An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity. - Martin Luther King, Jr.
At the center of non-violence stands the principle of love. - Martin Luther King, Jr.
I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant. - Martin Luther King, Jr.
Life's most persistent and urgent question is, 'What are you doing for others?' - Martin Luther King, Jr.
Whatever your life's work is, do it well. A man should do his job so well that the living, the dead, and the unborn could do it no better. - Martin Luther King, Jr.
The time is always right to do what is right. - Martin Luther King, Jr.
Look, it's Brickday at West Portal Station in San Francisco.
Brickday? Yes. Or Brick Day if you like.
Here is how to celebrate this glorious holiday:
1.) On October 15, call in sick to work.
2.) Get a brick.
3.) Take the brick to a bar during the day. Ideally the Stork Club in Oakland.
4.) Set the brick gently on the bar or table.
5.) Drink.
T-800: The Skynet Funding Bill is passed. The system goes on-line August 4th, 1997. Human decisions are removed from strategic defense. Skynet begins to learn at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. Eastern time, August 29th. In a panic, they try to pull the plug. Sarah Connor: Skynet fights back. T-800: Yes. It launches its missiles against the targets in Russia. John Connor: Why attack Russia? Aren't they our friends now? T-800: Because Skynet knows the Russian counter-attack will eliminate its enemies over here.
So, today is a day that's already passed where nuclear war was to happen but didn't.
That's worth celebrating.
Terminator 2 is one of the finest action films ever made. Watch it today. And don't forget, there is no fate but what we make.
Here is the original teaser trailer:
And for good measure, here's a video from Bay Area string metal favorites Judgement Day. This video is for their song "Into The Abyss," and it has zombies in it. Enjoy.
(Thanks Dad, for taking me to my first legal Rated R film.)
This shatterer of a song sums up many of the roiling doubt-stricken internal emotions of being young.
Or being any age.
Never before had the sentence "We make plans." held or hurt so much.
The video is by YouTube's boywithstars, who had this commentary on the clip:
Jawbreaker playing "In Sadding Around" live at Vino's in Little Rock, AR on 6/15/1993. This is from the tour that followed their recoding session with Steve Albini for 24 Hour Revenge Therapy. I've kept all the between song banter and whatnot so that you can view the whole show if you'd like, the quality of this one is a bit lacking. Go to my profile, and check out the playlists for the easiest way to watch the whole thing, or other shows. This is part 11 of 14
(Thank you to YouTube's boywithstars & the indispensable loosecharm.org. Hello LRRN! Hello LNZLLO! Hey, Hodge.)
"Hunter on Ducati" by Ralph Steadman: "This is new print which is a facsimile print exactly the same size as the original drawing of Hunter Thompson track-testing a Ducati Super Sport motorbike to destruction"
I don't remember, exactly, how old I was when I discovered Dr. Hunter S. Thompson. My fallible brain tells me it was somewhere around the eleventh year of my life, wandering around the Thousand Oaks library and spotting a cover with "Hell's Angels" written all over it in large, orange block-letters. I knew from the title of the book that I wasn't going to check it out, there was far too much religious dogma at home to be caught with such a title, so I hid in a corner of the library and began to read the "Strange and Terrible Saga."
It took me a few weeks to finish because I only went to the library for one hour every Friday, but when I turned that last page on that Friday afternoon, I knew I was infected. Infected with a whole new sense of Pride, Purpose, and Patriotism. I knew that whoever this Thompson fellow was, he certainly wasn't going to take any sort of shit from anybody anytime, and I wanted a piece of that action.
It was around this time that the early onset of Teenage Rebellion was setting in, so I took a dive into the Deep End and planted myself on the murky bottom of the You Just Don't Understand Me pool. I was no longer scared of the consequences of bringing home the words of the good Doctor and I would purposefully leave his books out in the open, casually daring anybody to tell me otherwise.
Nobody noticed, of course, and all of the great arguments that played out in my head never happened. I guess that parents eventually learn to leave their little weird reader kids alone.
My love affair with the Doctor didn't end but the flames of passion burned down to coals and life got in the way as I became an adult and tried to make sense of The World and my place in it. Our relationship was rekindled in 1997 when The Proud Highway came out and suddenly I felt like a little kid again, filled with a sense of wonder and dread about these letters and what they meant to the man that wrote and received them. I inhaled The Proud Highway faster than a junkie can suck down an eightball, and when that wasn't enough for my fix, I went back and reread everything I could get my hands on. Luckily for me there was a bit of a resurgence of Thompson's popularity because the Fear And Loathing movie was becoming a reality, so the bookstores were all stocked with his backlist and I worked at a bookstore. I would place a copy of Hell's Angels or Fear And Loathing or Better Than Sex into the hands of anybody foolish enough to get close to me.
It is Sunday, July 18, 2010, on what would be the 73rd birthday of Hunter Stockton Thompson. I started the day with some Kentucky whiskey, raising my glass not to Heaven but just to the sky in general. I feel that the good Doctor is not in Heaven or Hell but, rather, some slice of somewhere that he had to build himself, carved out of the rock with the sheer determination that only an old Dopefiend has. The World that Thompson left behind isn't a better place, the politicians aren't less corrupt, and the air is probably a bit more difficult to breathe. Thompson, like anybody else, couldn't change the world. He could change people though and, even though we never met, he certainly changed me.
Happy Birthday, Hunter, you are gone but never forgotten.
I reckon that the thing to take away from Bastille Day is how hard it is to have a representative republic. It's a struggle fought in the days in-between the celebrations.
Remember, "[every] revolution is unfinished." Every day must be a fight for a more just world. We can always do better -- individually and collectively.
But tonight, party. Party it up for the French, 'cause they got it done once.
(This one, of course, is for Mom. Thanks to hep for the "lol freedom of speech" link. Thanks to Glen Carlson for recording that AmSteel show. Picture of the painting via Wikipedia.)
Shirts and sweatshirts and art for you.
Soon, soon.
