Mitch

[b]600 minutes gone[/b][PG] He comes home from ten hours of working. Back sore, cut hands, tired legs, dead head. He meets her in his room. She gives him a back massage. He hugs her. He almost cries. He is warmed by her. Too bad it's all in his head. He'd like the world to stop spinning now.

[b]Little Bill[/b][T] Little Bill smokes a cig on the couch. She rips it from his hand. Sucks in. "Gimme my cancer stick back," he says. "I paid good money for that so I can get cancer." She grabs a garbage near her and hits off the ashes. Little Bill lights another. "Everyone is so desperate to die," I say, but no one seems to hear.

[b]Random Moment[/b][T] He hates the smell of smoke. "You nervous?" she says. Him, nervous? Well, yes. "I guess. I'm fine, though." Voices in the other two rooms. You can see a man naked in that one. The door's slammed shut suddenly. "My vision's already blurred," she says, sips again. "How weak. I've already got a buzz."

[b]Super Quickie and Super Batty[/b] [M?] Superman wasn't so super. Batman was batty. "I'll keep you by my side with my superhuman, my achin' kryptonite," Superman sang. They were atop a skyscraper. "Three Doors Down?" asked Batman. "Yeah." "Why're we here?" "Thing're stressful. 'Job's getting to me. I need to vent." He leaned forward, kissed Batman. They made love.

