THINGS AREN'T SO BAD

Things aren't so bad, it's just people that are getting worse --  as Moses Allison so succinctly sang.

Ain't that just like Levin...whatever happened to REAL life?

I do have this to say about that.  Recently passed and processed a birthday.  and it made me think how lucky/unlucky I was to be born when TVs were scarce, and people had to look at non-screen things.  Squirrels, art, rain, other people's eyes and ears, hands, feet.  Signs.  

This is not going to be yet another Old person ranting about all the Young people staring at their phones...but WTF children?!

Today at the Hyundai dealership (Hun-die?  or Hun-day? --  even the Hyundai people are not sure), a comparatively large human, male, 6'6" approx, maybe 270+ lbs, was in my path looking at his phone.  I started to change my path.  But he sensed my distress and danced beautifully sideways.  Turns out he was a ballerina, not a football joueur.   Or baller at least.   No one was hurt, this time.

God, it's so beautiful, the known universe, relatively calm and slow, like butter.  We are made for it.  Screens make you dizzy and stupid.  I don't care how good the movie is.   It's not really moving.

When all else files about you, remember, um, whatever you can remember about 

     "what's better" conundra.....n'est-ce pas?

What's better?............

Butter or A parking lot

Friends or Fiends 

Gruesome details or Grew just a single tail 

Feeling or Eating 

Eating or Spitting 

Working or Therapy 

saving the world or saving the whirl

Bread or Toast 

Being well-bred or Being, well, toast 

Funded or Founded 

Group sex or Cauliflower

What's that Smell? or I can't feel my hands

What's that smell? or Who is that smell ?

Indigenous or Just silly 

Big fat and juicy or Just juicy 

interstate or intestate 

Shrodingers cat or Shrodingers magazine subscription 

The end of the world as we know it or as we don't know it at all 

All my passwords or All my children 

All my children or "All my Children" 

Changing your will or Changing God's Will 

Joe Biden or Beethoven 

Donald Trump or Blondie 

Giving up or Taking down

A bass bow or a bass beau

sugary or surgery

somehow not as good as they were 10 years ago, are they.  But what is?   Ice cream, maybe.   and less of it please!  I will never give up, and I'm pretty sure I will never euthanize myself, because, ironically, the  youth in my family (what's the youth?) would be sad.  they would.  Plus, I'm not actually depressed.  Although I am a bit shorter, in stature.   Stature case, I say, and move on down de lion.  More likely I will set slowly in the West, because real estate in the East is out of reach, as well as out of sight, mind, and Texas.   Thank God Texas is still cool, not literally.    "Hottest year ever."   Turn off your sensors!   Won't matter where your son rises.

the past or the future

that is the question.

  

STATUE, Robert?

It doesn't do

any good

unless you follow

the erections

with devotion to the Hero.

Southern generals,

generally speaking,

did not have heros,

no Philly subs,

altho they straddled

their steeds (instead)

and presumably in

or near Chambersburg

Some filly or other

straddled Lee,

JEB Stuart,

or Stonewall J.

who was later a country star--

In a country that approached, 

not perfection,

but, politically,

correctness--

we pulled down all the statues

of the offensive men

(You seceded first!

but, yet, did not succeed at all).

So, down you come

even if you were

shot in the back by

your own men--

Friendly fire

on a cold knight

 

Breathe

We take a breath
and breathe!
But take a life, it's killing,
... murder, Ma
What do we take when we
Deathe?
They (all) say
"You can't take it with you."
not without a to-go bag.
it's messy, Missy

Breath be not proud
"for your ties are too loud."
an even (not odd)
couplet
written in the
last century -
the last completed century,
Donne now.

I would give my life for my century
in a hearbeat.

poetry and/or extinction

extinction is called that
because it really stinks
or
or
it used to be a tinction,
but reconsidered

I read that bits of organic gunk
were spread around much of our
so large system by
the big asteroid event
66 million years ago
give or take

Do people really believe this?
only if they are moved
by the movie
or rent the movie
shred it
like steve or
jeff beckons
or (slave name) jimi

I, me, I am a slave
to notes
of no particular distinction
I smell like an old man
because I am one
and saddle-y
when I die
I will
briefly
smell even worse

a dictionary for the new millenium

Mill an yum!

