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The World’s largest panorama & a short film on surf photographer Mickey Smith:

A bit of poetry to start the day…

The Layers
by Stanley Kunitz

I have walked through many lives,
some of them my own,
and I am not who I was,
though some principle of being
abides, from which I struggle
not to stray.
When I look behind,
as I am compelled to look
before I can gather strength
to proceed on my journey,
I see the milestones dwindling
toward the horizon
and the slow fires trailing
from the abandoned camp-sites,
over which scavenger angels
wheel on heavy wings.
Oh, I have made myself a tribe
out of my true affections,
and my tribe is scattered!
How shall the heart be reconciled
to its feast of losses?
In a rising wind
the manic dust of my friends,
those who fell along the way,
bitterly stings my face.
Yet I turn, I turn,
exulting somewhat,
with my will intact to go
wherever I need to go,
and every stone on the road
precious to me.
In my darkest night,
when the moon was covered
and I roamed through wreckage,
a nimbus-clouded voice
directed me:
“Live in the layers,
not on the litter.”
Though I lack the art
to decipher it,
no doubt the next chapter
in my book of transformations
is already written.
I am not done with my changes.

This is absolutely a must read. A tear was running down my cheek as I burst out laughing hysterically at another message.

What’s this mania that you all have to play the assassin? Your killer is a guy without imagination: he doesn’t give a damn for death because he doesn’t know what life is. –Jean-Paul Sartre, Dirty Hands

Free hugs video

Frood posted this over on the guild site… Really moving. What’s saddening is that some repressed control freak actually banned them. Don’t fuck me up with peace and love!

The phrases “run away like a little girl”, “cry like a little girl”, “scream like a little girl” make me nuts. My gaming group knows this. I am sure they think I am nuts.

Excuses abound… but the reality is, we never say “runs away like a little boy” or “cries like a little boy”. In fact, none of the typical “emotes” we have to express cowardice, pain, or fear relate to men. Why is that? Someone today said something to the effect that they were tried and true cliches… My response was, well, they’re offensive, so stop using them. I don’t think many get why they’re offensive any more than they get why saying “amg that’s gay” is offensive. The problem with people is that they have these huge brains and they utterly refuse to use them. I am not sure what’s more infuriating: the fact that they refuse to actually think about what they say, or the fact that they don’t care that it hurts others. (Probably the latter, though the former really pisses me off too.) The fact is, we fall back on sorry cliches that hurt others all too much, and most of it is because we are just too lazy to be creative about our insults.

I really don’t care for people who have causes… mostly they’re just annoying, whiney, and misguided… but this one is mine. My gender doesn’t make me a whiney, screechy, annoying, coward. Sorry guys, but really.

I was a tomboy. I was the dodgeball team captain and you’d better believe I didn’t “throw like a girl”. Fine, a lot of girls did/do fit this sterotype… but for those of us who don’t, never have, and who’d like to be effective in life, having to account for it every day of their lives is just downright annoying. Some of us will kick your butts boys. My guess is you damn well know it, and that’s why you keep falling back to these weak attempts at disempowerment. We all know when we’re outgunned. Smart, capable women are scary. Maybe if we don’t admit they exist, they’ll just go away!

But, there’s a catch-22. You like women. Heck, some of you even like the smart, capable kind. Now, we women know you don’t think much. It makes us sad, but you’re kind of cute anyhow. However, you would be so much hotter if you revelled in our brilliance, our courage, and our strength… if you saw us not just as individuals, but as a gender, for exactly what we are.

We shoot guns and hoops as well as you do. We play video games as well as you do. We don’t run from challenges and in all honesty when something awful happens, we will probably be the first ones there to provide comfort- not “crying like little girls” but supportive and never asking anything for it.

You all had mothers. Would you speak such of them? I highly doubt it.

So, think about what you are implying before you speak. Being of the female persuasion is not inferior (“ladies”). Being homosexual doesn’t mean you’re stupid (“that’s so gay!”). Stop being a thoughtless, mindless, cruel idiot. We have plenty of them around. (And yes ladies, that applies to you too.) Challenge yourselves. There is great satisfaction in insulting someone and having them thank you for it… try The Superior Person’s Book of Words if you need inspiration.

And, if you’re skeptical, take heart guys… Women like smart, thoughtful men. They make more money. :p