McCain hates 'Gooks'

**warning, profanity and racial laden post**

Presidential candidate John McCain is not going to apologize or change his language in reference to the North Vietnamese prison guards who held him captive and tortured him during the Vietnam war.

``I hate the gooks,'' McCain said yesterday in response to a question from reporters aboard his campaign bus. ``I will hate them as long as I live.''

The full story from which I pull my comments and quotes comes from San Fransisco Chronicle. (liberal slanted news paper? yeah likely)

The report adds a quote from Diane Chin the executive director of the San Francisco-based Chinese for Affirmative Action who would OBVIOUSLY be offended. Here is her quote:

``The use of a racist slur can't be acceptable for any national leader, regardless of his background, [edit] For someone running for president not to recognize the power of words is a problem.''

Well, not for nothin' but McCain has every right to call those prison guards 'gooks'. They TORTURED him for 5 YEARS. What do you think he will call them? BFF's (best friends forever)

• McCain is right not back pedal on his comments.

Further on in the article another guy (literally) speaks up, Guy Aoki, president of the Media Action Network for Asian Americans, an anti-defamation group. So of course this guy is upset too.

``If Sen. McCain had been captured by Nigerians, could he call those people `niggers' and think he wasn't going to offend everyone who is black?'' Akoi asked.

McCain is only referring to his captors, not ALL Vietnamese and if it were Germans they are all Nazis, and Italians -pasta eating guineas. I guess what I am saying is that it's not a race issue, but an act issue.

Akoi's also makes a statment that, "we can all feel what he went though". How about if a bunch of Mexicans tortured Akoi for 5 years and we can check back on his feelings for burritos. I'm thinking McCain isn't a big fan of Pad Thai.
Shit, my wife made me watch Glitter and now I can barely look at Mariah Carey without breaking out into night sweats.

As I have already said, McCain shouldn't change his language. And he wont.

``Gook,'' he said, ``is the kindest appellation I can give.''

President O

Hillary Clinton has paved the way of the idea for a woman to be President of the United States.

Barak Obama has paved the way of the idea for a black person to be President of the United States.

Combine the two and what will we get?

President Oprah Winfrey

Discuss.

Cat Attack!

Occasionally my job requires that we bring in the big toys.



This was a pic I took during summer near the start of a project I managed. We ended up removing 5,500 yards of 'dirty dirt'.

How many cats can you count?

Art Friday

Today is Friday and it feels like a good day to post a little artwork. So as usual I like to post stuff done by Steve Dean who's work will be hanging at Breaking New Grounds on Exchange Street in Portland, Maine during the Month of March.

This piece of work is titled 'ALIENS'. I don't remember the size, probably about 8"x11" It was composed with ink and watercolor.

If you like this visit SteveDeanArt.com and see what else he has to offer.

Or see other art posts I have put together.

1, 2, 3, 4

Pimp my TERCEL

I was inside most of the day Sunday after brining in a few loads of firewood in the morning. The bitter cold makes too much time outside a touch uncomfortable so I came in and started watching one of my favorite tv shows: MTVs Pimp My Ride.
Then I started thinkin'. What the Hell! Why is it that only these stupid punks from Southern California are the only ones gettin' their rides pimped. I have been watching Music Television since 1981! So I did what every good youtuber does...I made a video.

My featured video is a short piece I made this afternoon introducing my ride.

Come'on X-to-the-Z-xzibit...

PIMP MY RIDE!

Nat'l Geo Cover

I stumbled on to a site tonight that will upload your pic of choice to a magazine cover. Very Fun.

So using a pic from a hike Mt. Webester I did a couple years past I ended up with this:

Read the ORIGINAL MT. Webster POST

You can pick from a number of different magazine covers, Vogue, Maxim, Rolling Stone -just to name a few. Its pretty fun. MAGMYPIC.

Other tales of my hiking madness can be read for: Maine Ice Storm of '98, Mt. Adams, Mt Katahdin, Mt. Meder.

I think I have others in the history as well. Ill try and get them up here.

Book Review: The Third Policeman

The Third Policeman

Author: Flan O'Brien

I just completed reading this story and would like to suggest it to you.

The story is narrated by the main character. He and a friend (Divney) commit a murder (Mathers) for finical gain. Divney hides the cash box that Mathers was carrying.
Years pass and the box remains hidden. Just until the heat cools off of the murder, so says Divney. After 3 years the location is revealed and the narrator goes to get the box. INSIDE Mathers home.

Then things change. The narrator then comes across two Policemen with odd features conducting odd tasks speaking in odd terms. It's all very odd. The story carries on with the narrator speaking with and following around the Policemen while they show him around. He is shown a box one of hte policeman crafted. A beautiful work of art, inside which contained another identical but smaller box, inside which contained another identical but smaller box..smaller and smaller each box identical to the one before it until the 28th and smallest box visible only with magnifying glasses.

He is also introduced to the 'atomic theory of bicycles' which basically states that the longer one rides a bike the more the rider and bicycle become one another by exchanging atoms. Especially on a bumpy gravel road.

The story carries on. I do not wish to give away the plot twist. Perhaps you wish to read the wikipedia entry to find out.

I found that the plot is striking. It as memorable and good story as 1984 or Fahrenheit 451. Im not saying that government over-rule takes place, just that the story is as good.

The superb usage of alliteration and excellent visual descriptions was continuously interesting and helps 'paint the picture' so to speak. Here is an example of one of my favorite lines talking about fixing his bicycle:

"...felt his tyres with red knowing fingers and furbished his machine fastidiously."

Final Notes:
The narrator has an internal conscience who speaks up from time to time. His name is Joe and adds a bit of humor to the story. The narrator also has a fascination with a philosopher named 'DeSelby' and frequent tangents to the story about him appear at the bottom half of a page, occasionally for several pages. I found this distracting and the small print eventually led me to skipping all those pieces.

It is a good read and I suggest that you add it to your reading list today.

Geology Post

Another good example of ptygmatic (tig mat tic) folding. There are hundreds out in cyberspace. I found this while collecting data for my MS back in the summer of 99.

I found this ptygmatic pair very near (less than 25 meters) THIS set of conjugate quartz veins all of which is located at the southwestern extent of my field area. An area I called Buttonwood Hill. If you look closely at the photo in the upper right plunge of the folded vein and hinge are visible. Don't ask me to recall the angle. Its just a cool geologic feature photograph.

Other posts from my thesis area are: HERE and HERE.

A Word Dump on 01-01-08

Sunday it snowed. We got about 8 inches. Monday after I got home from work I cleared the driveway with the snowblower then started in on some beers. OBVIOUSLY.

Today Wife and I took the dogs snowshoeing over at Jamies Pond, a wildlife management are nearby. We spent about an hour walking thought some of the prettiest snow covered forest you have ever seen. I forgot my camera so that kind of sucks, but shit happens. Ill get a photo next weekend.

It is now Tuesday evening. Its only about 6pm but feels like 10. Would you believe that we are getting hammered with another round of snow? We are due for about 12 inches, give or take a few. Where in the fuck am I going to put all this snow? The driveway is going to start to get narrow.

Oh well. Thats life around here. The snowshoeing out back will be wicked awesome. Maybe I will take the dogs on a night hike tomorrow. Yeah. definitely.

Happy New Years.
2008.