WorldView
In the tradition of PI, I feel the need to state my current assumptions about the world:

- There is an ultimate truth, but our human imperfection keeps us from knowing or understand it. However, the search and attempt to find the truth is what gives meaning to our existence.

-All religions, philosophy, and science etc, point towards the general direction of the truth.

-Man lives within nature, an eco-system. Nature isn't refined to trees and fields - this involves the natural universe, etc.

-Mathematics may very well be the closest we have to a universal language. It is also the only non-subjective language.

-Hierarchy of expression - thought, action, visual, writeen, spoken.

-Government has exceeded its purpose.

-The age of rationality has all but erased our intuition, which may be more valuable.
(This may be attempted to be relieved by such forces as modern art, metal music, and david lynch-style movies)

-Man's greatest humiliation is the rediculous and arrogant struggle for order.

ADDitional Disorders
I have ADD. Really. And it's getting worse. I can't sit still without having to do something. I'm too used to being really busy.

Matt. I know you read this once in a while. WTf. you're never online. you need to tell me how to get you your dvds back.
how are things man?

It's been a while.
Headbanging to Mudvayne on the ride back from work at six in the morning is priceless.
I was reading an info sheet on the tell tale signs of drunk driving last night and realized that that is how I normally drive. Drifting over the yellow line, random and sporratic breaking and accelerating, forgetting to stop at stop signs, etc. Go figure.

I was reading Stephen Hawking's Illustrated Theory of Everything tonight and I realized that although he might know his cosmology and physics, his grasp on philosophy is a bit off:
"...the idea that God might want to change his mind" (various problems with this, and it's slightly irrelevant, but moving on) "is an example of the fallacy, point out by St. Augustine, or imagining God as a being existing in time. Tim eis a property of the universe that God created." (right, sounds good so far) "Presumably, He knew what He intended when He set it up." This makes me think he totally missed the point of God being out of time, not just correct in the first place. Oh well. It was a pretty cool book in the first place, and inspired me on how to finish off my quarter-sleeve tattoos.

The night shift is fun. Last night was my night off so I stayed up all night and painted at four in the morning. Had it not been so cold I would have gone outside, but either way it was glorious.

Here are some notes from the past few nights.

or rather just the previous night cause I lost the one before that.

6/20, 5am - In a book I recently read, conservatism was defined in part by the tendacny to take history into account for current decisions. After reading some history of heavy metal and reliving the days of the PMRC and other censorship movements it has come to my attention that these conservatives should learn from the past indeed and realize that their tactics, well, suck.
Basing arguments on not facts but whatever arguements they wish, distorting lyrics, claiming occult influence, satanism - depicted as atrocious behavior and rituals that the Catholic church itself made up - and making up the presence of subliminal messaging, the claimed to want to "protect the youth". These movements seek to censor and alienate youth culture by straight out lying.
What worries me most is that these people could be doing something positive with their time. Once their "youth" realizes that these scares are all just a lie, who's to say why they should believe anything else that the "adult moral majority" has to say, especially when they blatantly expressed disinterest and even repulsion towards what the youth have to say.
Now I consider myself somehwere in the middle fo conservatism and liberalism. Lately, eco-anarchy has my attention. But learning from the past is a good tactic indeed, and in many cases we can see for sure how things should not be done. In other news - Mudvayne's bassist rocks. Dig is my current favorite example.

*squeals of laughter*
*biggest sigh of relief in the world* *followed by a squeal of mischievous laughter*

I had something else to say but I forgot.
I've been much less restless since I've been back up. It's going to be a great summer.

I'm feeling pretty good tonight. In the day I've enjoyed church, steak and good alcohol., woohoo

Sonny and Steve. The G(r)eek Duo.

Home?
So I've been waiting all year to be back for a substantial amount of time. To be back "home". And now it just feels weird. It doesn't even feel like home, at least not yet. I feel like an intruder, like I shouldn't be back, like I'm getting in the way somehow. Hopefully I'm just being paranoid and things will feel better in a few days. But for now, I can't help but feel extremely nervous about it and be afraid of what the summer might be like.