I think a new dictionary is in order.  At least a glossary.
Today's term:  use
derivative: usage, useage (sic), used, usual, us

They want to use somebody's work.  They will pay for the right.  Not unusual atoll.  What they will buy is the right to use the work, aka "use rights."  "Usage," in contrast, is always meta.  Always about WORDS and how they are employed.  "Common usage" is what I mean.  Odd, there is no "Un-common usage." but there is uncommon use.
If you take this lunatic ranting and use it to sell wicker, that's a use,  Not a usage (or useage, sp, no)
No such thing as usage rights.  Although it is clearly part of what language is that I can use any word I want, correctly /incorrectly ... whatevs!.  There is no real penalty for messing up.  Other than looking dumb.  There's no vocab jail.  Yet.   No bed-wetter's prison either.  Damp!

It's not unusual to want to be used.  I learned it first from a Truffaut film.  Everyone wants to be used.  Opposite of useless, which no one wants.   I try to keep moving.  That way, no one can be sure I'm of no use.

I could use a little help.   Mean it.  My therapist goes just so far.  He gave me succulents, some with pricks.  Next week's term:   Pricks

cookies

I have never been caught with my hand in the cookie jar.  Would have, but do not have such a jar.  If I want cookies, by God...!  The other kind, the kind you generate by visiting this page, are infinitely sweeter.  Those web cookies help the Amazon Primers and Vulgar Grads in digital Silicon Valleys all over the world to know, without a doubt, that I thought about pickup trucks for 1 minute 32 seconds yesterday.  And that I want a black one.  Not 4WD.

Wicker chairs too.  A lot wicker.   And teak oil.  Which contracts to T'oil.

So, we all leave this trail of desire called 'Cookies.'  And the cookie monsters aka Al Gore rhythms in stuffy dig it all closet cubicles seek quasi benignly to grant our outermost wishes.  Sex, not love.  Recipes AND meals.  The presents, not the pasts.  New arms and legs, and no head.

I am told it's all about followers.   And heaven help us when they actually catch us!
More sugar!  doh!

Joining the other Humans

It's like there's fee for joining up - the opposite of a signing bonus.

Currently, still, I live in the country.  Alone/  Sort of alone.   But here in the country, there are now more mustangs (Fords), and man they must stang! And there are young boarders on their skate boards.  And quiet streets full of emptiness like death.   Retirees plugging in at the RV park.  Or parking at the fire plug.
No one joins me.  But it's not the country anymore.  Not for them anyway.

My old house was moved out here, to the middle of Egypt, in 1973 - the year I crossed the Mason and Dixon line for good - and ill.
And then slowly, but then with greater and greater speed and thickness,  the masses - replete with jobs and children in prisons made by the Independent School District and home entertainment centers - cluster nearby, talking about me just up the Nile from them.  And wishing they could live in my house, on my few acres;  to which all the deer and the antelope and the rattlers and opossums and rats and mice and bugs and smaller bugs and wasps ....  have flocked.     Since the new houses are 6 per acre, you see.  Or 7 for luck.   It's so quiet in those neighborhoods!

I mostly avoid them.  When I don't, it's usually okay.  Which has led me to think -   "I shall leave Egypt forever and join folks in the old home town," which has grown into a pulsing deathstar of booming modern hubub.   (That's Austin, TX to you)

So, yeah, there's a fee.   $Half a Million.  Inexorably.     I am to be a neighbor among neighbors.  And I will be well-liked by one or two.  And my favorite city haunts will be increasingly haunted by me, on foot even.   And my grandsons will visit, on holidays.  And my soul will not extinguish, and I will sometimes not be sad.

Hurry!  Supplies are going fast!

Hum us a few bars

It's spelled HUMMUS,  Or HOUMOUS.  I prefer the former.   People actually eat chick pea.  They do not drink it.  But this comes as no slurprise.   Hommus (erectus).   The stuff smells somehow like armpit.   And it's not the tahini.   As a matter of FYI, humming is perhaps the most difficult human sound to record.   It's like mumbling.  Speak up dammit!

Which brings up:  What is a human sound?   Really does not matter.   I was full of piss and vinegar earlier.   Then I emptied.   It was transient, momentary.  A burst of Spring.  Because it is actually Spring today.  So I looked up how to spell hummus AND Spring.  Its full name is Springtime, for obvious reasons.  Spring is when you wish you had your lawn mower.  If you have a lawn.  And especially if you have a HOA.

