Monday linkage, with Joe Pye weed

Some random linkage, starting (of course!) with my own radio show: Thursday, Friday and today.

We were a bit off our game today, since Gregg and I had to soldier on without Double A. Next week, I am going to Texas, and they will have to soldier on without ME... so I am not complaining.

I just get nervous when we change anything.

~*~

Just back from Atlanta, where I caught a very personal story in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (unfortunately, behind a pesky paywall, or I would link it) about the former Miss Georgia, beautiful Leighton Jordan. In the AJC account, Jordan's eating disorder is presented in stark, primary colors. It was harrowing; the unending treadmill of ballet, pageants and thinness seemed less like the life of a princess (the fairy tale we all hear about) and more like being caught in a trap.

In her work as Miss Georgia, Jordan describes a personal appearance wherein she spies a 13-year-old girl, very thin and obviously "jittery" as she is confronted with a table full of food. Jordan takes the girl aside and tells her that she needs to hear her story.

It was an amazing moment of sisterhood, self-sacrifice and love.

I promise never again to be mean to the pageant-participants. Jordan has redeemed you all.

Namaste.

~*~

At left: Joe Pye weed, from Linky Stone park. Ain't it just so purty?!?

I used this photo as the background for my new Tumblr, which you should all check out.


~*~





Other stuff--

6th big cat dies at Texas animal sanctuary (USA Today) -- I did not know that big cats caught feline distemper, as domestic cats do. :(

~*~

Also covered on our show today, CNN doctor-on-call Sanjay Gupta reversed himself on the weed. And yes, we are now waiting on the rest of you 'experts' who have said stupid things in the past; you too may be regarded as respectable once again! SAVE YOUR REPUTATIONS NOW! FREE THE WEED!

~*~

[Attorney General Eric] Holder seeks to avert mandatory minimum sentences for some low-level drug offenders (Washington Post) Better late than never.

~*~

Speaking of marijuana (doing radio has taught me the importance of a good segue!), Erin Tatum's feminist review of "We're the Millers" at Bitch Flicks accurately articulates my concerns about the movie, which I haven't yet seen (but I have been subjected to oodles of trailers):

Really, you are lying to yourself if you thought the powers that be would waste any opportunity to showcase Jennifer Aniston's legs. The ensuing montage is pure wet, slow-motion fan service. The dance ends with Rose releasing a steam valve, disorienting their captors enough to let their "family" escape. I'm torn about this scene because although it's trying almost too hard to show that strippers can be smart and intuitive, Rose’s most valuable asset is still her body and her ability to be objectified. I take issue not so much the objectification itself so much as the fact that the definitive aspect of Rose’s character seems to be “LOL WHAT 40+ and still hot?!?”. Certainly Aniston's boldness and athleticism are praiseworthy, but given the amount that the actors talk about it in interviews, you would think the strip routine was her sole appearance.

~*~

I am greatly looking forward to Elysium, a new film containing one of my very favorite scifi plots ever: Earth evacuated by the rich as a festering shithole, while only the poor, sick and unlucky are left behind. This was a favorite theme of my beloved Philip K Dick, as in his great masterpiece Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, which became the film Blade Runner. (It is also the scenario in The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, a novel of obsessive importance to your humble narrator.) Elysium was directed by Neill Blomkamp, the director of DISTRICT 9.

Unfortunately, Elysium is getting rather mixed reviews, even though it easily won the weekend box office. I still intend to see it, so stay tuned.

The Conjuring got on my nerves, because I really wanted to like it.

~*~

And for you musically oriented folks: I finally "cleaned up" my infamous three-year-old instrumentals post... I profusely apologize to the people who Googled "instrumentals" (which are notoriously VERY HARD to find, since there are no lyrics to look up) and came upon my post with so many songs missing. I blame YouTube! (Again, time to plug the invaluable YouTomb, a fascinating website that chronicles the whys and wherefores of various videos getting the plug pulled.)

I especially got a chock full of searches after MAD MEN used "Love is Blue" over their closing credits in one of this past year's shows.

And so, here it is.

Love is blue (L'amour est bleu) - Paul Mauriat (1968)

Cinco de Mayo!

It's been a tough week for blogging. But at least I saw another antique Chevy when I went out to grab a bite earlier in the week!




