Things I've Learned Today

You can freeze eggs.

The Earth is becoming more or less invisible to alien intelligent life. Since the switch to digital from analog television last year, we're sending less and less information over radiation waves. We'd be almost undetectable were it not for the 2 watts we're still transmitting over a long distance, not much more than that of a cell phone.

Eight Rules for Writing Fiction, by Kurt Vonnegut

1. Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.
2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.
3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.
4. Every sentence must do one of two things — reveal character or advance the action.
5. Start as close to the end as possible.
6. Be a sadist. Now matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them — in order that the reader may see what they are made of.
7. Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.
8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To heck with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.

From CorpWatch: in the case Citizens United v. FEC, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that corporations have a First Amendment right to spend unlimited amounts of money to influence election outcomes.
Money from Exxon, Goldman Sachs, Pfizer and the rest of the Fortune 500 is already corroding the policy making process. Now, the Supreme Court tells these corporate giants that they have a constitutional right to trample our democracy.

The Guardian UK says that Oil Companies are now more dangerous than ever.

I instantly loved the art of Kelly Vivanco!

Cuzco

The place where Mormons have "confirmed" was Nephi's City, a religiously significant site in LDS scripture, is Cuzco Mexico.

I rejected the whole religion a long time ago.

Cuzco has the highest ultra-violet level on Earth.

What does that mean?

Memories of Alternative Futures

Have you ever looked up an old friend, or a town you moved away from, or an old love, only to be surprised by your own intense nostalgia? I recently found the blog of an acquaintance I'd lost touch with. Their life - every single aspect of it - was founded on principles that I'd long ago abandoned. I had no idea who I was then; all I knew was that I enjoyed this person immensely. Something felt natural and right; when we lost touch, none of those principles felt right anymore.Reading this person's blog was like looking at the world upside down. It's dizzying to recall something that never happened, with remorse, and to know that because of one bad call, someone else was living my life. As I saw the photos they posted, the smiles, the stories... all of it was familiar. The bike lanes, the diner, the piles of laundry, the railroad tracks. All of these memories I shouldn't have.

Boys and Girls Together

Boys don't want to be princes.

Boys want to be shepherds who slay dragons,

maybe someone gives you half a kingdom and a princess,

but that's just what comes of being a shepherd boy

and slaying a dragon. Or a giant. And you don't really

even have to be a shepherd. Just not a prince.

In stories, even princes don't want to be princes,

disguising themselves as beggars or as shepherd boys,

leaving the kingdom for another kingdom,

princehood only of use once the ogre's dead, the tasks are done,

and the reluctant king, her father, needing to be convinced.

Boys do not dream of princesses who will come for them.

Boys would prefer not to be princes,

and many boys would happily kiss the village girls,

out on the sheep-moors, of an evening,

over the princess, if she didn't come with the territory.

Princesses sometimes disguise themselves as well,

to escape the kings' advances, make themselves ugly,

soot and cinders and donkey girls,

with only their dead mothers' ghosts to aid them,

a voice from a dried tree or from a pumpkin patch.

And then they undisguise, when their time is upon them,

gleam and shine in all their finery. Being princesses.

Girls are secretly princesses.

None of them know that one day, in their turn,

Boys and girls will find themselves become bad kings

or wicked stepmothers,

aged woodcutters, ancient shepherds, mad crones and wise-women,

to stand in shadows, see with cunning eyes:

The girl, still waiting calmly for her prince.

The boy, lost in the night, out on the moors.

-Neil Gaiman

I Carry Your Heart With Me

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in
my heart) i am never without it (anywhere
i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)
i fear
no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want
no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

-E.E. Cummings

Why is Carrie Underwood Marrying Teen Wolf?

"I want a groom, good food, and an open bar." Carrie Underwood, talking about her dream wedding. But really? This guy? Just goes to show you never can tell, as they say.

Quote by Unknown

"Unless it is mad, passionate, extraordinary love, it's a waste of time. There are too many mediocre things in life - love should not be one of them."
Love feels like "Static Grate" a song by B Fleischmann that played in the office ten minutes ago.Enzo Emanuele and coworkers reported the protein molecule known as the nerve growth factor (NGF) has high levels when people first fall in love, but these return to previous levels after one year.

Philosopher Gottfried Leibniz said that love is "to be delighted by the happiness of another."

Couldn't Find the Song

I have a great deal of love and fear for abandoned places. I want to know their stories, but I like making up my own creepy stories in the mean time.


I googled combinations of its lyrics and it sounded like Bob Dylan. No such luck. It's one of thoooose days, huh?

I told myself today, as I walked up the steps into the office, that today was going to be a GOOD ONE. I would work my butt off, I would be proud of myself, I would be happy and despite it's best efforts, the universe would not hold me asunder. I was wrong. Well played, universe.


I bought a print from Missed Connections today. I lovelovelove this site. I hope to collect them all. To me, there's something darling about reading Craigslist's Missed Connections and it turns out I am not alone.

Cute New Emoticons in No Particular Order

(9_9) Didn't sleep last night.

('o') singing

(><) ouch

(=_=) bored

(o_O) incredulous

(!__!) sad

(<>..<>) alien

(X_X) dead

\\(*O*)// cheering

Our Sacred so and so's

Under my love
Wake up to your window
The day calls in billows
It's echoing moonlight on to the blue nightmare of your heart
In cosy red rainbow
It's shaking off halos
And the memory of our sacred so and so's

Oh take my hand sweet
Complete your release and bury your feet
And married we'll be
Alone in receiving ours is a feeling not that they would see
They don't know that we could be
That way your cradle escaped the sea
And your raven haired Mama cought told you so's

Were laying in the shadow of your family tree
Your haunted heart and me
Brought down by an old idea whose time has come
And in the shadow of the gallows of your family tree
There's a hundred hearts soar free
Pumping blood to the roots of evil to keep it young

Ah me all mine
Is it safe to say that we've waited patiently
Call me on time
And recall the tune that has place us gracefully
All into line
There's the garden grave and a place they've saved for you
I'll fall by your side
Though your silver haired Mama throws told you so's

Were laying in the shadow of your family tree
Your haunted heart and me
Brought down by an old idea whose time has come
And in the shadow of the gallows of your family tree
There's a hundred hearts soar free
Pumping blood to the roots of evil to keep it young

And now we'll gather in the shadow of your family tree
In haunted harmony
Brought down by an old idea whose time has come
And in the shadow of the valley of your family tree
There's a hundred hearts soar free
Pumping blood to the roots of evil to keep us young

-TV on the Radio "Family Tree"