my horoscope on Yahoo today:
Horoscope (by Astrocenter.com)
The only reason you are still living close to reality, is simply because your life needs contacts with other people. You should try to find someone who shares your tastes. You just love staying in bed all day long with a good book. But worry, there are people like you out there. You just need to find them
--other than the first sentence, which is absolute gibberish ("still living close to reality"? "your life needs contacts?")--& the the last bit is either the result of a horoscope writing hack who was a bit careless on the re-read, or else a very perceptive random fortune-generating program that dabbles in a bit of existentialist poetry:
but worry,
there are people like you out there
you just need to find them...
however garbled it be, it nonetheless strikes a chord regarding last night at the prison. it was one of those nights where I was paired up with an officer I haven't worked with yet, & I noticed as I pulled my book out that he didn't have one & appeared to be limbering up his vocal cords for an evening of conversation.
in the abstract, this was, like I said, my first night with this officer &, as I'd probably find myself working with him in the future, this would be a good night to put the book away (granted, there's usually not much choice), listen to what he has to say & get a feel for him--his history, his philosophy of life, whatever, so I know what to expect next time & can either engage in a lively bit of conversation, diplomatically breaking off when possible (I'm not the type to volunteer much information about myself when first meeting someone, & usually I don't have to, as most people--especially people who don't carry books with them--are more than happy to tell me all about themselves, secure in the knowledge that I'm devoured with curiosity)
(I should note that books are considered contraband--we're not, technically, allowed to bring them in or read them on duty. so let's just say that I'm relating a fictional episode here, alright?)
anyway, he flipped on the Stentophone (sort of an intercom) connecting us with Tower 3 & left it open all night.
there's a stereotype about us rural folk to the effect that we're preoccupied with guns & trucks, & that we're, as patriotic Americans, fairly prejudiced against vast chunks of the population (which is kinda like considering the human body a sublime work of art, an infinitely complex clockwork that undeniably shows the Fingerprint of God, but hating the organs, the blood, the hair, & most of the ickily biological processes, but whatever)
like most stereotypes, this is grossly unfair, but, well, it didn't just, like, emerge from a vacuum.
anyway, I got a monologue about trucks, guns, faggots, ragheads, cunts & gooks.
faggots are a pretty common target here, in fact, the fascination with faggots (see: queers, fudge-packers, Democrats, etc.) well...it makes ya kinda wonder about the concurrent fascinations with football & firearms (doth the lady protest too much?)
ragheads...well...considering our connection with the Middle East is at the gas pump & increasingly shrill pronouncements from the Administration...it's understandable (see: red savages, yellow peril, red menace, Liberals, etc.)
cunts--a distinct connection with the college-educated crowd here, or, at least, that segment that were in fraternities (go ahead! accuse me of generalizing here! I can take it!)
gooks--here it gets a little more twisty. I've known a number of Vietnam vets in my times & travels. they're all, of course, different in what they've gone thru, what they've carryed away, & what they've retained. for the most part, the ones that I've known have been unwilling to talk much about it (& I haven't pressed). when they do, it's with sadness, or bewilderment--usually anger--anger at the situation they found themselves in.
last night the monologue was how many confirmed kills, how happy he was killing gooks ("I didn't give a shit if they were VC or not, if I saw slanty-eyes, it was all over, Charley!"), several anecdotes involving baiting gooks here in the states (& "gook" was expanded to include Koreans, Chinese, Japanese, Laotian, Pakistani)--tossing a fake bomb into a "gook" convenience store, phoning in death threats, intimidating a couple that was looking into buying a house in his neighborhood (supplying the dialogue of the audacious pair in a sort of exaggerated "ching chong chinaman" dialect.)(I should note that the gentleman--ahem--in question is a but a callow youth of--he volunteered this--56)
thing is, in the back of my mind, I knew it was probably all bullshit. my first thought (& I haven't shaken it yet) was "He was in Vietnam, & he spent the tour scrubbing trucks or peeling potatoes." & then, "how fucking pathetic." then, "there's a thousand of him for one of me." I thought lots of other things. I didn't really say much. I didn't say that one of my best friends came over with her family when she was three, that they'd been treated fairly roughly by the VC, by the French, by the Americans, & they got more than their fair share of harassment here in the Land of the Free. (although I'm not sure what the "fair" share of harassment is) I pretty much just concentrated on the floor & felt my prejudice against this "man" harden.
God bless America.
the Salt of the Earth.
blah blah fucking blah.
"You should find someone who shares your tastes." is pretty much the only sentence in my horoscope today that doesn't read like it was run thru a linguistic cuisinart.
I'm trying. God knows I'm trying.