Oh well, I guess I'll just have to wait and see.

art.
Art should be accessible. But not obvious. One should have to work for the meaning, and most interesting conveyances are only able to be brought out in such a manner. One must read or otherwise experience what the artist is referring to, and should be able to gather meaning by looking at the artists work in its entirety, not just a single piece. This is interpretation by discovery, not infusing your own meaning. It't not relative, it's just not obvious. In the same way that the world works. Art should represent the world, and exactly how you go about doing that should reflect how you go about seeing the world. The question in art is how far you want to go and what level you want to focus on.

co -Lateral-us
"Black and white are all I see
in my infancy.
Red and yellow then came to be
reaching out to me lets me see.
As below so above and beyond I imagine
draw beyond the lines of reason.
Push the envelope, watch it bend."
-MJK

Everythings a whirl and I all I ever
knew I wanted I reach out for
now with new meaning.
But because of my lapses and confusions
it doesn't reach back.
It doesn't reach back.
Strain to recapture my vision.
Realizing my passions.
Trying to make new sense of myself
and filtering the world.
I want everything
so I can throw half of it away.
Inded I may have done so enough
and now its time to focus.
Focus on the blur.
Focus on the whirl.
Hope the lens doesn't break.
Hope the scenery isn't any impression.

Help me be in all.

Art helps you say what you didn't expect to think. Good art helps others think what they didn't expect you to say.

A reformation is coming, a collection shall be revealed and from the debris a vision will come. A vision will come.

Notes to Self.
Okay, this is what must get accomplished during spring break. For real. No excuses.

-the website needs to be completed and filled in with the art work and such.
-need to do some scholarship applications and take care of financial aid papers.
-need to start applying and look at jobs and internships.
-complete the fellowship application.
-get a ton of reading done....you know that stack of books I want to get through.
-talk to "the boys" about what I've been thinking and discussing. Because I know they'll have some cool insight.
-hang out. get back what i miss.
-probably a lot of other stuff that I just can't remember at the moment.

I can't wait till this summer. I can't wait to have an apartment (hopefully that'll work out). I can't wait to be able to mesh everything that I want together and "have it all" as I like to think of it. (Maybe someday.)

Mix & Match Aesthetics?
So I've been trying to figure out how this all works. Instead of just understanding that I like certain things, I figure I should look at my life as I look at the work. That everything is connected and try to figure out how everything is connected. The major problems I come up with are reconciling morality with disbelief of god and also the punk/goth/whatever aesthetic with conservative politics. I've been doing a lot of reading and hope to get a chance to really get to the root of these things. I'm not finding it useful that I have very little spare time lately. It doesn't give me a chance to do what needs to be done. Hopefully this weekend I'll actually get done what needs to be done and use my time in a productive manner. Hopefully.
I would be nice to talk to other people with this sort of dichotomy thing going on, especially on the aesthetics. I've found a few pages online that talk about that sort of thing. I want to be able to put what I want to do with myself and my political views alongside what I like as far as cultural aesthetics and such and be able to say it makes total sense. I also want to figure out how there can be morality without a god and what that rests on. Which means I should get reading in my "philosophy for dummies" book and try to see how people have approached it in the past. ah the time commitment.

At the same time, though I'm getting my political and philosophical fill here and it's qutie wonderful, I'm not getting the aesthetics taken care of. I'm not concentrating hard enough on music, but I suppose that's what classes are for. What an odd split...classes = artsy aesthetic, extra currics = politics? Hmm. I'm starting to be able to bring them all together, and I'm starting to notice that I'm recovering from whatever the past few years have been. I need to look through all my old writings and stuff. I need to start doing that, creating and keeping on a regular basis. I need to organize my time so that I have time left over to be Angie at the end of the day rather than be constantly running around trying to do everything all last minute.