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Well, it's a better year to be an American, with Obama and all. Bush certainly felt like an anvil strapped to my shoulders - I'm sure I'm not the only one. br /br /Whatever the case, to my fellow Yankee Doodles: Enjoy the Fourth. I certainly will. I'm celebrating by going to a baseball game and doing a comedy show. I may even eat some roasted cuttlefish.br /br /Here's a great American band doing a great song:br /br /lj-embed id="36" /

divspan class="Apple-style-span" style=" white-space: pre-wrap; font-family:-webkit-sans-serif;"span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:medium;"This afternoon as I was returning from class, I noticed a couple of the building maintenance guys hanging out by the window near the elevators. I nearly moved in to push the button to alert the elevator that it was time to have it's way with me, when it dawned on me that perhaps those guys weren't just hanging out; perhaps they were waiting for the elevator! With this brilliant observation to keep me in check, rather than desperately pushing the elevator button like it'd been a while, I squinted at the light over the button to see if it had already been pressed. /span/span/divdivspan class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:-webkit-sans-serif;"span class="Apple-style-span" style="white-space: pre-wrap;"br //span/span/divdivspan class="Apple-style-span" style=" white-space: pre-wrap; font-family:-webkit-sans-serif;"span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:medium;"As it turns out, it's difficult to see if the indicator light over the button is lit up when the sun is coming through the lobby window of my building. Of course, you could determine the status of the elevator by the presence of people around the elevator, as I did today, but such people are only present 98% of the time. The other 2% of the time, pressing an already-pushed elevator button in my building on a sunny afternoon does not guarantee that you're a tool. /span/span/divdivspan class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:-webkit-sans-serif;"span class="Apple-style-span" style=" white-space: pre-wrap;"span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:medium;"br //span/span/span/divdivspan class="Apple-style-span" style=" white-space: pre-wrap; font-family:-webkit-sans-serif;"span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:medium;"It appears that I was unfairly critical of people that I don't know. Needless to say, I'm wearing an expression of shock on my face. I could apologize, but apologies without corrective follow-up are just meaningless filler. I will absolutely do this again. /span/span/divdiv class="blogger-post-footer"img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/8717288587980140931-2360286891537017117?l=mediocracies.blogspot.com'//div

a href="http://www.made-in-england.org/giving-birth-to-yourself-costume/"...this!/a

Spare a thought for the hapless Cyon (싸이언) marketing department: whether by accident or design, it only gives English names to new products, and so by this stage in business it must seriously be running out of ideas. No really, how else to explain the singularly uninspired choice of “Black and White” for the latest, well…black [...]

pFor those of you in the area, let me plug the two comedy shows I'm taking part in this weekend:br /br /Friday, July 3rd, at strongVINYL UNDERGROUND/strong in Busan.br /Saturday, July 4th, at strongTANDOORI BAR /strongout in Gimhae.br /br /Real live standup comedians.br /br /Featuringbr /br /strongBRIAN AYLWARD/strong (Newfoundland, Canada)br /nbsp;br /*Winner of the 2008 Hong Kong International Comedy Festivalbr /br /strongROSS GARDINER /strong(Glasgow, Scotland)br /br /*Appearing at this year's Edinburgh Festivalbr /br /strongME, SHOWBIZ MCTHARPY/strong (Seattle, baby!)br /br /*Infamous agitator, blogger, rock and roller, fisherman, and emprovocateur/em.br /br /Hosted by strongROY EARLY/strongbr /br /Both shows start at 10:30 (ish)br /br /I recently performed with Brian and Ross up in Seoul, and I can guarantee that they're both funny as fuck.nbsp; Ross is heading back to Haggisland soon, so catch him while you can, or before he becomes the next big thing over there.br /br /This will be interesting as it's the first comedy show in Busan since Babopalooza, when we all got arrested.nbsp; But we're charging no money and not mocking the Immigration Police, so I'm sure we'll be fine.nbsp;br /br /Anyhow, come on out and support this shit while it's here.nbsp; Because you never know when you'll get it again./p

