light. Experimentation will be done. Things will be learnt and incorporated into our accepted body of knowledge.

Fulcanelli will be hailed by all as a modern pioneer... Which is his rightful place.

Part of the failure of our security outfits, such as the CIA, and the FBI, as regards the terrorist attacks collectively known as September 11, had really nothing to do with the terrorist threat at all. Our security forces have been becoming more and more inefficient for a long time now. I am still not blaming them for September 11, mind you, I stand by what I said before, that the huge amount of information, mostly useless, that is gathered makes it a virtual impossibility to process and filter out the gems from the dreck within a reasonable timeframe. What I am saying is that common sense, intelligence and analytical reasoning have gone the way of the Passenger Pigeon.

A case in point is the missing child who was found in a pool 2 days after having disappeared. A pool that had been searched, presumable not only by policemen, but by the kid's friends and family. So it's not only our security forces who have gotten stupider. Only you expect them to be smarter. You expect the people watching out for you to be part of an elite. The kid's friends and family have a right to be stupid, God bless their average American hearts.

So how could the kid's body not be seen in the pool by his near and dear? And then, a fact which irks me no end, not be discovered by the many cop types that canvased the whole area, including the pool? And a pool technician did some chemical treatment to the pool as well, the following day, and did not see the child's body. He's the only one with a good excuse, he wasn't supposed to be looking for the kid. My opinion is that the police have been trained so much on proper procedure, and have been forced to rely so much on high tech gadgets, that not a single cop even thought of just looking into the pool to see if anything could be seen, much less having someone swim down to check the bottom. And then we expect these very same people to actually analyze data from multiple sources and figure out that a terrorist attack against the country is going to be carried out? We should be grateful that the terrorists are a bunch of deluded camel humpers. If they were actually smart, they'd have taken over the country already.

New tourist attraction... Visit England and get fucked by a dolphin!