I am grateful I woke up this morning without any notifications of direct threats, as I did last Saturday. It is not a day I am likely to forget. Five people sent me messages as soon as I signed on, several making sure I TOOK THE SCREEN SHOTS. I obediently did as they told me to do, but I did not visit the hate-page after I initially took the shot, because I found it too unnerving.

I have spent the last week decompressing from disaster, even though I gained a parcel of new Facebook friends and radio-show listeners. At the same time, I have been extremely careful, looking over my shoulder. Is this what it's like to be well-known and controversial? Apparently so. I have been wondering if I am up for this.

I was blocked from Facebook for about 24 hrs. I am not sure of the specific reason, since all my requests for clarification were totally ignored. One of my comments was deemed "threatening"--which is pretty ironic under the circumstances (as stated above, there was a whole Facebook page threatening me physically), and my questions ("Why or how is this a threatening statement?") sent to the proverbial round-file. I have since learned that if your comments are deliberately targeted (as mine have been) and reported X number of times, THAT is what deems it offensive, not the actual content of the comment(s) in question. It's all about the clicks. The warnings and blockages are executed by Facebook-bots, not by actual people. This explains the wildly-varying standards: on one Facebook page, you can talk filth and nobody cares, but on another, a simple factual statement such as (for instance) Bob Jones University-affiliates are covering up for rape-apologists is considered "offensive."

The truth is now subject to censorship for being "too offensive" for certain overprotected, neurasthenic people to be able to tolerate. And their intolerance is what makes it "offensive."

I am suddenly reminded of a bone-chilling line in Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by the legendary Philip K Dick, a line that (tellingly) did not make it into the screenplay of the film, which became Blade Runner. Paraphrasing: What proof do we have that empathy exists, asks the android, except the humans' word for it? Isn't it something they just made up to prove they have this special thing?

And the Bob Jones University-apologists similarly ask: What proof do we have that your truth exists, except your word for it? Isn't it something you just made up, to say something bad about us?

It's scary, isn't it? After all, they already say this about science and evolution, global-warming and gay people.

I've long been claiming there is no such thing as objectivity, and I think this whole debacle is proof of that. The word "offensive" is no longer about unacceptable cuss words and sexual terms; the word is now assigned to any statement that bothers you, for any reason. Whether the statement is "objectively true" is of no importance in this determination.

Empathy is next. What proof do we have that it exists? OOOPS, is that an offensive statement? BOOM, down the memory hole.

You should NOT have to read such disconcerting, disorienting notions.

~*~

I attempted a joke on my show this morning, off the cuff, and it bombed. Nobody's perfect. Better luck next time and thank you for playing!

Podcast of bad joke and other topics, is up.

And last night, saw another cool car and took another picture. My favorite color! I am not sure of the make/year of this very lovely, cherry-red beauty, but if you know, speak up.

Biographical aside: I used to work in the purty pink building, which is at the corner of Main and East North Streets in Greenville. It is now a clothing store, but was a GNC when I worked there.

~*~

Lots of interpersonal ups and downs in local Occupy groups, including mine, as well as groups in Spartanburg and Columbia. (I haven't yet checked the astrological charts, but I am sure something must be going on.) I shall refrain from bad-mouthing liberals and their inability to SUBMIT TO COLLECTIVE DISCIPLINE (Yes, Barack, I am lookin at you too) but.... well, they DO have a problem submitting to collective discipline.

Simply put, if a whole group votes that you are disruptive, stay your ass away. Is that too difficult to understand? People seem to get this concept in ANY endeavor but politics. It appears that some folks think they are just so wonderful that they deserve to be heard and listened to (including their sorry excuses) more than other people, certainly more than they have ever listened to anyone else. How does that work exactly?

In any event, I am once again reminded of my mentor, Steve Conliff, and his rule of thumb for the Yippies, that I know I have quoted numerous times previously, in this space: If you let anybody in, anybody WILL come in.

And yes, they do. The confused, the argumentative, the power-tripping, the lecherous, the whole Hee Haw gang is present and accounted for. I always take their presence as a given. I can easily accept these people, if they are aware of their personality-issues, as I am (mostly) aware of mine. I want people to cut me slack, so I cut others slack, too. But I notice many of these people do not think they have any personality-issues, in fact, they think they are just peachy-keen and wonderful. Unfortunately, that is often where the liberalism comes in: they have been believing their own press. They believe they are compassionate, aware and kind, just because liberals are said to be compassionate, aware and kind. (By contrast, radicals never get this kind of good press; radicals are dangerous, crazy, insane, outside agitators, etc.) Thus, when these folks go off the rails, you also have the attendant spectacle of other liberals going into catatonia: But I thought he was... NICE!