Welcome back to any of you losers who get here via the blogroll over at a href="http://www.pusanweb.com"http://www.pusanweb.com/anbsp;. nbsp;I was temporarily removed for having the word quot;FUCKquot; in one of my titles.nbsp; The site's owner is also unhappy that I post my blog titles in ALL CAPS.nbsp; He says it makes the page look quot;ugly.quot;nbsp; He's a nice guy and this is the first time I've run afoul of his sensibilities, but it brings to mind the question:nbsp; Should I ever temper the look and/or content of this blog in order for more exposure?nbsp; That's selling out, right?nbsp;br /br /*nbsp; *nbsp; *br /br /Koreans are busy people.nbsp; The only people who build faster are the Chinese, who literally sprint around the worksite.br /br /I'm looking out my window at what six months ago was a giant dirt pit.nbsp; A small city of apartment blocks has since risen from the soil,nbsp;thrown-upnbsp;at alarming speed.nbsp; They're onlynbsp;aboutnbsp;three quarters constructed, butnbsp;still.nbsp;Six massive cranes work around the clock on what no doubt can be viewed as a neighborhood beautification project.nbsp; My midtown locale, Yeonsan-dong, is kind of old and shithole-y, so this gleaming new cluster of high-tech shoeboxes will no doubt raise the real estate prices around here.nbsp; Let us hope it doesn't affect my rent, since I'm paying too much as it is.br /br /strong*nbsp; *nbsp; */strongbr /br /This is the first official week of summer break at the college, but I'm working as much as ever.nbsp; I was slated to work extra classes for the first month of the break, and picked up even more than expected.nbsp; Fuck it, though.nbsp; I could always use the money and don't mind working extra before my REALnbsp;vacation kicks in, even if I have to get up early every day.nbsp; It just makesnbsp;the upcoming month offnbsp;all the more sweeter.br /br /Which brings me to vacation plans.nbsp; I was considering going back to the US, since my grandmother's health was up in the air (read: she almost died).nbsp; But she's since stabilized and doesn't appear to be in any imminent danger.nbsp; Of course this could change tomorrow, but after consulting with my sister and brothers, the consensus was that I continue with my original plans, so I'm doing that.nbsp; The China/Laos trip is on, only with one slight alteration.nbsp; Lucie gets a week of vacation during the first week of mine, so I want to do something with her.nbsp; She will either accompany me to China for the first week, or I may delay my arrival in China and spend the better part of a week with her on Jeju Island, here in Korea.nbsp; If I do that, I'll have to catch up with my comrades down in Yunnan, but that's fine.nbsp; They'll be fine without me for a few days, at least if Angry Steve is there to read the map.nbsp; Whatever the case, Lucie and I will discuss it tonight and make our choice. Inbsp;leave in just a little over three weeks now, and am, of course, utterly stoked.br /br /*nbsp; *nbsp; *br /br /In other news, Mr. John Bocskay got married last weekend.nbsp; I was priveleged to attend both the wedding and reception, and aside from congratulating Ae-ran and him, I must give the couple BIGnbsp;RESPECT for hosting one of the BOOZIEST WEDDINGS I've had the pleasure of taking in.nbsp; The ceremony was at the Westin Chosin Hotel, where we all enjoyed an open bar of top shelf booze and beer.nbsp; The ceremony itself was short, sweet, and sincere, followed by a five-course meal in which the wine poured and more drinks were enjoyed.nbsp; The party then moved to Metro Bar in Kyungsungdae, where again alcohol was provided emgratis/em, this time for about 100 of John and Ae-ran's closest friends.nbsp; This went on for several hours...nbsp; later several bands played at competing venues, vowsnbsp;were made,nbsp;happy couplesnbsp;turned on each other, and generalnbsp;abandonment reigned.nbsp; All that I know is that I found myself wandering the sidestreets at four AM, still dressed in my best suit (Gulati, Bangkok), seeing in triplicate.nbsp; At one point I ran into to Kiwi Craig Nichol, who was sweating profusely and slurring into his cellphone.nbsp; He invited me to come drink further, but even my alcoholic ass knows when to call it quits.nbsp; Sometimes.br /br /Anyway, the wedding was epic, and once again let me congratulate John on getting hooked up and hooking us all up.

