I had, like, eight million ideas while I was driving yesterday... and, of course, pretty much forgot them all by the time I got home. The one thing I am able to remember, however, is that I think I'm actually really glad that the price of gasoline is going up. The higher the better. And here's why...

Americans love their cars, and our towns and cities are so damned spread out that we have to drive all the time to get anywhere. And most places don't have jack for public transportation. Because it's always been economical and easy to just drive yourself everywhere.

Americans also love their money. In fact, I'd venture to say that we love money more than we love our cars. If gas prices continue to rise, these two loves are going to find it more and more difficult to co-exist. Personally, I think that our love of money is going to win out on this one.

As much as I like to bash western culture and American society, I DO think that we're a fairly inventive bunch. But we seem to need something to kick us in the ass to give us the spark to really start inventing. And the best kick in the ass for Americans is to start taking away their money. I really seriously doubt that any of the presidential candidates would be talking about self-reliance (as far as energy goes) if it wasn't for rising gas prices and, therefore, public pressure to do something about it. I took down the John Kerry banner on the site b/c it mentioned higher gas prices. It turns out that I actually DO want higher gas prices. It'll suck for a while, but if the price of gas keeps rising, we'll figure out something else to do. The slow decay of our environment hasn't been enough to make us REALLY try to change our ways. If it takes a hit to the wallet to make us look at these problems, then so be it.

This entry sucks ass, but I wanted to write something down before I completely forgot what I was thinking about. Maybe I'll try to make it better later...

Labels: Capitalism

I got this on John Kerry's website and found it interesting...

From the Associated Press:

WASHINGTON - A poll of Iraqis commissioned by the U.S.-backed government has provided the Bush administration a stark picture of anti-American sentiment — more than half of Iraqis believe they would be safer if U.S. troops simply left.

The poll, commissioned by the Coalition Provisional Government last month but not released to the American public, also found radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr is surging in popularity, 92 percent of Iraqis consider the United States an occupying force and more than half believe all Americans behave like those portrayed in the Abu Ghraib prison abuse photos...

"If you are sitting here as part of the coalition, it (the poll) is pretty grim," said Donald Hamilton, a career foreign service officer who is working for Ambassador Paul Bremer's interim government and helps oversee the CPA's polling of Iraqis.

...The poll results conflict with the generally upbeat assessments the administration continues to give Americans. Just last week, President Bush (news - web sites) predicted future generations of Iraqis "will come to America and say, thank goodness America stood the line and was strong and did not falter in the face of the violence of a few."

Labels: george bush

oh yeah...
add Velvet Revolver to the list of bands that are completely ignoring the South East. At least Bowie and the Cure did an Atlanta stop... VR's got nothing.

Labels: music

I hate Tuesdays.
Almost more than Mondays.
Especially now that 24 is over.
Tuesday is like Monday except that I'm already tired from doing stuff I don't want to do (i.e. "work") on Monday. Megatokyo doesn't update on Tuesday. RPGWorld doesn't update on Tuesday. Comics don't come out until Wednesday. It's still too far away from the weekend to really be excited about that... The only thing Tuesday has going for it is that Ozy and Millie is usually updated. And I could always read that on Wednesday. I guess new CD's come out on Tuesday tho. And they ARE rereleasing Diamond Dogs today... which I still don't have. Tuesdays still suck.

Seen a lot of movies in the past week... for me, anyway. A Mighty Wind, 21 Grams, and Lost in Translation. All were very entertaining, and I'd watch them all again. 21 Grams had Sean Penn being an asshole, but he was damned good at it. And Benicio is a really good actor. Now I want to see Traffic again too. AND he's going to be in Sin City! Being an avid Daredevil fan (the comic, not the movie), I LOVE Frank Miller. And his Sin City series was very very cool and perfect for a movie adaptation. Off-subject, I guess, but whatever.

A Mighty Wind isn't sticking with me so well. I like Best in Show better, but this one was still really funny. Although it was also kind of sad, which I wasn't totally looking for. Again, tho, definitely worth watching...

Lost in Translation, however, is sticking with me more and more. I had a bunch of people tell me not to watch it... Shame on you. This movie is perfect for the way I sort of feel or whatever. Yeah, I love Bill Murray (and might have to see Garfield just to hear him talk), and Scarlett is definitely a cute girl... But the thing that I took away from the movie was how the two of them were able to just BE in the NOW. No, their lives weren't perfect, and no, they weren't doing anything that was, say, "totally rad," but I really liked watching the two actors create their characters. And seeing the characters be able to just be happy with their present was really cool.

