Risk! Risk anything! Care no more for the opinion of others,
for those voices. Do the hardest thing on earth for you. Act for
yourself. Face the truth.
Capitalism is the astounding belief that the most wickedest of men will do the
most wickedest of things for the greatest good of everyone John
Maynard Keynes
I
hate to advocate drugs,
alcohol, violence, or insanity to anyone, but they've always
worked for me.
Hey there,
as I've mentioned several times on facebook and in my MySpace blog, I firmly believe in the 30-year cycle of things like fashion,music and pop culture. This means we are about to experience the 80ies again soon.
I've seen the first signs already.. Like the colors in upcoming fashion trends - blacks and greys are coming back along with b/w patterns, the ties are getting narrower and men are expected to wear more pastels.( Yikes)
And have you noticed how many over-knee-boots and short skirts are around? And if you remember, in the late 70' and early 80's it was the military look with a lot of camouflage and greens.(sound familiar?-yeah, we just went through that look) http://www.liketotally80s.com/80s-fashions-are-back.html
As far as music goes, I'm looking forward to that much more than the fashion (should you ever see me in a piano-necktie, you have my permission to shoot me)
I believe Rock 'n' Roll from the pre-MIDI era was much more honest,ballsy and rougher - just the way I like it.
Most current bands seem to be hardly more than interfaces for the producer & record company..
The dawning of all those synthetic casting 'bands' has really upset the music market. Artists no longer had to work their way to the top by building a solid fan base, playing all kinds of dumps and dives, but get thrown right into the big leagues with nothing to hold them up except the record companies' marketing machine..
And if a new "Star" comes along (with the next season of the show) the last years prodigy is left to fend for themselves with no foundation to support them. (Can you remember who won American Idol 3 years ago? - well, can you?) And if you can, when's the last time you saw them in concert or heard a new single?..
Now, back in the 'good old days' the climb to the top of the charts was a long and tedious one, but therefore the way down wasn't a drop with terminal velocity, but more a slip-slide down the side of a hill (with a real chance of regaining your footage)
There is a reason why 'real' bands like AC/DC, Mötley Crüe and the likes are still around and still going strong.
BTW: Did you know AC/DC never had a top-10 hit? and the first top 40 was "Shook me all night long" ?
But they are still a household name to this day (35 years running)
Also did you know the band that plays in front of the most people every year is the Dave Mathews Band !?
Not the most ppl at a time, but the most in total per year...
Oh yeah, I almost forgot. There's even a new Hendrix album out! Now if thats not a clear sign o'the times, I don't know what is.They had plenty of time to choose the release date of these 'ancient' recordings, why do you think they did it now-because they know it's time!
So to kick off this revival I'll dig up a few songs from that glorious time in Rock and post them here:
Here it goes:
I don't know about you, but as each day goes buy, I see things that make me stop and think about them.
This might be something as seemingly unimportant as a doorknob, or something with global impact,like a political decision by the leaders of our society.
So in this new category, "just wondering..", I'll try to share the little glimpses of wisdom or clarity with you.
For the first episode I've collected several examples. Here's the shortlist followed by their in-depth treatment.:
I was just wondering..-
how energy efficient would cars in north America be if they were built to travel only 100 km/h ?
how come they put the controls for the stove BEHIND the burners,where you have to reach across the heat source?
why are most burners hard to clean,open coil types, when closed surface burners have been standard in Europe for 50 years?
why do they build houses from wood frames and plywood? What part of "The three little pigs" didn't they understand?
why do people bother with DIET Coke after devouring 3 Big Macs and 2 large fries?
Cars in North America So, could somebody please tell me why the North American car manufacturers keep building and selling vehicles with 200 or more horsepower, when half that is more than enough to accelerate 4 adults to Autobahn-speeds of over 160 km/h. Now obviously I'm not talking about load-hauling trucks here, of course, but the average used family sedan for 4-5 people. Does it really take a 3.5 litre, 230hp six cylinder engine to drive your 3 kids to school? I can remember my little 1976 Renault 5-it had 64hp and with 4 (or more) passengers, it easily reached 160km/h while using less than 8 Litres/100km!
OK, it didn't have AC,GPS,ABS,ESP,MP3,DVD,Power windows or a huge trunk, but in 95% of the cases it did the trick just fine. Even that one time we had to fit 13 (!) in there going to a party...