Hey, Korea. It's been a while since we sparred. I've either become soft or have just completely lost interest in bitching about you. The latter is most probable. I'm not gonna lie, you sort of bore me. Even the following is not about you. Sure, you've been around for these happenings, but I regret to inform you that you cannot be held responsible. Believe me, I would throw you a bone if I could, but this simply isn't about you. Maybe next time. Don't hold your breath.divbr //divdivNot only is my new building much cleaner, bigger, and generally more fantastic than the old one, but it has twice as many elevators. Twice as many elevators! It's like a castle, without any of the nice stuff that makes a castle a castle. Of course, with twice as many elevators, comes twice as many people who don't quite understand how elevators work./divdivbr //divdivEvery other day or so as I am waiting for the elevator, somebody comes up beside me and pushes the button several times. Perhaps they think that I haven't bothered to push it yet and am just standing there like an idiot because that's how I like to spend my time. In this case, the illuminated red light that clearly indicates that I have pushed the button to call for the elevator is just a product of my imagination. The other, more plausible scenario, is that some people actually think that pushing the button multiple times will speed up the elevator and get them where they need to be faster. This is too stupid for me to speculate on any further (though I'm certain you can find such a rant elsewhere)./divdivbr //divdivWhen I am forced to witness this brand of stupidity in Canada Land, I struggle to get through the situation without bringing attention to the absurdity of the perpetrators actions. It's only natural that my first response to seeing it here is to come up with a list of snide phrases on my walk to work that I absolutely must get one of my friends to translate into Korean for me. Unfortunately, by the time I get to work I've talked myself out of learning Korean for the sake of being an ass. While at work, I like to feign that I'm a good person. /divdivbr //divdivThere's little sense in blowing my cover just so that I can insult people more effectively. /divdiv class="blogger-post-footer"img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/8717288587980140931-1466178616964134335?l=mediocracies.blogspot.com'//div

 Last Thursday while the world stood still over the death of public weirdo #1, Congress passed HR 2454 which will force businesses to buy carbon credits for the emission of greenhouse gases. Folks, greenhouse gases is AIR. THEY ARE GOING TO TAX AIR!

Not to mention that the companies are going to be buying their credits from the privately owned Chicago Climate Exchange, a company which Al Gore is heavily involved in. Al Gore, along with the Maurice Strong and a bunch of other elitists are going to be swimming in taxpayer money while Obama’s new youth brigades enforce the emission laws.

Don’t believe me? It’s all in the 1200 page bill that nobody read. We know about the youth brigades because Congressman Boehner (video below) tried to read the 300 page amendment to the bill while it was being debated before the vote, which passed 219 to 212.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEOSS8F_cmQ&hl=ko

The article below tells the rest of the story. Ladies and gentlemen, the takeover has begun.

RED ALERT: The Total Takeover Of America Enters Its Final Phase

Full frontal assault on every aspect of freedom kicks into high gear as the elite twist the knife into the rotting carcass of the United States

Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Monday, June 29, 2009

The wholesale looting of America and the transfer of wealth and power over to a private banking elite who are setting up a world government, along with the complete obliteration of any remaining freedom to protest, resist, or even speak out against this agenda, is now entering its final phase as numerous different pieces of the jigsaw puzzle fall into place and portray a clear picture of tyranny.

We are about to sound the death knell for the United States if every one of the following attacks on our liberty, free speech, sovereignty, and right to not be ruled over by an unelected banking dictatorship is not fiercely opposed and crushed.

RED ALERT 1

The passage of the “Climate Bill” by the House and its likely approval by the Senate represents the entrée for the complete and total subjugation of any freedoms we had left and the beginning of nightmare regulation and suffocating control over every aspect of our personal lives by millions of green stasi tasked with enforcing impossible to attain goals of 80% carbon dioxide reduction - all based on the manufactured threat of global warming.

This bill will also sink the economy and create a new great depression, effectively obliterating America’s first world status. It represents a transfer of power and wealth from both the U.S. government and the American taxpayer over to the system of world government and global regulation now being erected by means of the climate change hoax.

This is far worse than just a “new tax” as Republicans are complaining - this is the total takeover of the American economy by private banking interests through the carbon trading system.

As we have attempted to warn, the major beneficiaries of the climate bill will be the elitists who own the carbon trading systems that will be used to handle the ‘cap and trade’ program, namely Al Gore and Maurice Strong, two figures intimately involved with a long standing movement to use the theory of man made global warming as a mechanism for profit and social engineering.

