karuna's book

click to enlarge pictures

these are snapshots i took (shhh don't tell) of a little known book by Jung, as in Carl Jung, hand written and painted and illustrated by him.  Jung's Red Book had been kept hidden in a vault by his descendants who did not want the public to see this beautiful display of genius and madness.
the story of the history and publication of this book reads like a spy adventure tale!  read the story here!
my photos don't do justice to the colors. as you can see the book has now been published and translated, and thanks to my good friend karuna, i get to see it for a short time!  even if i never read a word of it, it is an object of amazing power and beauty.

did HBA write this story?

A friend of mine has a voice-over part in Dead or Alive Extreme Beach Volleyball 3 - the sequel!
So as not to be totally you know DUMB i looked it up on wikipedia.
Here's a LITTLE BIT of what is there...

According to the game premise, Zack gambles winnings from the Dead or Alive 3 tournament at a casino. He hits the jackpot, earning a ginormous sum of money, and buys himself a private island, which he names after himself ("Zack Island"). He invites the women from the previous tournament (along with his girlfriend) to his island under the pretense that the next Dead or Alive tournament will be held there. The women arrive and after discovering the hoax, decide to make the best of the situation and spend two weeks vacationing on the island.
At the end of the two week time period, the ladies depart, leaving only Zack and his girlfriend Niki on the island. Shortly thereafter, a volcano, thought to be inactive, erupts, threatening to destroy Zack's island. In the chaos, Niki escapes using Zack's jetpack. Zack survives the volcanic eruption, but the island is completely destroyed. While not part of the game itself, Zack's later Dead or Alive 4 ending shows the pair robbing an ancient tomb and escaping with a truck filled with gold, suggesting a possible financing source for a sequel. In the sequel, it is confirmed that this is indeed the source for financing "New Zack Island".

For unexplained reasons, the Dead or Alive characters' previous rivalries were reduced to a general dislike in this title. As a result, even characters who would normally try to kill each other (such as Ayane and Kasumi) can become fast friends through a brief exchange of gifts.

a bit more...

many reviewers were impressed at the depth of the volleyball game,

In its review, Edge focused on the game's unusual social, rather than adversarial, focus.

Dead Or Alive Xtreme 2 improvements: the female characters' individual breasts now have their own "physics."[3] This allows each breast to behave differently, although this has been criticized for making the breasts move in an exaggerated fashion (i.e., they often continue moving for an unnaturally long time after a character has stopped moving;and sometimes one or both breasts will freeze in mid-bounce.).

The Malted Bunneh comes to the small screen!

Enjah finished her machinima - whew! what a job, finding or making all those wonderful props and sets and animations, herding the actors, changing the plot daily!  it came out great especially considering she is new to this art.  i just hope i don't get type-cast as the hamster girl-friday armed with a heavy pocketbook!

global warming

stop global warming!
makes the days warmer, skies blue,
birds sing, snow melt. oh!
 
                                        ~mudpie
 

from page 81

the days above freezing have melted quite alot of the snow. 

the ground is still too frozen to absorb it, so we are in mud.

thus i looked carefully before stepping out of the car.

the truck-stop parking lot was full as usual. 

my eye was drawn to a small bright blue button there on the ground between the passenger side of our car and the driver's side of a large SUV. 

something in my Nature urged me to pick it up, but my Nurture talked me out of it.

i put my boot down in the wetness, then noticed another button.
once made aware of them, i saw 3 more.

five small bright blue buttons in the mud. 

it was like finding a scrap torn from a book (page 81) that said only "...she realized when all five blue buttons had fallen into the mud, someone might see them there and  ..."

crow light

bright morning sun lights
the snow-limned branch and twig
finial crow announcing
 
                                       ~mudpie
 
 

pizza!

i love the smell of pizza.
is it the perfect food?
contains every food group, and belongs to the round.
the round group of donuts, grapes, chocolate chip cookies, swedish meatballs,...a wonderful group!