Oven design
OK, so why the hell would you put the controls to a stove in a place where you have to reach across the burning fat to turn it off? And what is it with these heating coils ? They're hard to clean, they're never level and they're a general pain. Now I know for a fact that solid-surface burners solve these issues and they've been the standard on consumer grade ranges since the 1950's in most European countries. And currently it's the energy efficient ceramic or inductive ranges taking over. So why is North America still using pre-1950's technology ?
Three little pigs
Now this is the one that gets me every time I see news clips of houses damaged by storms.
I see them build 3 story buildings with wood framing and plywood walls covered with aluminum siding or fake brick facades..
And then they act surprised when a storm blows it to bits? C'mon, everyone knows the tale of the three little pigs?
What part of "..I'll huff and I'll puff and I'll blow your house down!" didn't they understand?
Or is it so much cheaper to build houses out of wood instead of bricks,that you'd rather rebuild every couple of years than do it right the first time?
supersize light
I don't think I need to add much to this. We've all seen the big lady in the line at McDonalds ordering 3 Big Macs, two large fries, an apple pie and, just as we're expecting her to pick some toys for her kids, she gives herself away by ordering one XL-sized DIET Coke. After destroying all that food, she leaves the restaurant and gets on her little scooter to ride the half a block home.
I don't get it. Everyone knows that marketing aims squarely at the guilt of those of us that have bad eating habits. If adding something to our daily diet makes us think we're going to loose weight, we're gonna buy it because it means results without giving up anything..
To the best of my knowledge most medical professionals agree that, to achieve sustained weight loss, a change in eating and exercising habits is required and much more effective than diet products or weight loss supplements. But this knowledge isn't backed up by a multi-million dollar marketing machine, so no one takes notice.
You want to know what scares me? Stuff like the new "MARS Slim" campaign. -
-First, the product packaging side of it. To take the exact same products, cut it into 2 smaller pieces and label it "Slim"...brilliant!
-using the image of singing people on the move to convey a sense of dynamics and motion...
-that horribly annoying song that says that this 'new' product CAN do everything for you that you need to be one of these 'shiny happy people'-all you need to do is consume.
-And finally, the absolutely silly comedic style in which the whole thing was shot. A great way to appeal even to the dim-whitted. Now the fact that I know this commercial will be successful, due to the frequency at which I find myself exposed to it, scares the shit out of me. The awareness how easy it is to manipulate the masses, how common sense is lost when individuals turn into a herd of lemmings.
Hey, it worked for the Nazis...
As I'm trying to get this blog to look and act like I want it to, there's bound to be a few changes in the way the page looks and handles.
Also some content may move around or the menu structure might change.
This does not mean the content is gone. It's just hiding ;-)
A first step in this process was
moving the Tumbleweed Diary to the static section of the page.
You can find them directly in the sidebar or here:
..........Hi there,
it's been a while since I updated this blog.
A lot has happened in the last year.
My fiancee broke off our engagement by email.
I never really found out what went wrong, when everything felt so damn right.
That really took the wind out of my sails. It was like suddenly the purpose of my existence was no more.
I'm still not convinced that I'm over her...
I had a good season working at the Skydome (or Rogers Centre, as the official name goes).
Unfortunately, this season will be much different.
A 'restructuring' of the organization caused my income to be severely cut and paying my bills has become a very close call.
Currently I'm living from paycheck to paycheck, but I'm working on a few new clients.
I've moved twice since my last entry.
In September I temporarily moved into a Place on Brock Street.
But I found out once I was there, that I could only have it until November.
So in November I moved to the East End near the beaches.
This is a shot of my current living room.
This apartment is fairly roomy and has a nice backyard for Jack.
I'd really hate to move again, just to save on rent.
I've had a few rough days lately but things are starting to roll again.
To be continued...
Welcome. To make it short, I used to keep a diary in the early 90's - and those were some crazy times, let me assure you! (I'm still amazed I survived those days..) Anyway, I'm planning to extract a few things from back then and put them into context with my views almost 20 years later.. I don't know what will come of it. So let's see.
Posts
The first human who hurled an insult instead of a stone was
the founder of civilization.
Mankind must put an end to war, or war will
put an end to mankind.
Risk! Risk anything! Care no more for the opinion of others,
for those voices. Do the hardest thing on earth for you. Act for
yourself. Face the truth.