It is my plan to move, for my waning years, into the city, where there are an increasing number of armpits.   I will mooove to a dairy barn and run the airconditioner plum out of its mind.  To its utter limit.
The new house is so cool and hip, OMG.  Its only obvious problems:   No windows in the bathrooms. The shower is set up so when you turn it on, you get wet.   (Seems like the idea... but think about it.)
And, oh yeah, it costs 5 years' pay.   And it's always raining.

Sulphur.

Oh, and the septic tank is never full and therefore fails inspection.
You can expect it.
I always (used to) say, if you expect to rate, you gotta expectorate.
But it's false, as the day is longer, in Springtime.  I sprang forward.  Darkness waits.

The Stock Market

The Stock Market used to be in Fort Worth.   Now they have museums there.   When the stock market was there, it was full, overfull, with stock.   Mooooving all the time.   Over time, the stock died.
Then the Stock Market got moooooved to New York (and Tokyo), and it is still overfull.   But the stock mainly does not die.  In fact, over time, the stock grows.  Sometimes it splits, but the offshoots somehow grow heads and toenails and lead more or less normal lives.
There was often something wrong with the market in Fort Worth.  Stinky.  Hoof!   The markets in New York and Tokyo are also stinky, but sometimes when there is something wrong (like stinky), there can be something called a "correction."  Which, oddly, makes things REALLY stinky for awhile, but not forever.  It has to do with methane and the president.
Who is a coward.
Well, I just said that because he grosses me out.  I was on a plane this morning, coming home from Memphis (is that a song?).  And I noticed that pretty much all the men and most of the women grossed me out.  I am picky in the extreme.  None of those people pay dividends.

It's a good day to take stock, and sell it.   Or keep it, but in order to improve the heirs, make sure to have lots of death benefits.

Happy Valentines Day.  !

Anxiety Oy Vey

I'm anxious!   Yikes!
Poor thing!   What triggered it?
Are you kidding?  Have you seen the world today?
Oh, the world triggered it?
No, sheesh, waking up triggered it.   Or maybe it woke me up...
It happens when I travel, on overpasses, in elevators, at the gym, I think I'm gonna puke, pass out, have a stroke.......

etc

I want to report progress.   I believe I have had so much time living in/with clinical anxiety that I am now more or less numb to it.  I have, in the language of the CBT theory, successfully removed the fear from the "uncomfortable bodily sensations." 
I have a story, several years old now:    I was a passenger in a car that drove off the road on a drizzly evening and spun around -  no one hurt, no damage.  The driver turned white, palms sweaty, etc.  I looked over at her and said "That was interesting....what's wrong?"
Nothing was wrong.  Nothing is ever wrong, unless the human condition is wrong.  Which it neither is nor isn't.  If it exists.
I honestly believe my body has been so mistakenly and crazily flooded with adrenaline for so long, I am out.  Out of adrenaline.
I still get the ears ringing, dizziness, disorientation/dissociation....   But I don't get scared much.

For those who still suffer:   "Relax!"  does not work.   "Whatevs...."  actually  ... does.

More on Feelings

Oh eff!   A friend name of G. Bob says that for him, after years of daily meditation, fear and anger are transitory curiosities.  Bob also says "Y'know, we spend 99% of our time thinking about ourselves and there's really no such thing!"  As thinking.  ?   No, of course, he means the self.
      I now view the self, my self, as the combination of 3 things:   a physical body (ever older til death), a set of beliefs which evolve over time - kind of like the stock market, and, #3,  the parade of feelings.   The body and the beliefs enter the consciousness as or through the, yes transitory, feelings.
Silly things.  Curiosities.   It amazes one how loud and painful they can be.  But if I pay attention, I notice they NEVER last more than a few minutes. 
There was the discussion of cravings.   Bell shape.  Level, ascent, peak, descent to level again.   Five minutes tops.   And this is what life is about?  No.  This is simply what life seems to be.

This kind of talk is not particularly beneficial or entertaining.  But I want to document my new view of feelings (a de-emphasis, a disparagement even), because I am actually experiencing something I want to call a new strength.   I can be a hero, in a good way.  I might even be sober.
 Arthritis doesn't go away, but at least it changes.

Some folks hate the president so much, they cannot listen to him speak or view his image without shuddering.   I'm sort of one of those people.  Is it fear or anger?  I'll let you know....
Both.   I wish he would just listen to reason! (to me).   But he won't. 