And there is often no evidence that this person was EVER "nice"--except that they agreed with us. We tend to assume a lot about the people who agree with us: they MUST be good, since (it goes without saying!) WE are GOOD!

Maybe the operative difference is, I don't think I am particularly good. I try, but I fail repeatedly. Thus, I assume others are trying and failing, repeatedly, all the time. And as we know, passing the kid who has consistently failed is ultimately a mean thing to do and sets them up for more failure. So it is with people who repeatedly fail us.

At some unavoidable juncture, it is time to send them back to Decency 101, that class they obviously missed. We tolerate their continued failures at our peril.

~*~

Greenville Occupiers, bringing the radicalism! Yeah!







There will be an Occupy Picnic in McPherson Park this afternoon, 3:30pm, be there or be square. General Assembly is tomorrow at 2pm in Bergamo Square; Main and Coffee Streets, across from Coffee Underground... which is especially handy for quick coffee-junkie fixes, also a very good refuge for bad weather, which has only happened a couple of times.

Bergamo Square is currently under construction; it will soon be the home of some monstrous new building, currently given the ominous title of PROJECT ONE. (Wasn't Kampuchea named that by Pol Pot?*) It is growing fairly enormous by the day, and we usually picket right in front of it.

The Greenville Antiwar Society used to have our yearly candlelight vigil exactly where the construction is now, but the small building with two giant flights of steps (where I took this photo from) is now gone.

Since we are standing there with signs, several people have asked us if we are protesting the construction.

They seem disappointed when we say no.


*Correction, that was THE YEAR ONE. I always get capitalism and communism mixed up, sorry about that. ;)

Library Thing is cool

I love my new LIBRARY THING widget! (see lower right of blog) I'm afraid I got very obsessive, and easily composed my 200-book list with nary a second thought. They allow listings of 200 books per free account; you can pay a premium to list your entire library. (PS: That's another thing that happens when you get old--I figure I've read thousands and thousands of books by now.)

You can match the widget to your blog colors and craft it to show however-many-books-you-want per page load. (Any more than 9 at a time seems to make the covers virtually microscopic, and that's no fun.) What's neat about LIBRARY THING is, if you are poor, you can change the book-display to a nicer cover, and no one will know you read it second-hand for 10 cents. Then again, some of the new covers are shit, and you can also keep the old ones if you like them better. (I also chose at least one cover of a foreign translation, since I thought it was prettier and showed up better on the widget.)

I didn't know if I should list books that changed my life, or just books I love since I eat up certain scandals like ice cream, or what. So, I went in several directions at once, and tried to make my list fairly representative. However, some aspects of my identity got decidedly short shrift; I think there is only ONE vegetarian book listed ((guilt)) and that is probably because it's the official cookbook of Michael Stipe's restaurant. Since this is ostensibly a feminist blog, I listed several now-forgotten Second-wave feminist books that I think are terrific, as well as important. I tried hard to keep the celebrity bios to a minimum, but sometimes, you simply must include certain people.

Library Thing also lists other members with your books in their catalogues. I have already noticed there is significant overlap in various cult-followings, particularly those of Philip K. Dick, William Gibson and J.G. Ballard (RIP, dearest one!) and I find this fascinating; I am trying to figure out why and how these writers' sensibilities are similar...or are the READERS the people who are similar, and our attraction to these writers ideas is about US, not them?

Some books have a mere 6 followers*, and some, of course, have followers numbering in the thousands. I have not yet reviewed books or participated in any of the conversations, but I hope to do so at some point. Right now, mere escapism. (I haven't had as much time to myself since one of my co-workers decided to walk off the job and I have taken up the slack.)

It's lots of fun to browse old books in musty second-hand bookstores and public libraries, and it's fun online, too.

~*~

*Nan Goldin's I'll be your mirror is also reviewed here.

Voodoo Chile, slight return

Our Lady of Fatima appears to Lucia, Jacinta and Francisco in Portugal in 1917, stained glass from St Mary's Church in Greenville, SC.

