St. Cynicus

I’ve always heard that a person should mind their actions carefully in the course of their day-to-day life, because God (or Santa Claus, depending on age at the time) is constantly watching. Being beyond childhood, I’ve abandoned Santa Claus as a potential threat to my happiness. And, being a staunch agnostic, I tend to look on God as more of an intellectual endeavor than a source of retribution. But occasionally I stop and reflect on something that I might be doing, and, just as a lark, ask myself whether God might approve. According to what I’ve been told of His nature and general disposition, this is doubtful, regardless of the activity. Despite my lack of any religious conviction whatever, this realization never fails to give me pause. But then it occurs to me: If God is all that he is purported to be, then there is not one blasted thing that I could possibly do, no matter how despicable or deplorable, to damage Him in any way at all. Thus, it should make precious little difference WHAT I choose to do at any given time, for all the harm I could cause. And, further, if He has the power to observe me, certainly it is also within His power to avoid doing so, should He find what He sees to be distasteful. So why am I going to so much trouble to pretend to be respectable?
Just a thought...

A Very Good Question

The other day, a child approached me on the street and said hello. I of course responded with one or another of the customary responses to this greeting. But she--a dirt-smudged girl of about seven or so--went right on staring at me. I began to grow nervous, because you can never tell who might be a covert assassin or an undercover Avon salesbeing. I proceeded to watch the girl out of the corner of my eye and practicing various alarmed and/or frightened facial expressions, just in case I had need to put one on in a big hurry. When, after a few seconds she failed to produce a firearm or a sample case, I turned to face her again. Not knowing what else to do, I stared back, putting every square inch of my countenance into a look that would have made a schizophrenic wallaby twitch. The average adult would have lost neural function. Apparently children, owing to their fundamental insanity and their 90%-sugar body chemistry, are impervious to this. So, while I attempt to reassemble my facial features, this grubby little ragamuffin grins up at me and asks, deadpan, "Are you a Mexican?" This was precisely the sort of question that I, under no circumstances, would have anticipated being asked. I gaped at her in a manner similar to that in which a goldfish might gape at the north face of the Federal Reserve building. Eventually I managed to babble, "No." I am not, in fact, either a citizen of or descended from any peoples native to that nation. Nor have I, a rather distractingly average Caucasian, ever been mistaken for anything else, save a piece of furniture once. I was fairly surprised. The girl seemed to attach no particular importance to any answer I might have given, affecting a lack of concern that bordered on catatonia. She, apparently, was just curious.
I wonder what she'd have done if I'd said yes?

Work Ahead (Sort Of)

In case it has not yet become painfully clear, I am something of a rank amateur in the field of web design and publishing. This is true in much the same way that an aardvark might be considered an amateur the field of quantum mechanical theory. I have great plans for this blog in the future. That is, I don't have any specific NEGATIVE plans, as of yet. But it's going to take a while. In the meantime, please kindly ignore the lack of any redeeming aesthetic qualities, dearth of technical functionality, and absolute content vacuum. I appreciate your continued reading.
May the logic be with you.

Profundity and Fruit

From Stephen Hawking's The Universe in a Nutshell:

As one goes back in time, the cross sections of our past light cone reach a maximum size and begin to get smaller again. Our past is pear-shaped.

That just about say it all, doesn't it?

Literary Dissidence

I am currently making an effort to re-read Mark Twain's Letters From the Earth. I strongly recommend it to anyone wishing to see Christian theology, as well as quite a few other things, dealt with in a most irreverent, at yet astute, manner.
Christians--especially closed-minded ones--be warned: The Creator is not spared a single shot, and this is not a Dean Martin roast. Be prepared to think, and laugh, hard one way or another.

Holy Abberrant Anthropology, Batman!

I recently had the opportunity to serve circuit court jury duty for the first time. Now, before you all mob me for autographs, I must regrettably inform you that it is nowhere near as glamorous as Hollywood would have you believe. There were no Clarence Darrow-esque orations, no dramatic gavel-banging condemnations, no John Grisham-style cloak and dagger shenanigans, and, most depressingly, no multi-million-dollar sequel rights. At least, I assume not. I never even got pulled from the juror pool. The closest I got to the American legal system was sitting in the back of a courtroom squinting at a haggard middle-aged woman trying to determine whether or not I thought she was guilty. No, no, of course I mean, trying to determine if I was familiar with her in any way which might adversely affect my ability to sit in the jury box mentally attiring the court staff in clown outfits and composing obscene verses to Dr. Seuss rhymes. If you think I'm kidding, you obviously have had no exposure to modern jurisprudence. It would seem, at first, that this would be detrimental to the legal process-- and probably it would be, if not for the fact that the counsel for both parties routinely fill the court's time by competing to see who can string together the greatest number of successive nonsense words while still keeping a straight face. But when you observe some of the individuals routinely posted to an average jury, you will quickly determine that the further removed from the actual decision-making process a jury can be kept, the better for all parties involved. Consider, if you will, this small cross-section of the group of prospective jurors of which I was a member:

• The volunteer fireman/EMT who, by his own admission, derived great pleasure from attending the scene of residential fires, and who seemed more interested in preceding other emergency medical units to a call than actually attending the victims.
  