The signs in the yards say 'Science is Real.'   With their dying gasp.   Well, science is an interesting body of knowledge gained by the experimental method and inductive logic.    Those of us truly inclined to revere science must consider the possibility that belligerent isolationism/protectionism + Reaganomics + disassembly of e.g. the State Department and e.g. the Dept of Energy and (another) e.g. the national parks may be just the ticket for the (still) new millenium.   Clearly these guys have their finger on the pulse of some living beast!

Next:   Inspiration and melody.

Frosty

Overwhelming that this man is gone.  Last few years it went:  "How ya doin Frosty?"
 "How do I look?"  
"You look good!"
 "Well then, ask me out!"

There was nothing that wasn't cool and/or astounding about him.  Except maybe the amount of pain he was willing to endure without complaint.  Astounding, that, but not really cool.
After one of the strokes, I visited him up at Seton NW.  Frosty said "Not doing too bad --  having a little trouble with this left-right thing"

Frosty lived in the old trailer at my place for about 5 years.  We had an understanding.  We would stay out of each other's way, not intrude.  Mostly, we accomplished this.  Except for the exceptions.           The well guys stumbled on a rattlesnake in the well-house.  Ran away, said it was above their pay grade.  Hmmm.    I called Frost to come out and lend a hand (heh).   He emerged from the trailer holding his cane (he had been suffering from gout) and a glok and hobbled over to the scene, about 30 yards from the trailer door.  It was tricky, but he was able to shoot the snake 2 or 3 times without destroying the well apparatus.  I chopped the head off with a hoe.  The snake head.

Casey Monahan brought Uzbek percussionists up to meet Frosty (in Buda)  in about 2002.  A visit to the guru for them.  They jammed a bit.

A fun rhythm section we had in the earlier Danglin Wrangler days was Frosty and Cowboy Dick (Dale Dennis) on bass.  Dale had a cool almost pitchless thuddy/groovy tone and never rushed.  Frosty of course liked to sit on the back side of the grooves, but he did not drag --  unless he meant to.  He caught my eye one night, nodded in the direction of Cowboy Dick (who was possibly doing some nodding of his own, noticeably dragging -- it was okay, it was Sunday at Huts), and proceeded to steadily slow the tempo of the tune til it was down to a crawl.  Tex turned around and said something like "What the hell$%^&*()??"   All in good fun. Cowboy Dick woke up at some point.  (We lost him for good back in the early aughts....)
     On an ad music session at Tequila Mockingbird, we were working on some funky thing, and I asked Frost to "put that back beat just a bit behind, like you like to do it."  He proceeded to show me the available catalogue of options for "just a bit behind."   There were more than 3 options.  More like 7 or 8.  "You want it here?...thwack...or maybe here?....thud....or tighter, like.....?

He admired Clyde Stubblefield.   I preferred him (Frosty).   He did things with his right foot that seemed illegal.   Fast eighth notes, perfect.  Let's face it.  He rocked.  Even with gout.

I made a record for fun in about 1990, some kind of jazz and some kind of country stuff.  I had AD Mannion, a dear friend and great jazz drummer, play the country stuff.  (I could be cruel sometimes) And I asked Frosty to play the jazz.  He said "You understand I am NOT a jazz drummer."     There are several tracks with Frosty playing his brand of jazz, with Jon Blondell on upright, Tony Campise on tenor, and me on the crappy piano over at (now gone) Lone Star Recording, at 12th and Lamar.  The record sold well under a million.

He disdained drum solos.  But was great at them.   He played the songs.  The grooves too, of course, but he knew, understood, MADE the songs.   Used silence - kinda like Beethoven.   Mike Flanigin reports that part of his audience came specifically to see Frosty.  The Wranglers at Huts had the same thing goin on.  Which made for quite a crowd, 'cause Tex had his fans too, as did Blondell, Junior Brown, Jimmy Day, Tomas Ramirez, Chris O'Connell.... but I digress.   (This stuff is so far back in the past, did it even happen????)

When I asked Frosty what his real name was, he told me Barry, but the room was noisy and I thought he said Mary.  And I occasionally called him Mary for many years, even though it felt dangerous.
Frosty probably had a classically tough childhood and was very strong.  But reasonable.  Actually my good buddies from that band are all that way, tough, brilliant musicians, poets, philosophers, and all were autodidacts.  RC Banks as well.