~*~



We are discussing archetypes, mountains, deserts, religion, Jesus, Philip K Dick novels, psychedelic drugs and other cool stuff over on the Rapture thread, so if you one of those old hippies into all that, bring it!



On the thread in question, I embarrassingly confessed that I once had a profound mystical experience listening to 70s progressive ART ROCK, God help us. (((blushes bright pink)))

To make up for that, and to mend my musical reputation, I hurriedly add that I also had a mystical experience listening to THIS... yes, along with most of the rest of population of Berserkely and all points Westward.

Only someone possessed of the Holy Spirit could make a guitar (or anything else) sound like this. And he played it upside-down and left-handed, which as any religion scholar will tell you, cinches the deal.

PS: And if people want to talk about Voodoo, go for it!

Must be played very, very loud for maximum spiritual benefits.

~*~

Voodoo Chile (Slight Return) - Jimi Hendrix



And if I don't meet you no more in this world
Then I'll meet you in the next one
And don't be late
Don't be late.

We Can Build You: the Vice Presidential debate

What did you all think of the Vice Presidential debate?

Amazed, I sat and watched as Stepford Candidate, properly wound up and battery-powered by the GOP, perkily chattered like a Disney-World android. Recalling We Can Build You by Philip K Dick, I wondered if perhaps they had created an android just for the occasion. Better safe than sorry!

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, Republican Vice Presidential candidate, has been sequestered down in Arizona for the week, cramming and studying for her final exam... most reaction shots showed her looking down at her index cards, hurriedly attempting to assemble a rational response. Some replies made sense and some didn't:

On at least 10 occasions, Palin gave answers that were nonspecific, completely generic, pivoted away from the question at hand, or simply ignored it: on global warming, an Iraq exit strategy, Iran and Pakistan, Iranian diplomacy, Israel-Palestine (and a follow-up), the nuclear trigger, interventionism, Cheney's vice presidency and her own greatest weakness.

Asked which is a greater threat, a nuclear Pakistan or a nuclear Iran, Palin seemed to be stalling, or writing a term paper, when she said: “An armed, nuclear armed especially Iran is so extremely dangerous to consider.”

When I didn't look at her, she sounded much dumber than when I looked at the TV and was distracted by her cutesy, winking demeanor (I counted 4 winks, which I found nauseating in the extreme). For example, when not looking at her, I heard her say "the revelations about Wall Street, made aware to the American people"... revelations are made aware to other people? Huh? Grammar, love.

It was all like that. A bunch of blather, strung together from index cards, punctuated by sweet beauty-pageant smiles, winking, and the characteristic Republican mispronunciation of "nuclear." (What IS IT with these people?!?)

I just saw a Republican congresswoman from New Mexico (could not make out the name, don't have my glasses on) talking on the tube about how [Democratic Vice Presidential candidate] Senator Joe Biden was "over the top" in saying that Dick Cheney was the most dangerous vice president in American history--the best applause line of the night.

OVER THE TOP, you mean like FUCKING WINKING like a Playmate of the Year?

Saints preserve us.

Discuss amongst yourselves!

Also see: VP Debate: Biden on McCain: "Maverick, he is not." (Crooks and Liars)

VP Debate: McCain's Big Gamble Comes up Snake Eyes (Huffington Post)

Biden vs. Palin -- Who Won? 6 Short Takes on the VP Debate (AlterNet)

----------------
Listening to: Louis Armstrong - Stardust
via FoxyTunes

We are currently experiencing technical difficulties

... in ohhhh, so many ways.

First, can anyone explain why I can't see any of my previously posted videos in Firefox, but I can see these same videos in Internet Explorer? Also, a few random widgets are missing in Firefox as well.

This appeared to happen right after I deleted Google's Adsense in a fit of pique, for putting "Osama Obama" ads on my blog. Then, I wake up this morning and can't see any of my videos. We'll teach you to diss Google, missy! Chastened, I put the Google Adsense box back, but it looks different this time. Also, I could not access my full layouts page (had to re-install Adsense through Internet Explorer, also). The bottom half of the Page Layouts (in Blogger) is gone, random widgets and links disappearing just like the videos did. The Template tab has also disappeared, along with my Dead Air Library widget. It was exactly like Flow my Tears, the Policeman Said, by Philip K Dick, the only logical outcome being that I would soon start disappearing, as well. There will have been no record of me OR my blog, and I will (necessarily) have to go around trying to convince people that I exist.