We must rally now to lobby members of Congress who voted for the legislation and demand they change their vote before July 2nd. Failing that, we must demand that the Senate does not rubber stamp this nightmare legislation. Failing that, we must support and organize to craft more legislation based on the example of Arizona, who recently passed state Senate legislation refusing to comply with insane climate laws coming from the federal level.

RED ALERT 2

The seemingly endless economic “bailouts” represent the wholesale looting of the American taxpayer and the grand theft of trillions of dollars by private banking interests who refuse to even disclose where the money went.

Not satisfied with stealing tens of trillions, under the Obama administration’s new regulatory reform plan, the Federal Reserve is now trying to enrich itself with dictator powers that will give it complete control over the U.S. economy, handing them the authority to “regulate” and shut down any company whose activity it believes could threaten the economy and the markets.

We must rally now and lobby more members of Congress to support Ron Paul’s H.R. 1207 bill to audit the Federal Reserve and highlight the fact that Bernanke is spewing financial terrorism when he threatens an economic collapse should the Fed be opened up to scrutiny.

RED ALERT 3

Federal hate crimes legislation, which in reality would criminalize “thought crimes,” has cleared the House and now faces the Senate as S.909, the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act (officially, the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act).

S.909 is a direct violation of the First Amendment. It allows the federal government to prosecute people involved in “hate speech” transmitted over television, radio, and the internet. The House version of the bill states:

“Whoever transmits in interstate or foreign commerce [radio, TV, internet] any communication, with the intent to coerce, intimidate, harass, or cause substantial emotional distress to a person, using electronic means to support severe, repeated, and hostile behavior, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both. (HR 1966, SEC 3, Sec. 881a)”

In other words, if a talk show host engages in “hostile” speech against a person or persons of the above mentioned federally protected group that talk show host will face federal prosecution and the prospect of a two year prison term.

The Megan Meier Cyberbullying Prevention Act would similarly criminalize free speech on the Internet if it can be deemed in any way to have been “harmful” to an individual. This represents the end of political blogging and free speech on the world wide web.

If both bills are not opposed and thrown out then the First Amendment will become nothing more than a relic of a bygone age.

RED ALERT: The Total Takeover Of America Enters Its Final Phase 250509BANNER
RED ALERT 4

The Senate bill S.787, otherwise known as the Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA), would replace language in the regulatory act currently using “navigable waters” with “waters of the United States.”

What this means is that “the government would essentially be able to regulate everything from standing water in floodplains to creeks that run behind business and residences,” according to an Environmental Leader report.

This represents a complete takeover of private land and waterways by the federal government, a total assault on private property rights and a complete federalization of America’s land and water.

“In a letter to Senate Environment and Public Works Chair Barbara Boxer and ranking member James Inhofe, the American Farm Bureau Federation said that the proposed law would “extend to all water — anywhere from farm ponds, to storm water retention basins, to roadside ditches, to desert washes, to streets and gutters, even to a puddle of rainwater,” stated the letter. “For the first time in the 36-year history of the act, activities that have no impact on actual rivers and lakes would be subject to full federal regulation.”

If this bill becomes law, it will empower the federal government to seize private property on a whim, using similar powers that Communist China employed during Chairman Mao’s “great leap forward,” where landowners had their property violently confiscated and stolen by the government.

If this bill passes the Senate, private property rights in the United States are effectively null and void and the federal government would legally have the power to bulldoze families from their homes as routinely happens in Communist China.

RED ALERT 5

Amongst the myriad of assaults on the Second Amendment rights of American citizens undertaken by the Obama administration during the course of its first year in office, the one that stands out as the most alarming is the attempt to ban people who appear on the terrorist watch list from buying guns.

But isn’t stopping terrorists from buying guns surely a sensible measure to take? The problem is that the terrorist watch list, sometimes called the no fly list, is not a list of likely terrorists, it is a sprawling database of of innocent people that contains the names of over one million Americans. This is a rise of 32% since 2007 alone.

Members of Congress, nuns, war heroes, reverends, the former assistant attorney general, toddlers and children, the ACLU administrator, people with difficult names and all American names like Robert Johnson and Gary Smith, have become caught in the vast tentacle of this list, documents the ACLU.