Horoscope (by Astrocenter.com)
The only reason you are still living close to reality, is simply because your life needs contacts with other people. You should try to find someone who shares your tastes. You just love staying in bed all day long with a good book. But worry, there are people like you out there. You just need to find them
--other than the first sentence, which is absolute gibberish ("still living close to reality"? "your life needs contacts?")--& the the last bit is either the result of a horoscope writing hack who was a bit careless on the re-read, or else a very perceptive random fortune-generating program that dabbles in a bit of existentialist poetry:
but worry,
there are people like you out there
you just need to find them...
however garbled it be, it nonetheless strikes a chord regarding last night at the prison. it was one of those nights where I was paired up with an officer I haven't worked with yet, & I noticed as I pulled my book out that he didn't have one & appeared to be limbering up his vocal cords for an evening of conversation.
in the abstract, this was, like I said, my first night with this officer &, as I'd probably find myself working with him in the future, this would be a good night to put the book away (granted, there's usually not much choice), listen to what he has to say & get a feel for him--his history, his philosophy of life, whatever, so I know what to expect next time & can either engage in a lively bit of conversation, diplomatically breaking off when possible (I'm not the type to volunteer much information about myself when first meeting someone, & usually I don't have to, as most people--especially people who don't carry books with them--are more than happy to tell me all about themselves, secure in the knowledge that I'm devoured with curiosity)
(I should note that books are considered contraband--we're not, technically, allowed to bring them in or read them on duty. so let's just say that I'm relating a fictional episode here, alright?)
anyway, he flipped on the Stentophone (sort of an intercom) connecting us with Tower 3 & left it open all night.
there's a stereotype about us rural folk to the effect that we're preoccupied with guns & trucks, & that we're, as patriotic Americans, fairly prejudiced against vast chunks of the population (which is kinda like considering the human body a sublime work of art, an infinitely complex clockwork that undeniably shows the Fingerprint of God, but hating the organs, the blood, the hair, & most of the ickily biological processes, but whatever)
like most stereotypes, this is grossly unfair, but, well, it didn't just, like, emerge from a vacuum.
anyway, I got a monologue about trucks, guns, faggots, ragheads, cunts & gooks.
faggots are a pretty common target here, in fact, the fascination with faggots (see: queers, fudge-packers, Democrats, etc.) well...it makes ya kinda wonder about the concurrent fascinations with football & firearms (doth the lady protest too much?)
ragheads...well...considering our connection with the Middle East is at the gas pump & increasingly shrill pronouncements from the Administration...it's understandable (see: red savages, yellow peril, red menace, Liberals, etc.)
cunts--a distinct connection with the college-educated crowd here, or, at least, that segment that were in fraternities (go ahead! accuse me of generalizing here! I can take it!)
gooks--here it gets a little more twisty. I've known a number of Vietnam vets in my times & travels. they're all, of course, different in what they've gone thru, what they've carryed away, & what they've retained. for the most part, the ones that I've known have been unwilling to talk much about it (& I haven't pressed). when they do, it's with sadness, or bewilderment--usually anger--anger at the situation they found themselves in.
last night the monologue was how many confirmed kills, how happy he was killing gooks ("I didn't give a shit if they were VC or not, if I saw slanty-eyes, it was all over, Charley!"), several anecdotes involving baiting gooks here in the states (& "gook" was expanded to include Koreans, Chinese, Japanese, Laotian, Pakistani)--tossing a fake bomb into a "gook" convenience store, phoning in death threats, intimidating a couple that was looking into buying a house in his neighborhood (supplying the dialogue of the audacious pair in a sort of exaggerated "ching chong chinaman" dialect.)(I should note that the gentleman--ahem--in question is a but a callow youth of--he volunteered this--56)
thing is, in the back of my mind, I knew it was probably all bullshit. my first thought (& I haven't shaken it yet) was "He was in Vietnam, & he spent the tour scrubbing trucks or peeling potatoes." & then, "how fucking pathetic." then, "there's a thousand of him for one of me." I thought lots of other things. I didn't really say much. I didn't say that one of my best friends came over with her family when she was three, that they'd been treated fairly roughly by the VC, by the French, by the Americans, & they got more than their fair share of harassment here in the Land of the Free. (although I'm not sure what the "fair" share of harassment is) I pretty much just concentrated on the floor & felt my prejudice against this "man" harden.
God bless America.
the Salt of the Earth.
blah blah fucking blah.
"You should find someone who shares your tastes." is pretty much the only sentence in my horoscope today that doesn't read like it was run thru a linguistic cuisinart.
I'm trying. God knows I'm trying.
VIEW 4 of 4 COMMENTS
as far as most of the Vets that I've talked to had a bit more to say about whole terrible theatre of war--the men, the women (on both--or more precisely, on the multitude of sides), the smells, the dumb little jokes that people under an enormous amount of stress make to keep from going crazy. one of the things that made me think he was full of shit was he made it sound like he was by himself, in the jungle, mowing down pop-up "gooks". but I could be wrong.
But we live now in such an enlightened age, it's easy to ascertain there are no fools nor idiots anywhere anymore. (no, seriously, have you ever seen one? at least, have you seen one idiot enough for uttering sentences that could be called prophetic?) And our craving for oracles would remain unsatisfied if we had not created this wonderful instrument of knowledge, Artificial Idiocy. Bots, answering machines, Random Generators of various things now pay the same services as village innocents once did (and they are not even drooling while doing that).
If I were you, I would pay attention to the advices of this Astrocenter thing.