Seeing Things In CSI: Las Vegas “Sheltered”

Posted on April 8, 2013 | Leave a comment

SPOILER ALERT.  I was watching CSI: Las Vegas with my wife and teenager last night, the 4/2 episode “Sheltered.”  (For the record, I’m not a super-fan.  I had to look that up.)  The first act suspect is a a bomb-shelter-living character subjected to a sketchy search by the CSI team.  His attorney has all the evidence against him deemed inadmissible.  I said, “I think they’re jumping to conclusions about this guy.” My wife says, “Of course the Democrat over here thinks the cops are at fault.”*

She was just messing around, but she started a conversation about the law and the degree to which different people value the need to insure that the rights of every man are protected.  My wife is comfortable with collateral damage – a few innocent people getting pinched and some rights getting trampled to get more criminals behind bars.  I’m much better with a few criminals getting away if it means that we can be sure nobody’s rights are disregarded.

Both my wife and my daughter said that they could never represent a guilty man in court.  I, on the other hand, said that I could do it and sleep like a baby (especially if I could do so on the grounds of illegal search and seizure).

As the story unfolded, my prediction turned out to be right.  It turned out that the man and his daughter were the victims of a violent crime who retreated from the world in an underground bunker to stay safe.  At the end of the episode they decide to leave the shelter and move to a small town in Oregon to start a new life in the larger world.  It was a great metaphor and a good story (good job Michael FX Daley).

One cannot live in fear and isolation.  Fear is the twisting and perverting fire that heats the shield so that it can be all too easily pounded into a sword.  The entire purpose of Law should be to defend and protect.  Not just from criminals, but from police, judges, prejudice, and general unfairness.

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*My wife as much interest in politics as I have in fashion.  Her political sorter has three bins: Democrat, Republican, and Communist.  I don’t know what I am, but it ain’t one of those three.  If the Libertarians and the Green Party had babies I might be one of those.

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Next Novel Behind Schedule (and a little teaser)

Posted on April 4, 2013 | Leave a comment

Writing Progress 130326Somehow I’ve managed to get behind on the next novel.  It’s not like this is my first book, but it’s still hard to hit the 1,000 words per day quota when you’re working a full time job, participating in a martial arts club, raising kids, maintaining a blog (and whining about how you’re behind schedule), etc.

Time to buckle down.

This is going to be a bigger book than the last one, and not just in terms of total words.  It’s got more characters, more layers of perspective, and more complexity.

The 14th Mansion is story of three unlikely characters — a homeless man, a biker, and a witch — trying find a lost college student who may have fallen prey to a serial killer.  It has strange plot turns, twisted villains, occult themes, sex, profanity, and at every moment the threat of violence and doom.   It’s a dark book punctuated with points of light in the form of humor and the possibility of redemption.

And if I can get back on schedule, it will be released in July.

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The Moon Right Before Sunrise

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Posted on April 3, 2013 in Green

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More Simple Lunch Ideas

Posted on March 29, 2013 | Leave a comment

For those of you doing the low carb thing (or some variant such as the 4HB slow carb diet, the paleo diet, etc.) here are a couple of lunch suggestions:

Try the Wholly Guacamole single serving packs.  They’re affordable, delish, and a nice balance of convenience and nutrition.  You get 6 for about $4.00.  Throw one in your lunch bag with some some snow pea pods and carrots.  A great alternative to ranch dressing or some other empty calorie dip.

Here’s another healthy main course you can make with 5 ingredients or less:

Broccoli Bacon Chicken Salad

3 cups diced free range chicken
3 cups thinly sliced broccoli
1/4 cup real bacon bits (not imitation!)
Olive oil mayo to desired consistency

Bake chicken at 375 for about an hour and fifteen minutes or until it reads 190 on your meat thermometer.  Allow to cool, skin, and dice.  Wash and slice broccoli very thin.  Combine with chicken, add olive oil mayo and bacon, and stir.

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The Templar Papers by Oddvar Olsen

Posted on March 27, 2013 | 1 comment

I just read The Templar Papers edited by Oddvar Olsen, a compilation of material from The Temple magazine. Some of the articles are better than others.  The best ones don’t have the phrase “what if…” in every paragraph.  There are a couple of sections that chain together five or six “what ifs” to arrive at a “fact” which is then used as the launching point and a reference for one of the other writers.