all the lunchtime diners in pizza chef are men.
large men.  with their winter jackets on.
no wait.  in that booth, the white haired people sunk into their down jackets, eating pizza.
a couple? male and female. so completely overlookable.
what are they doing eating lunch in pizza chef on a weekday?

my eyes blur as i watch them until, omg! her hair is a smooth brown pony tail and her smile is bright red lipstick!
her sweater is buttoned up the back, and, honest-to-god, a poodle skirt??
and he -- whoa, a hunk in a t-shirt, sleeve rolled up to hold a softpack, hair combed back like a young elvis. is it the same couple?
she grins at him, her toe taps his foot under the table, in time to -- where'd that music come from? -- "gonna make a chain of paper clips, and chain us together as i kiss your lips..."

what a strange vision.

POP! it's gone. and there are two old whitehaired people hunkered in their down jackets sitting in a booth eating pizza. her toe is tapping on his foot under the table...and LOL see them grin at each other?

haiku from mars and venus

i told Al i had condensed his poem into a haiku as follows:

our tracks up the hill -
my long sweet life with deb
even as new snow falls
 
he responded that it might be more like this:
 
Rabbit ripped from life
Fox dripping blood
My love is not like that

this reminds me of trying to create a skit with HBA, best described in this:

http://xkcd.com/611/

Valentine poem

every year my friend Al writes a valentine's day poem for his wife, Deb.  he graciously gave me permission to blog it.  like me, he walks the same trails hills fields near his house year after year always finding things to be interested in.

For Deb
       by Al Alessi

The prints are legion on the fresh few flakes
That dropped unbeknownst in the night
To the coyotes' delight
For the clean clear tracks will help their task
Of returning the owner to their maker
Taker wins all
In the call of the wilderness behind our home
It is the way of all time
This reading of lines on the white canvas
To know what chances are there to live or die
A storyboard screed for all to read
The grouse the turkey the hare
Their trails lay bare for the predator
Or tourist to decipher
The wild ridge where men can not easily live
Giveth and taketh away
Deer moose mouse and owl
Painting their lines of whence they came
And to where they would hope to go.

I do not look back to see our own trail
as we climb as we are able
To the lichen-lathered picnic table placed so long ago
By old Mr. Apple when his then spry prints
Of Vermont boot tread crisscrossed the ridge to be read
As surely as ours do today.
Do we in any way make sense
Of where we have been and what we seek
In this meander on our home hill
Where we must neither kill or be killed
We have not seen the risk of each step
As though it was our last
We are afforded contemplation
And the temptations that from there derive
As we drive on nearly to the top
With but our precipitous decline in line
To fall back untouched and unscathed
To the valley floor to our humble door and the hearth within

We have traveled many such paths together
And we know this small valley well
We know where the deer herd dwells
We know where we are headed
And if we turned about we'd see our prints in the snow.
We were there! And there!
We can see it stretch past the stoney ruins of the shepherd's hut
Our presence is as proven as calligraphy on linen
We were here
But it's clear that time will soon wash this sign of our boots
Down into the roots of maple trees and June's wild flowers.
How is it we can feel so lost and yet know our path so well?
Did we forget to choose something along the way?
Though if I chose nothing much ever very well
I am blessed that it is with thee I journey and dwell.

♥

??

(just stopping in to dust a bit and pick up the old newspapers from the floor. maybe i'll leave this lamp on just in case)

when writing skills turn to the dark side

(take a deep breath!)