Moreover, once a person is included on the terrorist watch list it is virtually impossible to get off it.

The terrorist watch list is an ever-expanding tool with which to deny Americans basic rights as well as to strip them completely of the Fourth Amendment.

Now it is being used to prevent law-abiding citizens from purchasing firearms. Legislation sponsored by the The Government Accountability Office seeks to “close the gap” and prevent victims of the terrorist watch list from being able to purchase firearms.

This represents a new end run around the Second Amendment and a concerted effort on behalf of the federal government to classify millions of innocent Americans as potential terrorists, thus stripping them of their Constitutional right to own firearms.

RED ALERT 6

Our right to protest against any of the egregious assaults on the Constitution that are listed above is itself being removed by new law enforcement and Pentagon training manuals and guidelines that define protesting as domestic terrorism.

Current Department of Defense anti-terrorism training course material states that the exercise of First Amendment rights in the U.S. constitutes terrorist activity.

Over the last few years we have documented countless examples of security assessment reports from the likes of the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI, as well as police training manuals, which state that anti-war protesters, gun owners, veterans, Ron Paul supporters and those who merely cite the Constitution should be equated with extremists and domestic terrorists.

The fact that the government is now treating people who merely criticize its conduct as domestic terrorists is the clearest signal possible that the United States has entered a period in history similar to Germany in the early 1930’s and that it can only be a matter of time before the right “emergency” provides the justification for dissidents to be targeted for round-ups and mass imprisonment.

No one can claim now that this is merely a paranoid delusion - the government itself is training its law enforcement and military arms that protesters and people who use their First Amendment rights are domestic terrorists. The last time this happened was under King George shortly before the American Revolution.

ONE MINUTE TO MIDNIGHT

If we don’t stand up in unison and exercise our right to protest and free speech now more than ever before, while pointing out that the real terrorists are those who would seek to destroy the freedoms enshrined in the Bill of Rights, then we may find ourselves doing our protesting behind the barbed wires and the concrete blocks of an internment camp.

The hour is late, the clock stands at one minute to midnight, and the federal government, through all the examples documented above, is on the verge of implementing nothing less than a total environmental, financial and societal dictatorship and killing what once was the United States of America.

Almost identical programs of total enslavement are also being pushed through in almost every other major western country at the same time.

If we don’t stop obsessing about the minutia of life and actually concentrate on the imminent destruction of the very principles of our livelihoods, the bedrock freedoms that allow us to operate in relative comfort on a daily basis and be reasonably secure in our own homes, being able to pay our bills, put food on the table, earn money, and air our grievances when government threatens to impinge on those basic freedoms, then there will be nothing left but a rotten hollow carcass and a memory of what America once strived to be - land of the free, home of the brave - not land of the thief, home of the slave.

http://www.prisonplanet.com/red-aler...nal-phase.html

 

