Okay. I endeavour not to run one of those blogs where people link to neat things they find. I'd like to think I'm more erudite than that, by nature of being able to use "erudite" in a sentence and also find a rhyme for it if I needed to.
However, my under-employed friend Mark suggested I look at lowbrow dot com, a collection of anecdotes reflecting on the ugliest moments of human life. Hit refresh about a couple of hundred thousand times and see the majesty.
You know, I have this theory. It's probably quite similar to one of Freud's or Jung's. I never got into their stuff outside of the context of the emotionally taxing "Literature of Suicide" course taught by Berman at SUNYA. After hearing him describe in vivid detail his own experiences with suicide and psychoanalysis, I realized I'd probably prefer second hand Freudian psychology to the straight dope. That, and "Dora" didn't really impress me about anything other than Freud's pompous lack of understanding towards women and humanity in general. Not everybody who doesn't want to have sex with somebody is that way because he or she is subconsciously repressed. Most of these decisions are quite conscious and performed without dogmatic influence.
My theory is this, and it's not too complicated: in addition to our normal, rational thinking brain, all humans have a coordinate and opposite primal instinct. It is this instinct that is responsible for all of the insanely stupid things we do in the name of violence, sex, friendship, self image and spirutality. The reason we think these things are stupid (or try tell ourselves they aren't) is because the rational brain realizes it shouldn't have let instinct win the battle over that decision. Despite the fact that they are opposed, the two brains generally help each other out. The higher brain prevents the lower brain from doing anything so immensely stupid that we wind up in court or a hospital. And the lower brain makes sure we take time off to party.
Occasionally, however, the higher brain is completely squelched by its primate lower half. The higher brain has no choice but to watch in a stupor as the body executes a bad choice that it could have prevented, were it not sitting this one out. This stupid monkey brain is what caused me to snap my cousin's bra strap when I was thirteen. This stupid monkey brain is what caused me to attempt to pummel my best friend despite the fact that he was much stronger than me. This stupid monkey brain tells me to look at pretty girls who are way too young to look at and wouldn't give me the time of day even if all things were equal. My stupid monkey brain wants me to become a rock star, smoke herb all day, and eat a whoe box of Trisket crackers at lunch time.
Low Brow is a celebration of the stupid monkey brain. It's people talking about sex, drugs, messed up relationships and pooping. It's impossible to turn away from it. I share it with you, reader, because I love you. Don't go giving it to all your loser friends.
I spent my lunch break adding my own experiences to Low Brow. In fact, I have added nearly every embarrassing sexual situation I can remember from my life in adequate detail, all signed with my email address. I read once in a book on nutjob theories that the Rosicrucians believe in leaving a clue somewhere to all of their conspiracies because they believe the truth should exist somewhere. I am comforted by that belief...and comforted that if you wanted to find out what I did that rainy day when I was fifteen, all you have to do is keep hitting refresh.
Here's some bullshit, Hallmark card metaphysics for you:
When life gives you lemons, plant lemon trees.
I came up with this little gnomic gem on my way into work today, sucking down a delicious hand-rolled Bali Shag Halfweizer Light. It's been, I guess, a bit of a crappy week.
My long awaited Nakamichi tap deck arrived and in true ebay fashion, it was missing an integral component. The POWER SUPPLY and amplifier, if you can believe it. Now, i have a LOT of broken car stereos with no amplifiers. The last thing I needed was another.
But fuck it. I can reverse engineer this thing, and make it sound better than any of the others. I've already got a power supply built for it. And it'll still have the Nakamichi look and these awesome controls, not bad for $60.
My newly reconditioned laptop was first delayed, then arrived broken. Froze up during my editing of the registration form, if you can believe it. Guy at the Apple Store says it'll be at LEAST a week before they get it back. But no big deal...I sniped a good deal, got it $400 off. If it takes a month to get it working, I'll still not find a better deal in those thirty days. It'd be nice if it was ready for my birthday. Nice, but hardly essential. I'll find some other computer to run iTunes Party Shuffle for BBBQ2.
I should probably be pissed off -- that's the American thing to do when deals don't instantly go your way, right? But why? Overall, things are okay. The dog is very pretty. I made dinner two nights in a row. My long debt to the IRS is paid in full, Rakim style-ee. Work is going well, my car is getting 32 mpg even with the bike rack. And I have some great ideas for new chargrilled delicacies. Spicy grilled pineapple -- does that do anything for you, holmes? With everything so good, why grouse about some dumbass posession?
And back on the good news tip, I found a cheap little place to buy automotive paint. I recently cleared a free compressor, tachometer and timing light from the estate of Tracy's grandads and have option on a suction feed paint sprayer from my boy, hotrodder and new Webslum member Mark Johnson. That little Beetle isn't going to know what hit her. By this time next month, she'll be a gleaming blue rocket.
It doesn't, you know. Even if it did, you'd never know about it. First hand truth is no good because our senses are inaccurate and can only perceive a momentary composite of the true state of things. Second hand truths can never be trusted because some people lie, and because they too cannot be expected to trust their own senses. Besides which, human communication is a lossy form of thought compression.
So why are you reading this? Go enjoy yourself and forget about all that boolean bullshit for a while. Get drunk, get naked, have a nice big orgasm, and listen to some rock and roll music. Or some raw, funky jazz. Or some mind blowing hip-hop, if that's your thing (it's mine).
Don't get depressed. You don't need to buy in to all this black or white stuff to live happily. In fact, without absolutes, chances are you're happy already, because there's a good chance you're successful and didn't even know it. Just sit back, kick off your shoes, and fuck what you think you know. It's not real!