So, I guess that I'm saying that, all the "triffling truisms clothed in great, swelling words" notwithstanding, I still don't get the whole idea of letting the past go. So stupid. So, somehow, that's what I got out of that movie. And I want that feeling of just really not having any cares at the moment and just being somewhere... and being happy with just being there. Dunno if it takes a trip to Japan, but I wouldn't mind being completely uprooted and just leaving everything behind. Even if only briefly.

And, actually, that kind of goes back to something I talked about long ago in reference to a Peter Milligan story (Human Target #1) where the character was supposed to be at the WTC the day it was blown up, but he wasn't. But noone knew that he wasn't, so he just pretended that he was... everyone thought he was dead, and he just disappeared to recreate a different life elsewhere. Despite the obvious hardships of such a move, that has SO much appeal...

Anyway. Now I want to see Lost in Translation again. And, frankly, it could do without the semi-nakedness.

Labels: _self, Movies

and, crap, I forgot...
there are lots of new CIF uploads.

Most importantly, I think, is the June 2 Charotte show. It was a GREAT show. And, even though I screwed up the recording for the last half-hour, you should still get it. (I'm an apologist) More good covers of Jerusalem and Lowlands, but Dustin also did "The Aeroplane Over the Sea" by Neutral Milk Hotel, and I was blown away. And I was reminded that Power of My Hands is a really good song. And I still think that Redemption is better than Men Who Die Young. Even with the weird harmonies at the beginning.

Labels: music

So I was perusing the shelves at Heroes yesterday and saw this:

I read this comic back in 1991 or whatever when it first started... it was pretty cool, but I hadn't picked it up since the first issue of the ongoing series. But I bought a couple of issues yesterday, and it was really really cool. The story itself was good (SPOILER: The bad guy-turned good guy-turned bad guy, Mako had kidnapped this woman that he loved... Dragon was there to get her back... Mako got whacked somewhere, and the girl came over to help him. Mako stood up and, thinking she was Dragon, punched her in the face, and her head exploded. NICE).

I also liked the art. Larsen had an uphill battle to climb with me b/c McFarlane's art on the adjectiveless Spider-Man title was, imho, AWESOME. ("Why do I shoot so much webbing??") When Larsen came out, I was less than thrilled. But, he really is a good artist, and he's especially good on Dragon. It shows that he cares about his creation.

But enough of that... none of that is why I'm going to start buying this comic again. Not only was there a full-length Dragon story, but there was an 8-page backup story after that, AND a one-page humorous comic after that. I don't know if this is exactly what's going on, but, it seemed to me, that Erik is giving some lesser-known people some opportunities at the end of his books. So very cool. We get stories that, so far, have been pretty good, creators get a chance to show their stuff, and no one has to worry about a new book with a new creator bombing! perfect.

Even cooler tho... Dragon still has a letters page. Wait, sorry... TWO pages worth of letters. And it's always proceeded by a nice little Larsen blog about what's going on with him and the comic. It's nice, when you finish a comic, to get a word or two from the creator. Anything to make things a little more personal and to get some thoughts about the issue you just read. For example, in one of the ones I bought, Erik goes on about how he subconciously stole his page layouts from Jack Kirby's Tales of Suspense (I think) #95. Something I never would have picked up on but think is amazingly cool to know.

I doubt that anyone reading this has any idea what I'm talking about. All this is just me saying that Erik Larsen is the Man, and it's great to see that the ideas that Image started out promoting are still alive and well somewhere.

And, what kind of brought this on is that I mostly read Marvel stuff with some Vertigo thrown in. Marvel has long since abandoned the letters' pages to save money. Everything with them is so... industrial or something. Utilitarian. I still love the Marvel characters, but I really miss the feel of being part of what's going on. The best example I can think of at the moment is this: I was reading this new series called "Hawkeye." (he's an Avenger, and he shoots arrows) So far, the series was reading like a pretty good mystery. Just so happened that the detective was a badass archer. Really enjoying it. Issue 8 came out yesterday and, apparently due to slow sales, issue 8 is the END. Ignoring the fact that 8 issues does not come close to giving a title a fair chance... especially when two of the issues were LATE... I got to the end expecting some kind of announcement or farewell or something. Nothing. The final frame had the word "End" in it, but that was it. No letters, no word from the creators, NOTHING to let me know that this series is over. If I didn't have access to the internet, I would have no way of knowing this was over. And that pisses me off. Marvel is just like, "here's the story, now good bye." If Erik Larsen can take the time to give his readers a paragraph every month, I think that Marvel should at least be able to devote a page to creator's thoughts or SOMETHING when a series is ending. I mean, damn.

Savage Dragon.com

Labels: Comic Books