• The late-middle-aged man who seemed genuinely dismayed at being denied the privilege of passing judgment in a murder case
  
• One admittedly great guy who, I am almost certain, chose to partake of some combustible botanical matter other than tobacco during at least one smoking break.
  
• The two or three older gentlemen who seemed never to actually leave the courthouse, remaining always congregated in one spot or another swapping miserable-life stories.
  
• The pompous, self righteous young Christian woman who took pride in ministering endlessly to anyone who would listen, while never once forgoing to laugh at the distinctly "adult-oriented" humour of another member of the group.
  
• The woman who behaved so eccentrically as to elicit comment from the man who appeared to be perpetually stoned for four days.

...and so on.
As you can see, the law is in fact much better off for having been denied the direct input of average American jurors. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go and finish writing the last few verses of "Horton Leers at Hooters".

Think on.

Patience, Please

I realize that thus far I have posted naught but useless verbosity and documentation of my various technical misadventures. I do, however, intend, at some time before the sun cools significantly, to begin the actual weblog portion of this weblog.

Trust me...

Resume DEFCON 4

So far as I can dertemine at present, there are no further malfunctions in the commenting system. I haven't the slightest idea what the cause of the difficulty was, but it seems to have passed as soon as I erased the script from my source code and re-inserted it. Thus, I must, unfortunately, assume personal responsibility for any failure based on my own ineptitude. Ah, well. As all is now apparently five-by, I welcome any and all communications. As the link says, "Speak and be heard."

Peace.

Technical Difficulties

As of right now, commenting is nonfunctional. I've scoured the boards at HaloScan. Apparently Blog*Spot is not naturally conducive to the running of the comment-host code, as several people are reporting having the same problem. I've also put out a note to the Blogger/Pyra techs, and I hope to have everything up and running as soon as possible.

Blogging for Spite

I've noticed something. It makes no difference how little you have to say, or how pointless and/or innane it might be, if you publish it in some dort of mass media, people will read it. And, what's more, they will BELIEVE it. It's true. Someone, somewhere, will believe anything. When first I realized this, I was somewhat dismayed. In my opinion, this demonstrated a fundamental failure in the human intellect. If people are, in fact, willing to be led about by the cerebrum by anyone with typesetting capabilities, the species is doomed to forever pander to something less than the highest common denominator. But then I thought, SOMEONE has to wield this power. And, as with any power, those who grasp it first are invariably those least qualified to have it. So my next though, obviously, was: Why not me?

The Prodigal Pedant Returns

Some of you out there might, perchance, have read a miserable, aborted one-entry attempt at a blog bearing the unlikely title of "Improbability's March". You will then no doubt notice that the byline was that of none other than yours truly.

**pause for applause and cheers to die down**

That's right. I have, for good or bad, returned. And I come aremed with a new blog, which looks, as you certainly have noticed, almost exactly like the last one. This is by design, I assure you. That, and I have proven to be far too lazy and uncreative to actually complete my own template. I decided on the new title mostly at random, as is my wont. I don't know precisely what it means, but I'm sure I'll think of something. I guess some might be given to wonder just why I felt the need to begin a new blog (I HATE that word, incidentally). After all, I couldn't even be bothered to actually use the first one for any better purpose than occupying valuable Pyra bandwidth so that it couldn't fall into "the wrong hands"--more on this at a later time. In answer to these inquisitive individuals, I can only say: "Look out! There's an economist behind you!" Now, I am aware that this makes no sense whatsoever. But you must admit that it provides much in the way of distraction, no? As for how I plan to conduct this little foray into electronic personality dissemination, we will all find out together. I have no specific plans as yet. I may post anything from my philosophical deviations to my views on politics to random vitriolic opinion-spewings to lists of my least favorite newspaper columnists and/or laundry detergents. I may not post every day, and I won't promise anything useful when I do. I won't even guarantee lucidity, just to err on the side of caution. In other words, what you find here I urge you to read, but at your own hazard.
Anyway, I have re-embarked on the weblogging phenomenon, way behind the curve, but moving fast.
Moving, at any rate.

Happy hunting,
ML