p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"I am currently reading Ted Simon’s book i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal"Jupiter’s Travels. /iIt recounts his first trip across the world by motorcycle in 1973. Not that long ago he wrote on his website about people’s attitudes towards motorcycles and riders. He wondered why many times there is this negative feeling toward bikers. To one extent riding motorcycles is extremely macho. There is the whole bike gang thing. There is riding fast and not obeying the laws of the road. As well in North America it is considered a hobby. It’s not a serious part of life. span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /span/p p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanSeveral months ago I was thinking about the trip I was planning to take across the world by motorcycle. But as it was still a couple of years in the making I was trying to think of things I could do to prepare. span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanReading about other people’s trips on the internet was beginning to be a bit boring. It was also not that pressing yet to make more solid plans and learn first aid. Then I had the idea to start travelling around Korea. I had a motorcycle and could make time for it on the weekends. I also decided to video the trips.I also felt I needed a creative outlet. I was pretty stagnate for over a year. I needed a regular creative activity. span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /span/p p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanAfter about one week of researching filming on a motorcycle I headed out on the road. I decided to just go with it. Rather than too much planning I needed to just get at it. The first trip ended in disaster. I broke my camera. I had mounted it to the bike and the vibration of the bike toasted the hard drive in the camera. Then I tried to fix the camera myself…bad idea./p p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanDuring the next week I bought a new camera. I also managed to put together a helmet camera system for under three hundred dollars. This shop in Nampo-Dong made me a helmet camera. I am not sure the guy really understood what I wanted, but he seemed determined that I leave his shop with a purchase. In the end it has worked very well. (with some improvements to the cabling…that only took three trips to figure out.) The new camera I bought also had a problem. The exposure did not work. After possibly having to wait two weeks for the camera to be fixed, Samsung gave me a new camera. /p p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanI headed out on the first trip finally not really sure what to film or how. It ended up working out not bad. Then came the next step: to edit. In the film industry they say you shoot to edit. I shot without knowing how it would be edited. I had a lot of footage that I now had to tame. I have been shooting video for twelve years. I have developed what I like to call my “Run ‘n Gun” shooting style. I like to shoot without a super set plan of shots. There are directors that swear by set shot lists and super planning, while others will figure out scenes as they go. I prefer that style. Especially when shooing in the real world, you never know what cool shot you may end up getting./p p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanThe first editing was a beast of the job. Lots of footage and I had to figure out a form for the video. And Stupid Codecs!!!!!!! span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanI am using two Samsung cameras that use different codecs, both are not common. First I had to get them to play on my computer. Then figure out what program to edit with. I have now worked out a system. It means I have to end up converting the video’s format three times to get it onto you tube. I am not a 100% happy with that but it works. It also has allowed me to tighten up the edits. The first couple of videos have some relative sloppy edits because of technical problems that I let slide instead of toe punting my computer out the 24supth/sup floor window of my apartment. Then I got a computer virus and had to format my computer and reinstall windows./p p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanNow that I have worked out systems for editing and filming, I got to thinking about span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanthe reasons for my video. It started as way to be creative again and way to prepare for my trip. Yet I know that I still needed to refine the idea. Travelling across the world in some ways a relatively selfish goal, in the end you can say you accomplished it but what is the bigger picture? I also need a lot of support to do it. I am finally at a point in my life that I truly know my life passions and now I want to do those things full time. I am not satisfied with only doing it on the weekend or a few months out of the year. My passions are: Motorcycles, Travelling and Comedy! Those are many times just hobbies, so I got some work to do. span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /span/p p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanMy father not known for good ideas said that I should make a comedy travel show. He said is what I love to do, so that would be a good job for me. Later that night I thought wait a second that is a good idea. But how? Fast forward a few years later and I am living in Asia. So once filming became manageable I thought where I could take this? I realized that I needed to make some changes to the video. I am not going to promote the motorcycle side of it anymore. I want as many people to watch as possible and I don’t want someone not to watch my video because they don’t like motorcycles. As well I don’t ride a bike that is interesting to many other riders. To many motorcyclists my video will not warrant attention because it does not feature one of the latest bikes./p p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanTo be honest I am not that interested in motorcycles. I love riding! I would ride anything with two wheels and a motor. I actually like riding a bike that many people would not consider good enough for certain kinds of trips. For me riding motorcycles is zen. Everything in my mind turns off and I just become a part of the environment. It is really hard to describe, but I could be having the worst day ever and little time on the bike and it all disappears. After 22 years of riding I still get that thrill of anticipation to ride that I got before my first ride./p p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanSo I will continue to ride for my videos, but I want to shift my focus more to comedy as it is more inclusive. As well I began more to realize the importance of being inclusive. span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanThis of course brings up a new host of problems. If you are in your own culture then you kind of know what you can and can’t get away with. As well you can possibly push the boundaries more. As well who is the target audience? Can you make everyone laugh? I have been slowly trying to shift my comedy style. For many years I did a lot of parody, but eventually I felt very dissatisfied with it. If Britney Spears is crap, is a parody of her really anything better? What was I contributing, was I actually creating anything? I attended a Cirque Du Soleil and was blown away. I then felt like a really really crappy performer. There was such a sense of excellence. I wanted to be a part of that. That of course is easier said than done. I did join a circus school and learned to ride a unicycle. As well I learned a lot by how they approached training and learning. span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanSo I am still striving for excellence even if that is not always apparent. I try! /p p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"span style="mso-spacerun:yes" /spanOver the next few months I will make several changes. I also have a lot of good ideas for new videos. I will release a new video every week beginning in August. I hope you enjoy them. I will also try to write more often to explain the project and how I feel it is progressing. /pdiv class="blogger-post-footer"img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/8160194368337455238-5580975700952706420?l=brandjeff.blogspot.com'//div

Yes, Korean “gender” reader from now on, as despite the name my “feminist reader” posts were really always more on gender and sexuality issues rather than on feminist ones per se, although of course they’re still intimately related and will still get mentioned. I’ve updated the names of all the old posts accordingly. 1) In an [...]