Like anyone else in such a situation, understandably, I did panic.

~*~

This hasn't been a good week. Two days ago, while my arms were full of (not kidding) dog vitamins, I tripped over a badly-stacked bottled-water display and ended up splayed out on the floor--SPLAT. (Dick Van Dyke redux, for you baby boomers.) I badly bruised both elbows and my left knee, but as my regular blog-readers know, I'm a well-padded gal of hardy peasant stock who ingests every supplement ever invented (and then some). I am relieved and grateful I didn't break anything, but if I had, I would have talked to a few bone-building supplement manufacturers and demanded an explanation.

Anyway, already a bit jarred, and then last night I watch Rick Warren and the presidential candidates engage in some depressingly predictable repartee.

My supervisor is changing jobs, as noted before, and will be leaving us this week. I ate lunch with her today; I am crestfallen over her departure and feel an acute sense of loss.

And then, I see that I am disappearing! Where's my videos?! ((screams))

~*~

Comically, I attempt to leave messages for the Blogger Help Group, which also advertises for ESCORTS from various warring countries. Gollee, I had NO IDEA! No, wait... that is SPAM that the Blogger team is too lazy to clean up. You figure a place that tolerates all of this sex-spam ain't gonna be much for answering my question. I dutifully type "disappearing videos from blog" in the little search box provided, and promptly find a dozen people with my same question, spread out over the past four months.

And not a single answer.

Why do they bother to tell us about a Blogger Help Group, if they have no intention of helping? Is this some new, creative form of postmodern torture?

Anyway, I apologize for being slack lately. I wanted to blast the Rick Warren follies good and proper, and may well do so. I have a tight schedule the next few days.

And I might disappear entirely by then.

How I learned to stop worrying and love the Tarot

Left: The High Priestess, from the Rider-Waite tarot deck.

~*~

Can I really tell people's fortunes?

Someone asked me, as I was idly reading the tarot for myself, sitting alone and drinking coffee. I told them: I read the tarot.

Isn't that reading people's fortunes? Telling the future?

At that point, I launched into a rather flaky Philip-K-Dick-inspired explanation of pre-cogs. PKD's particular pre-cogs saw a collection of futures and then, one future would appear prominent and more obvious than the others.* Interestingly, two pre-cogs may not agree. In one of his most famous stories, three pre-cogs are used to arrive at a conclusion and it is discovered that one of them frequently dissents from the other two, and this account therefore disregarded. (This dissent was known as the Minority Report.)

In various of PKD's tales, when the pre-cogs tell the future, that future may suddenly vanish. It has changed, in the telling. It was prevented by saying it aloud; also the intention in Minority Report--to actually prevent what the pre-cogs see from ever truly coming to pass. (It was called the Department of PreCrime.)

And then there is Dickens' version. After being shown his unpleasant fate, Ebenezer Scrooge notoriously pleaded with the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come to please clarify: Is this what CAN be, or what WILL be? And the spirit, dressed like the grim reaper (who never says much in fiction, you'll notice), didn't answer but kept pointing to Scrooges' gravestone. The only thing certain is death.

When I read the tarot, I feel I am getting a series of random snapshots from that person's psyche, all measured in archetypes. The best reading is interactive, when I read the archetypes and the person tells me who/what these represent to them and what it means when they see the images and I repeat the words: The Lovers, The Chariot, The Moon, Strength, The Fool. Who is the Queen of Swords? Who is the King of Cups? They will usually tell me, unless guarded and distant (and some are). They unwind their selves for me, confiding and reaching out. I feel then that I truly know them, even if I have just met them. They have shown me their vulnerability and I show them whatever I think they need: kindness, encouragement, reproach (yes, some come to confess their sins; usually at least one card always gives open permission for this to happen), interrogation, an overall lightness, fun. Every person is different. I ask them what they want from the reading and I try to deliver it as best as I can.

Sometimes, as was true for my friend JW, the person invigorates my spirit and helps me see myself better, too. And I know the reading was also for myself.