A good friend and great audio engineer named Sullivan referred yesterday to "trying to deal with this chaos of no Frosty."
It feels as though the planet's axis is ruined.

Feelings....Nothing

....more than feelings.   I sent a mentality to my staff, and they mostly responded with dove ocean.   Oh, she and ick!  I asked for a poem about dolphins and James Brown, and Abigail said "Who's James Brown?"   I said he was sort of like Michael Jackson but, well...., no.  Trying to forget my feelings of love.   (That's the next line of lyric -  more evidence that lyrics absolutely wither without melody).   I feel good, just like I new that I wood.   My rod, my staff, they prepare EST, a table, long before me.

Here's a story of a ping pong table.   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cIIW0p7bJg
That was the missing link.  I stumbled upon a classy ping pong table at the Outlet Mall.  (Picture a large concrete drainage pipe with hungry zombies dancing.)  ((My grandson asked me something....I thought he said, "Grandpa, how many zombies are there, actually?" -   nun, nun, nun!)).   (((The real answer is:  All of 'em!)))
I would buy this elegant table for its symbolism.  I played when I was a child.  It was serious.   The table was in a small room in the cousins' house.  We were all pretty good, but I was the most competitive.   Now, I learn one of the great lessons:  how to lose with equanimity.  Seems like an oxymoron.  What's the score?   Even?   Odd!   "I'm losing, and I'm okay cool with that. --  you there, go ahead and win; you can even win by a lot; you can even cheat!   Cheater!   Cheetahs never win, at ping pong.  They can't hold the paddles properly.
Tears, running down my face in streams
Dripping off my chin and things,
Nothing more than things.   You can live without them, and you must, if you can't transport them.  They'll just have to stay where they are, until dis assembled.

What can happen, does

What can happen happens?   No, not always.  Suns don't burn out.  Oh...wait.   Aliens don't invade Earth.   Not yet.   People keep falling in and out of love.

What is the King?   Love?  Death?  Money?  Intelligence?  Spirit?   Serenity?

All of it, and none.  It's not a car, or a set of golf clubs, nor a negligee, nor a smart phone.

Of everything I mentioned, only one thing is deeply scary.

Smart phone.

Truth, Rage, and Me - Redux

The earlier "Truth, Rage, Me" came out in 2008.  Ah, the good old days!

The main thing I want to report/change is that frozen dinners no longer appeal.  At all.

Even if I was stuck on a small volcanic island (atoll).  Which I kind of am.  And I've kind of gotten in this habit of cooking balanced, healthy meals for myself.  Usually about once a week.  And the dogs and I sort of enjoy them.  (We eat meat)   And we are all just fine.  We hold our own against the rats, the fleas, the roaches.  (I'm Holding my Own was Leroy Parnell's big hit, and it's still pretty funny.)

Anyway back to the atoll.  There is an ATM on the atoll and it dispenses obsidian and ash.   I got a piece of ash there fairly recently.  It was perfect.  Perfect ash.   Kind of hot.  And I did get burned.  But I'm used to it.

Crazy time now, really.  I spend a few hours a day starkly sane and in pursuit of sanity.  The rest of the time I either do or do not notice how physically crappy I feel and worry that I'm going to mess up somebody's day.   No one really cares.   Specially me.  In a word, INsane.  (not a word)

There was a band, man.  A famous top hand.  That hailed from down ol Texas way.    Way......
In the last decade there was the idea of the Sweet Bunch of Daisies, the band, and then the dispersal.
I loved that project.  Me and three astoundingly talented players of the violin in lots of styles, all of whom sang really really well and in lots of styles.   There was a City Hall concert in 2009.  Perhaps there is an archive.   I have it somewhere.

It is past.   I had Bell's Palsy in 2009.   It mostly passed.
It was a painful and lengthy drooping.  Like lava flowing out of that ATM on the atoll.  On my face.
Droopy.   It was not a stroke.  Who needs a stroke anyway?   Don't touch me!  I might erupt.

Prodigal

Having been prodded, I am now prodigal.

The last entry was in July 2015.  I am rusty.   It was hot in this hemisphere.   I was not.   I was incredibly stupid (i will not explain this).  What's different now is that I got worse and worse until just a few months ago, when an enforced stint behind bars jolted me into a bit of better information and an open mind.