So I've caught a lot of flak from my last missive in which I trumpet Michael Jackson's importance.nbsp; Friends of mine came out of the woodwork and beat me up, saying that I was exaggerating, that he cannot be put on the mantle of musical greats, since at best he was a great dancer/singer and quot;music video innovator,quot; and that his pathetic slide in freakshow works as some kind of negative stock against his true contributions. br /br /Fair enough.nbsp; I was steaming drunk when I posted it and may have been guilty of hyperbole.nbsp; I've been thinking it over the last couple of days and I go back and forth. br /br /I never thought I'd be put in the position of defending Michael Jackson - someone who has elicited derisive sneers from me for much of my life - and Inbsp;donbsp;agree with much of what the detractors are saying.nbsp; br /br /BUT... br /br /I gotta say that I detect a whole lotta condescending priveleged white guynbsp;scoffs in these comments, that they are overthought and, dare I say, elitist.nbsp; To say that Brian Wilson is greater than Michael Jackson raises eyebrows for sure.nbsp; Wilson is indeed a genius and has influenced countless artists, but go ANYWHERE in the third world and mention his name and I fucking guarantee you will be met with blank stares.nbsp; Mention Jackson, and most will not only know who he is -nbsp;they will like his music.nbsp; This is especially true among poor brown and black people.nbsp; I bet John Lennon doesn't even turn up on most of their radar screens.nbsp; And this is the majority of the Earth's population.nbsp; So how important does that really make him, when really, today, he's not as known or admired as you may think? br /br /To answer Angry Steve, Jacksonnbsp;HAS been massively influential.nbsp; He wrote the book on modern pop - from boy band schlock to R and B to what you might call quot;dance music.quot;nbsp;nbsp; Who has henbsp;exactly influenced, you ask?nbsp; Timberlake, Usher, Babyface, R. Kelly, Britneynbsp;Spears to name a few. nbsp;Sure, a lot of it is commercial and awful, but it's very popular.nbsp; I know that's not necessarily the barometer of good, but wenbsp;can't ignore it either.nbsp;nbsp;Can younbsp;write off his influence just becausenbsp;younbsp;DON'T LIKEnbsp;his music, because it's notnbsp;COOLnbsp;enough fornbsp;you? br /br /That's fine, but what needs to be realized is that Jackson was truly international, and aside from Bob Marley, he was the first black artists to go global, to be embraced by everybody.nbsp; He paved the way for hip-hop's now global appeal, so you can't divorce him from its success.nbsp; For a while he was more famous than any human had ever been before.nbsp; He was huger than huge.nbsp; It was almost sick.nbsp; But you can't deny that despite his own bizarre racial self-loathing that henbsp;indeednbsp;broke down barriers. nbsp; It can be argued that Jackson made it possible for a Tiger Woods or even a Barak Obama to happen.nbsp;nbsp; br /br /Michael Jackson had planned a comeback tour - which was obviously going to be a disaster of Hindenburgian proportions -nbsp;and yet 750,000 thousand tickets had already been sold.nbsp; 750,000.nbsp; That's a fucking heaping jolly shitload. br /br /So yeah, he mattered to people.nbsp; nbsp;A lot of people.nbsp; They might not be the kind people you consider ornbsp;like, but they live all over this globe and have opinions on music, just like you and me.

Always interesting to get the Chinese netizen's take on the news. Here are some comments translated from forums about the passing of that Michael Jackson guy. Props to chinaSMACK once again.No mercy.新浪福建厦门网友: This world is again less one abnormal/perverted/deviant piece of trash! Excellent, tonight I will drink! 新浪湖南网友: Michael is just a singer, but to some ignorant fans he is like their

Crawling through footage. I'm overwhelmed.div class="blogger-post-footer"img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/8996817544959520976-3805430399130158663?l=www.koreadreambus.com'//div

( The title reads: “A message of hope to all women!” ) If someone had told me years ago that I’d be writing about a Korean infomercial at some point, then I would have wagered good money that it would have been about one for bidets actually, for nothing quite gives you that “We’re not in [...]