People know what they want. They know what future they want. They want permission, encouragement, warnings, best wishes. Perhaps in the past, they had kindly relatives living close by, who could offer these. Maybe they had a priest, a rabbi, someone who delivered the periodic warnings and the necessary checks and balances to the ego. But lately, people have fewer spiritual authorities, even as their existential options have exponentially increased. They want to be in charge (and on some level, realize that they ARE), and yet, give some quiet assent to tradition, old ways, the unpredictability of life and fate. They want to go to a grandma-hippie figure and be comforted or upbraided. Their own grandmother might be in another country or on the other side of this one. This is the reason people have psychics, shrinks, therapists, life coaches.

~*~

Left: the Eight of Coins (Craft) from the Nigel Jackson tarot.


I could never have read the tarot when I was young. I just wouldn't have had the nerve to look at a bunch of cards and talk about what they mean. I studied the cards and knew about them, but I don't know when it was that I saw a reading and realized I could do it, too. The first time I read the tarot for another person, I could clearly see that they were trusting me implicitly with their honest life-questions... and it was THEN and only then, that I understood the tarot's purpose; it is a process, an interaction, an exchange of knowledge, impressions, emotions. As I read the cards, it all unfolded before me--my own future too.

During the advertising campaign for Sam Raimi's film THE GIFT, screenwriter Billy Bob Thornton made waves when he said he based the lead character on his own mother, a small-town psychic in Arkansas. More weird shit from Billy Bob, said the press, rolling their collective eyes heavenward. But I heard him when he said that in certain parts of the south, people don't trust educated counselors and professionals the way they would trust his mother. It was also a matter of class, money, motive and overall style. People will either get it, he said, or they won't.

The easiest tarot reading is the skeptical person who has never had it done before. The archetypes represented by the tarot deck freak them out in a big way; they didn't realize they had consented to Jungian psychoanalysis as conducted by a hippie herbalist.

"Who's the Emperor?" I asked one such skeptic. "Your father?"

"You're supposed to tell me that!" he barked, condescendingly.

"Okay, your father."

He grunted.

And let's not forget: Occam's razor works well for tarot, too.

***

*In Ubik, a group of pre-cogs hired by one corporation is neutralized by another. They do this by making all futures (as foreseen by the pre-cogs) equally probable, thus canceling out any prominent ones from manifesting. (Of course, this essentially made them just like anyone else who could vividly imagine a future.)

Aliens are dogmatically approved!

Happy Pentecost! It's official! The Vatican says we can believe in aliens!

VATICAN CITY (AP) - MAY 13, 2008 The Vatican's chief astronomer says that believing in aliens does not contradict faith in God.

The Rev. Jose Gabriel Funes, the Jesuit director of the Vatican Observatory, says that the vastness of the universe means it is possible there could be other forms of life outside Earth, even intelligent ones.

In an interview published Tuesday by Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, Funes says that such a notion "doesn't contradict our faith" because aliens would still be God's creatures.

The interview was headlined "The extraterrestrial is my brother." Funes said that ruling out the existence of aliens would be like "putting limits" on God's creative freedom.

This invites more questions, of course. What if the aliens have their own deities, that look really different from ours?

If you enjoy ideas like that, here is some recommended reading for religiously/spiritually oriented scifi folks:

A CASE OF CONSCIENCE by James Blish. This book rocks so much, I can't adequately convey how great it is. Jesuits were the priests elected to preach the gospel to other cultures, to new worlds, to utter strangers. It seems likely they'd be the ones to visit other planets.

Do aliens experience the phenomenon of original sin? Only if you bring them to Earth:

Father Ramon Ruiz-Sanchez S.J., is a part of a four man scientific commission to the planet Lithia, there to study a harmonious society of aliens living on a planets which is a biologist's paradise. He soon finds himself troubled: how can these perfect beings, living in an apparent Eden, have no conception of sin or God? If such a sinless Eden has been created apart from God, then who is responsible?

JESUS ON MARS by Philip Jose Farmer asks the question: What would have happened if Jesus had never been crucified? What if every planet gets their own Jesus, to see how they react to Him?

UBIK by Philip K Dick tends to defy description, as PKD usually does. What happens after you die? PKD thought he might have an answer. (Several theological nods to my man Meister Eckhart!)

A CANTICLE FOR LEIBOWITZ by Walter Miller is also too fabulous for mere words. I wish I could tell you the ending. Still, one wonders if people even UNDERSTAND what they are reading. For instance, in the above-linked review:

So often in science fiction, religion is treated as a subject of ridicule, satire and scorn. A Canticle for Leibowitz is refreshing in that it looks at the Catholic Church as a viable, eternal entity. The fact that Miller's Church remains essentially the same in the 26th, 32nd and 38th century as it was in the Middle Ages does not, in fact, detract from its appearance in the story.