I’m not sure, but my impression is that these writers are all in their own secret abbey somewhere trading bits of speculative information and nourishing each other’s ideas.  And although that sounds like fun, the level of speculation in this books puts it more the the realm of fiction than non-fiction.

It’s great to read as entertainment and it is valuable as such.  It excites the imagination into flights of fancy and its fun to read along and let your imagination run wild.  Unfortunately, it seems like most of what it contains is, well, just that.

Don’t pick it up for scholarship, pick it up for fun.

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Posted in Mysticism

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Drink Deep The Wine of Grapes

Posted on March 26, 2013 | Leave a comment

imageI got a bottle of this wine yesterday, purely because of the name on the bottle.  The winery took its name from the works of Rabelais, as Crowley did.

I hesitate to pull the cork and sip the wine.

Why?  Is this hesitation symbolic, or is merely because I do not want to see this potential poured out, this packet of delight transformed into an empty bottle?  Is there a ritual waiting to be formulated, a sacrament waiting to be performed with with this wine?

Wine is as sacred as one makes it.  I put it up for later.  There will be a time and a place for this cork to be pulled. Perhaps I’ll be invited to a meeting of the Hellfire Club and I’ll need a bottle for a toast, or perhaps some other rite is coming in due time.

 

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What’s a ‘Cheat Day?’

Posted on March 25, 2013 | 1 comment

One day I’m talking about the struggles of buying local and eating healthy, ranting about GMO foods, and posting healthy recipes.  The next day I’m posting about my ridiculous junk food fests and posting pictures of potato chip bags.

Allow me to head off any accusations of food hypocrisy and/or schizophrenia.   I only eat junk food on Saturday “cheat days.”  What’s a cheat day?  It comes from Tim Ferriss’ book The Four Hour Body.  Under his slow-carb plan, you can eat whatever you want one day a week.  I like the idea for two primary reasons.

First, cheat day allows me to eat whatever my friends and family are eating one day per week.  If the guys are having nachos and beer, or the wife and kids want Chinese, I don’t have to the alien from Planet X.

Second, cheat day encourages me to be much more strict during the week.  Before I began allowing one cheat day per week, junky foods started creeping in everywhere.  Now, if a food item seems remotely junky, I put off eating it until Saturday.  You can only eat so much junk in one day.  In short, my net junk food consumption is lower with the addition of one cheat day per week.

In my opinion, cheat days are fun and beneficial to anyone trying to stick to a very rigid diet plan (mine is meat, eggs, veggies, and nuts only.)  If you’re having trouble sticking to a diet plan, you might find that giving yourself the safety valve of a weekly cheat day actually increases your overall long term success rate.

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Quote Me on This

Posted on March 21, 2013 | 2 comments

In a previous post I said I wanted to see the world “philistine”* re-enter common usage.  Why?  Because philistines and their rampant philistinism are at an all-time high.  Don’t struggle to describe these people — use the perfect word!

Since we’re rediscovering the word, let’s use it in a sentence:

“Religious dogma, social convention, and philistinism are the hammer, tong, and anvil of mediocrity.”  ~Robert Mitchell

I wish you would quote me on this.  I really really do.  In fact, if you quote me on your blog or website and post a link to it in the comments below, I will email you a coupon for a free download of my novel Ghilan.  Or, if you prefer, I will just jump up and down, sing your praises, and generally scamper about and proclaim what a smart and well-informed person you are.

* Philistine (Phi*lis”tine):  A person deficient in liberal culture and refinement; one without appreciation of the nobler aspirations and sentiments of humanity; one whose scope is limited to selfish and material interests.  (Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, 1913 Edition)

UPDATE:  Rachel Izabella reblogged my quote.  So, as promised, this is a photo of me snapped mid-scamper.  As for singing her praises, let me say that Rachel’s blog is fascinating, fun, sometimes funny and other times sad, but always well informed — and she obviously has great taste in quotations.  I’d send her a coupon for a free download of my book but she already has it (and didn’t hate it).  You rock Rachel!

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“Generally scampering about”

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Marcus Aurelius and Our Ever-Declining IQ

Posted on March 20, 2013 | 6 comments

Marcus Aurelius said this.  He was a Roman Emperor who lived and ruled almost 2,000 years ago.