So, I am moved to show you this open mind.   Pieces of its grey matter --  dark matter.  Don't matter.

For one thing, the purported best bestest most awesomest time in my life- the early 90s - sure had its nice qualities.  For example, I pretended to believe in God and be His humble servant.  I even think I bought my own BS on that  (though I drank no KoolAid).  I got to hang with some really awesome humans: my former wife, my younger 3 children.  Even had actual friends  (by this I mean humans other than musicians with whom I conversed and ate food occasionally --  other stuff too:  I successfully sold them on my BS.  Maybe.   Of no consequence really....)

You know that old saw "Keep it Simple!"   ?   Stupid?   Yes.  Because it's NOT simple.   I like (really do) "My son, look for God within you."   But, dad, ego is in there.  Is Ego God?   "No, look again."
Then everyone fell asleep,
and a great cloud swept over them and
deposited nickels on their eyes
and their heads were each worth
ten cents!  adjusted for inflation.

The early 90s were not that great for some folks.

Breaking Up

This is something waves do not do.  Waves break.   Electrons (whatever they are) do not.   Cars break….down.  Sometimes brand new cars have defective sensors.   Mine, for instance, does.   Toys break, but only if you leave them in the middle of the street or in the hands of careless children.   Divorce.  It's two things, vorcing.   Have you ever heard of a divorce that didn't work out?   I have.

If you love someone and break up with them, there will be pain.   Seems like an axiom.  Love + breakup = pain.  But there can be "I'm so proud of myself."   "I have time to do the things I need/want to do."   "I was horny all the time anyway."   &c.   I told somebody "She's not stringing me along."  And he said "You're stringing yourself along," and laughed.

Johnny Gimble

When he said something, you thought "What's the other meaning?" His granddaughter mentioned this.  I smiled and agreed.   There was always at least one other meaning.  Perhaps a pun.
Yes he was a great musician, and he was one of those who "play to live."  Like me, he always looked like he was having a tremendous time.  Unlike me, I believe he was.  And of course the joy was infectious.
He gave everybody a solo and collaborated on a lot of what are called "twin parts."  "Arrangements," actually.
Somewhere in the later '80s, I played with him up near Liberty Hill, and I caught him conversing with the Christian spirits.  He felt something impending.  I guess it was that first stroke.  He lived to recover and make a couple records with which I helped.  His playing had been effortless before the stroke, pure joy.   After it, he told me, it required effort.  Sounded, if anything, even better, more astounding on Beaumont Rag for instance.   And then a decade and a half, and now gone.
I heard some of the old Texas Playboys enjoying this humorous line of talk:  "Hey, when you die can I have your <      > ?"  (fiddle, car, wife….)   Ha ha ha.
I would like to be Johnny.  I know he suffered, as humans do.  But he was elemental.  He was plugged into some vast positive reservoir that now feels inaccessible to me.   It is dammed up somewhere on the Cap Rock, beyond a thousand pumpjacks silently murmuring "Dollar….dollar….dollar….."

Memoirs

"These memories are really hard to forget!"   An old friend said this to me Friday, smiling.   I mean really old, older than me   !    Usually the elderly jokes are, well, about hiding your own Easter eggs kind of thing.

Sorry.  I've been reading DF Wallace again, and I slip into being one of his sad characters.

I've also been inspired to begin my memoirs.   The funny thing is, I don't remember much at all.  Or, I should say, I remember quite a bit, but it's memories for gosh sakes, not facts!   Not real stuff that really happened.  Just impressions.   I desperately want to write interesting things.   There are facts, but they all seem so mundane.  e.g.  I watched a guy mainline adrenaline once, and he turned a little green.  (I also watched the same guy mainline gin and get drunk really fast).   Later he had yellow eyes.   He and I were students at an Ivy League college.   Smart guys.

Facts.   Perhaps.   The world is all that is the case, or ever was or will be the case.

What makes it into the memoirs?   Haven't really firmed that up yet, but I hope everything does.  All of it.   It'll be a really long memoir.  One idea would be not to die until after it is published.   But then I'll have to live nearly forever.   Facts, impressions, lies, slanty posturing re this or that idea of God or theory of knowledge, whatnot.

How is Kickstarter different from begging?  And is begging lame?   Better than working for a living I'd say.   Better than working for a living.   Not easier though.

Remember this:   I love you.