I really was never a reallynbsp;big fan. Never owned an album.nbsp;nbsp;More of a rock and roller, to tell the truth. nbsp;BUT, his influence, both on music and pop culture can't be denied. br /br /He was never quot;dead to me since...quot; This is the third time I've gotten this quote today.nbsp;nbsp; quot;Michael Jackson has been dead to me since....quot;nbsp; nbsp;What is this? The fuckingnbsp;emGodfather/em? nbsp;While I appreciate the cynicism, Michael Jackson was always VERY ALIVE to me. br /br /He was alive to me during the 70's, when Jackson 5 records played on my parents hi-fi stereo are some of my first memories as a human being.nbsp; Everytime Inbsp;here quot;Baby Take Me Back,quot;nbsp;I'm transported to my house in Nisqually Valley, circa 1976.br /br /He was alive to me in the early 80's.nbsp; I remember listening to songs from quot;Off the Wallquot; during my summer's doing childrens' theatre.nbsp; These tunes were part of the soundtrack to my pre-adolescence. br /br /He was alive to me in middle school:nbsp; I remember when quot;Thrillerquot; came out, how I was a emrocker /emand had to pretend to hate it so much. And I did, publicly,nbsp;thoughnbsp;I secretly liked a lot of the songs.nbsp; What nbsp;I did hate wasnbsp;how POPULAR it was, how it was some sort of quot;normal personquot; litmus test that you liked the thing. It was like railing against The Beatles after they appeared on quot;Sullivan.quot; I may have been righteous in my cause, but it was a losing battle.nbsp; Not liking quot;Thrillerquot; in the day made me feel like a freak, like an iconoclast, and I still carry that real feeling of oppositional pride with me today,.br /br /He was alive to me fourteen years ago.nbsp; I remember in the mid '90's when quot;Historyquot; came out. I remember the uber-pretentious superhero/Stalinesque mural that adorned the wall of - what was it - Penny Lane in Lower Queen Anne? It was then that I knew it was over, that he had crossed the line from silly to sick. br /br /He was alive to me ten years ago (or so), when he went on trial for abusing those kids.nbsp; And though we all know he was guiltynbsp; (and he was, he fucking did it, ALL), he got off.nbsp; Was it just wealth?nbsp; Or was it the fact that we all knew that he'd already paid for his crimes, that his existence was nownbsp;pathetic and miserable, that prison time would just be redudant?nbsp; One glance at those SAD SAD photos of his surgery travesties told a thousandnbsp;stories of abject self-loathing.nbsp;nbsp;He was already a casualty of himself.nbsp; br /br /People have abused me for mourning MJ's death. I've gotten my share of mocking laughs and ironic shrugs. Fair enough. He was a child molester. This is plenty to damn him anywhere. He was a freak. His plasic surgery catastrophes could elicit nothing but pity from anyone who was unfortunate enough to witness the photos. br /br /You can condemn him on these terms alone. br /br /But he was one of the purest pop geniuses to come around in a century. Lennon? McCartney? Wilson? He was their EQUAL. But, he was an absulote contradiction. He was brilliant and eternally flawed, so fucked up that many of us wished him this death some ten years ago. He lived and died by this wicked sword, but, like it or hate it, his impact on pop culture is more than indelible. As I said before, it's Elvisian. Both were tsunamis of effect. Both were massive in their day. Both were tragic. You can roll your eyes and sigh and tell me, quot;I told you so,quot; but it doesn't make Michael Jackson unimportant. As fucked up as he was, he was a FORCE. br /br /There are VERY FEW artists you can say that about. br /br /Think about it

Love him or hate him, there is no denying, between his solo material and his run with the Jackson 5, the guy was involved in a lot of great tunes.I have been going through his play list and at times I am greatly moved by the memories --his songs are like place markers for different points throughout my life.For all the times I made fun of him over the years since the late 80's, I am a bit shocked

It appears that Michael Jackson is DEAD. Perhaps a prescription drug complication.br /br /For some reason I find this freaky and moving, so I'll leave it at that.