“Everything harmonizes with me, which is harmonious to thee, O Universe. Nothing for me is too early or too late, which is in due time for thee. There is one light of the sun, though it is interrupted by walls, mountains and infinite other things. There is one common substance, though it is distributed among countless bodies which have their several qualities. There is one soul, though it is distributed among several natures and individual limitations. There is one intelligent soul, though it seems to be divided.”

This is from Aurelius‘ Meditations, a collection of his philosophical thoughts. In addition to being an emperor, he is considered one of the great Stoic philosophers.  Can you imagine any modern leader being remembered for anything in 2,000 years?

Part of the reason why we find it hard to imagine the emergence of a modern version of Marcus Aurelius is the issue of diminishing IQ.  To put it bluntly, people just aren’t as smart as they used to be.  Ever-declining IQ — not just in the U.S. where it is down at least 3 points just since 1950,  but worldwide — should be a serious concern for all of us.  Read more about it here.

But the real stumbling block is the ever-increasing shallowness of American life, where philistinism is a badge worn proudly.  A man like Marcus Aurelius would be laughed off the podium, derided as a dreamer, a metaphysical fruit loop, a thinker not a “doer.”  To fire up a crowd these days all you have to do is sip a Big Gulp at CPAC.*  Meanwhile, the supposed ‘leader of the free world,’ in an over-populated, over-heated world screaming for sustainability, is still banging the drum for the clearly obsolete growth model of economics.   The longer I live the more Idiocracy looks like hard science fiction instead of farce.

Where is the America that produced Thomas Paine, whose pamphlet Common Sense so deeply inspired America’s early revolutionaries?  Paine was an anti-Christian deist, occultist, and Freemason who had a fascination for Druidism and was a close friend to the famous poet, visionary, and mystic William Blake.  I bet he read Aurelius, and there is at least a chance he’ll be spoken of in the year 3776 (assuming Earth still has an atmosphere).

Aurelius endures.  As for the leaders of the 21st century, I see none of them withstanding a 2,000 year test of time.

*For the record, I’m not a fan of bans on big sugary drinks — even though I know they’re horrible for your health — because I’m a fan of personal freedom.  I just think that public political figures should get standing ovations for substantive positions not theater.

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How Left and Right are Physically Different

Posted on March 19, 2013 | Leave a comment

Do you think that your political affiliation is based on freedom of choice?  Careful and reasoned  evaluation of facts?  Common sense?  Well, you might have made your choice based on the makeup of your brain.

A wealth of studies now show that there are physical differences between people who define themselves as Liberal and Conservative.  Let me break them down for you:

1. Conservatives spend more time looking at unpleasant images, and liberals spend more time looking at pleasant images.

2. Reliance on quick, efficient, and “low effort” thought processes yields conservative ideologies, while effortful and deliberate reasoning yields liberal ideologies.

3. Conservatives react more strongly than liberals to disgusting images, such as a picture of someone eating worms.

4. Liberals have more tolerance to uncertainty (bigger anterior cingulate cortex), and conservatives have more sensitivity to fear (bigger right amygdala).

5. Conservatives have stronger motivations than liberals to preserve purity and cleanliness.

6. Liberals follow the direction of eye movements better than conservatives.

7. Republicans are more likely than Democrats to interpret faces as threatening and expressing dominant emotions, while Democrats show greater emotional distress and lower life satisfaction.

8. Conservatives and liberals react similarly to positive incentives, but conservatives have greater sensitivity to negative stimuli.

9. Conservatives have more activity in their dorsolateral prefrontal cortices, the part of the brain that activates for complex social evaluations.

10. Conservatism is focused on preventing negative outcomes, while liberalism is focused on advancing positive outcomes.

11. Genetics influence political attitudes during early adulthood and beyond.

12. Compared to liberals, conservatives are less open to new experiences and learn better from negative stimuli than positive stimuli.

13. Conservatives tend to have a stronger reaction to threatening noises and images than liberals.

14. Liberals are more open-minded and creative whereas conservatives are more orderly and better organized.

15. When faced with a conflict, liberals are more likely than conservatives to alter their habitual response when cues indicate it is necessary.

16. Conservatives sleep more soundly and have more mundane dreams, while liberals sleep more restlessly and have a more bizarre, active dream life.

Read the whole article at Procon.org.

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