We write to officially notify you of this award as we congratulate you over your success in the following official publication of results of the e-mail electronic online Sweepstakes organized in conjunction with the Bid South Africa 2010 Football Local Organizing Committee and expatriate registered Telecommunications companies for the promotion of BID-SA 2010 FIFA FOOTBALL WORLD CUP that was held recently held here in Johannesburg.

farewell to arms

i know these guys...they are amazing! makes you wonder, tho, how it ended!

letter to ms f

someone i know, who graduated from college quite awhile ago, came across some memorabilia from her college days, and thoughtfully sent a list to the university archives offering the items.  here's the reply she received (names omitted):

Ms. F

Thanks for your kind offer, but I believe that we already have most if not all of the items you mention.

xxx xxxxxx
Associate University Archivist for Research Services
xxx@xxx.edu
------------------------------
not even dear ms f, or kind regards or anything!  some of her friends felt this was astonishingly rude, and one of them composed what she felt would have been the correct response, which made me laugh so hard! here it is:
-------------------------
Dear Ms. F,
Thank you so much for your kind offer to donate memorabilia from your years at xxx.  We enjoyed having you here and are pleased that you have preserved some of the artifacts of your time here, an important time in the history of xxx University.  We would love to house your items here and showcase them as part of our history, but unfortunately we have no space to preserve them or showcase them as we would like. As xxx archivist, I have put together a plan to build a museum on campus to house such memorabilia and the administration and Board of Trustees have agreed, provided that I can secure funding.  If you could send your memorabilia together with a check for, say, $100,000 to kickstart the project, the University would be happy to consider naming rights for the museum, provided that you also solicit additional funding, say $600,000, from your fellow classmates. I appreciate your initiation of this project that is near and dear to my heart and yours and I look forward to working with you towards our shared goal.
Sincerely,
xxx xxxxx
Associate University Archivist for Research Services

paperwhites

 

                                                         click to enlarge

you are what they feed you

Last night i watched a movie called Food, Inc.

In some ways I think everyone should watch it.
On the other hand, I'm not sure everyone should.

It is very much like a science fiction tale of the 'future', except that in science fiction you are horrified even though it is not real -- although to some extent you realize it is.

Food, Inc is horrifying in much the same way. Oh, and it is real.
So if you like scary movies...this one's for you!

You need this information.
Not to make you feel bad about yourself and the choices you make, you are the victim not the perpetrator in this story.
Information however unpleasant, provides choices. Knowing more, you can recognize times when you have a choice, and make the one you need to make at the time. Only you know what that is.

It's one thing to decide you are going to eat bacon now and then, despite all you know about it. It's another to ignore and even condone the passage of laws that result in millions of people having no choice but to eat total crap that ultimately sickens them.
Children shouldn't watch this.

You can get a copy here http://www.foodincmovie.com/

bring on the ducks, we have water!

we have water!
sunday night we stopped having water.
monday the plumber came.
wednesday the well guys came and we found our well, not where we'd always thought it was.
they dug down through the snow and frozen earth, pulled the fried 40 some year old pump up from 180 feet and replaced it all.
the water is muddy and smells like the pool at the Y
the mud and chlorine are fighting it out i guess.
at least we can flush!

more ducks-on-bikes creativity

Osprey's fake trailer with DUCKS-On-BIKES

they just don't stop!!  this is so funny!

feet on the ground

Good morning! From the Fairbanks Museum in St. Johnsbury this is your feet on the ground gravity report for February 2, 2010.

A widespread area of low gravity will be moving into our area from the south today, heading into Canada. This will bring with it an increase in silliness so be sure to wear your sense of humor. Heavy shoes recommended for everyone, especially the kiddies ... stay away from those backless clogs today. You ladies might want to save that skirt until next week and wear slacks when you head out to work or some shopping.

Groundhogs and other hibernating animals have been known to pop spontaneously from their dens during these gravity lows; skiiers and showshoers be on the lookout! In fact, in 1958, on February 17 during record low gravity, a black bear popped from his den right under Corny Merton, skiiing the back trail at Killington! Merton -- as it happened, a prize-winning bull rider at the Rutland State Fair -- managed to hold on and ride the confused animal to the parking lot of the lodge, where it feasted from the garbage bins before ambling back up the slope!!

The low gravity should be moving out of our area overnight, so enjoy it while it lasts. Dieters, don't forget to weigh yourself today!