Detract from? I think that was the umm, POINT, dude.

THE SPARROW by Mary Doria Russell is the newest of the books I have listed here. One of her main ideas/plot twists appears to be lifted from HG Wells, and I dunno if she properly gives credit or if it's understood that you can just BORROW a core scifi idea these days?... Nonetheless, the vegetarians (HG Wells was one) will heartily approve. I very much disliked the sequel, but my friend howls at me in pain whenever I say that (she loved it)--so never mind.

Nobody reviewing the novel ever comments on the name of the priest, which is Sandoz.

Leave it to me to notice something like that.

Q-and-A with Daisy - Volume One

Answering some of my mail, which has accumulated.

Q: When you went to The Grit, did you meet anyone from Widespread Panic or REM? What's the best thing to order?

No, I didn't. I did see people talking about Bonnaroo and one kept saying "My band at Bonnaroo--" so people kept looking at him as if he was important and whispering, "Who is that?" but I don't think he was a star or anything. (Admittedly, if any of the WP guys cut their hair, I'd be easily fooled.)

The grilled vegetarian Reuben sandwich is to die for!!!!

Q: Which of JG Ballard's novels is your favorite? Which do you think would make the best movie?

I am passionate about Cocaine Nights, Hello America, Rushing to Paradise, High Rise and Super-Cannes.

Concrete Island would make a fantastic movie, but not over, say, 80 minutes. Optimally, it should be done swiftly, like an early-60s Twilight Zone episode, not a lot of introspection and talk. Done well, it could kick serious ass.

Ditto Running Wild, which needs to be carefully crafted to keep the very-obvious ending from being so very obvious. Whoever successfully does that?--could make a blockbuster, classic movie. Because the plot is just too fabulous.

Q: Which of PKD's novels-into-movies have you liked best?

I really liked Minority Report, although the ending turned all touchy-feely and was nothing like Phil. Yech. However, the mutants are portrayed perfectly; the whole plot is true to the novella up to the Dr Feelgood-lets-all-hug finale. Also, the subplot about Tom Cruise's son dying was an unnecessary addition, part of the touchy-feely thing. Blech. The F/X were fantastic!

The short story Second Variety was molded into a well-done fantasy/horror movie, titled Screamers. Again, they had to prettify the ending (which is right out of left-field and really makes no sense), but until then, good stuff. If you enjoy sci-fi/horror, look it up.

I loved Richard Linklater's animated version of A Scanner Darkly, but I don't know how enjoyable it is for folks who don't already know the story. I think it may well be hard to follow or understand. And I realize: animation isn't for everyone. The casting of Keanu disturbed me at first, but I now see the choice of NEO as nothing less than mythic. Keanu Reeves looks GREAT animated! (See photo, left.) Robert Downey Jr. is a genius, as we all know, and Rory Cochrane is a real gem. As usual, Woody Harrelson gives us another truly funny, inspired doper. However, Winona Ryder was ALL WRONG for her role as Donna, which demanded a more duplicitous, stab-you-in-the-back Brittany Murphy-type character. Moviemakers once again hedged and prettified a bit, turning mean Donna into a somewhat more sympathetic person... Cmon, we all know that there is NO SUCH THING as a sympathetic female character in a Philip K Dick novel.

To Linklater's credit, he left the novel's ending intact... pure magic!

Aside: I hate how they enforce happy endings in Hollywood, because my guys often don't do happy endings.

Keep those cards and letters coming in.

Edit #1: I did not mention Blade Runner in my above reply, because I think it's as much a creation of Ridley Scott as it is PKD, but let me assure everyone that yes, I adore it! (Once again, we see Sean Young's sociopathic character was considerably softened, although at least they left Daryl Hannah's killer female android alone.)

Edit #2: The female character of Angel Archer, in The Transmigration of Timothy Archer, is a wonderfully, painfully three-dimensional and sympathetic character... so there IS such a thing as a sympathetic female character in a PKD novel. However, that IS the only one I can think of, the exception that proves the rule.

And to be fair, his male characters aren't bastions of decency either, but usually more hapless than malicious.

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Listening to: Lou Reed - I'll Be Your Mirror
via FoxyTunes