[b]Disappear[/b] [T] [b]Excerpts from Patricia's diary found in her apartment, and Alexander's notebooks:[/b] [i]the harder you think about this reality the harder it hurts the more it stabs and burns away at you it is full of decay, you're a fruit on the tree ripened beautifullly numb, ready to be picked away shoved inside someone's mouth (they'll feel a sickly sweet intermixture of satiated desire and an all-encompassing fire) that is why i have tried to while it away, to pass my sentence and not see these bars up until this time, i have failed i hope to do it one day[/i] He was a man, in his cell. Maybe he'd lost all his marbles. You didn't know. He looked like a clean-cut enough man. But that was on the outside. People have a way of hiding themselves inside the nooks and crannies of themselves. His eyes were wild. It looked like something was always swimming in them. He was on his bunk with a notebook. He was writing in it with a pen. He didn't even see me as I stood beside the bars. My mom had her arm around my shoulder. She was telling me "Come on, let's go." She had a nervous look in her eyes. I began screaming, "Daddy, daddy!" He didn't hear me. He kept writing. I was just a little girl then. [i]i am a man who is lost, entirely cross and i've no one where left to go but nowhere i've searched all my life for a meaning to this mess but this mess hall is never sorted the only way out is through, that is the only way to disappear from here as a ghost just fade away[/i] I don't remember much of my father. That is, when he was [i]really[/i] my father. I just have unconnected images. I just have what my mother has told me about this man. His name was Alex. It was what everyone called him. But he preferred Alexander. He was a man who acted happy on the exterior. But in the interior he was a gaping hole. He yearned for something deeper to his existence. He was a brilliant thinker. I've read some of what he has written. It blows you away. It's very nihilistic. His writing is how he kept himself going. He was an aspiring writer. But he never finished any story he ever started writing. The only things he finished were his thoughts he wrote down. When I pour through the pages he's written he's in the words. This is how I know my father. As a man who did what he had to do. But deeper inside he was never happy with the way things were. He was frustrated sick and tired. It was only a matter of time before what happened did. It was obvious it was going to happen to anyone who has read what he's written. He was a man being stretched and stretched until he was too thin to rebound. [i]today she was born, a girl i'll never know to think i was part of giving her life is a harsh thought she'll suffer just as i do each and every day with unbearable ununderstanding and uselessness it is better she had not lived this life i've given should be thrown away before it gets thrown away, tattered and torn on its own[/i] When I was born he acted happy. But inside his writings show he was not happy at all. My mother said he would sit with me in his lap as he wrote. He would cradle me to sleep. He would speak hushed words to me. Around this time things started getting more versatile at home. He had recently lost his job as a newspaper editor because he had gotten into an argument with his boss. What it was over I don't know. My mother was always pleading with him to get a job. We were running out of money. Soon enough our house was going to be taken away. Soon enough our car was going to be taken away. Soon enough we wouldn't have money to buy food. We'd end up on the streets with nothing. To add to things I would keep them both awake nights on end with my crying. I'd cry and cry as if I knew things weren't going well. [i]the baby cries, cries cries there is no shut eye there is no mending hand of sleep i only keep wandering over my thoughts tripping and skipping time ebbs painfully on my ear whispering what i have to do but i don't want to hear i wish life weren't such a hell[/i] He never did get a job. He just kept writing day after day. Other times he sat and just thought. My mom was starting to think about getting her own job. But he said that's something a woman shouldn't have to do when she's got a daughter. Eventually he just cracked. He couldn't take it anymore. He didn't want to work a job and he was getting more and more desperate with his existence. He was getting crazy and dangerous. It all erupted. They got in an argument one night. My mom said she refused to stand by while the money drained away. She was getting a job if he wouldn't. He grabbed her and they fell to the ground. He started beating on her. He broke her nose. He dislocated her shoulder. She was bruised and beaten all over until she blacked out. He eventually called the cops and an ambulance. He was ashamed of what he'd done but on the other hand he knew it was what he was capable of. Ever since then he has been institutionalized. Before that he was in jail for a while. He could never look my mom straight in the face again. [i]bruised beaten bloodied tattered torn i beat, beat, and beat on her until i couldn't anymore it was letting myself outside to say hello[/i] Since then I've come to see him over the years. He doesn't say much to me. About the only things he says to me is how one day he'll escape. He'll be free. Just how I don't know. [center][b]MAN ESCAPES FROM INSTITUTION[/b] Houston, Texas By: Lacey Sanders[/center] Yesterday inmate Alexander Ellington escaped from his cell at Wellington's Home for the Insane. The director of the institution, Bob Smith, says his whereabouts are unknown. He also says how the man escaped is unknown at this time. "What we do know," said Smith, "is that his daughter is also missing." Ellington's daughter, Patricia Ellington, disappeared from her apartment around the same time Ellington escaped. Police have searched the apartment, but found nothing. "It looks like a storm hit the place," said officer Orwell Norson, "but we don't have any fingerprints or anything." Anyone who has any information as to the whereabouts of either Patricia or Alexander Ellington can contact local authorities. There is also a reward for anyone who gives information which leads to a close of the case. The amount of the reward is unlisted at this time. Alexander had finally figured it out. How he had done it he didn't know. He sat there writing "I don't exist" over and over again. He wrote it for hours and hours. His hand had become cramped from writing it. His other hand had become tired from turning the pages so he could start writing it again. If anyone had been watching him, they would have seen him just disappear. It happened as suddenly as it ended, and on the security camera it was just a moment they thought Alexander had somehow fixed the camera to show. And he no longer existed. And because he no longer existed, neither did Patricia. But he existed in a sense. He existed in the words. All about his cell he was strewn about. He was in the crumpled notebook in the corner. He was in the yellowed notebook under the bed. He was all over the place, and he breathed with words. They were his lung. It was the first time he'd managed to escape into them and it was the last. He had disappeared. He was gone.

Me want to join, too. I'll be picking this book up today or tomorrow thusly.

[quote]?Well here I am!? she screamed, ?Look at me! I dare you to look at me! Look at me in all my bitter anger and resentment and rage and rebellion, stare at me and see my pain. Where?s your answer?! Where?s the answer for all the hurt you?ve caused?!? Her eyes were wild now, and madness crept closer as a sick smile mutated her face, ?Do you hate me? [b]Do you hate me for all the things I remind of you of[/b]? Is that why you always look away? Because to meet my gaze would mean facing all your guilt and shame and responsibility! You can?t take that. To you, I am nothing but a blur of memories which you would rather forget. And do you know how that hurts??[/quote] What I bolded is the only error I found in the story. The story was very poetic, and morbid. I enjoyed it, although it was hard to get a full grasp of it with how quickly I had to read it. There is not much else I have time to say. It's a very good job, though.

This is a nearly impossible thread to give an answer to singly. The main song that comes to my mind is The Doors' "The End." I'm sure all of you are familiar with this song (otherwise you must be under a rock). Whenever I listen to the song, it gets me in a poetic mood. The song is about 10 minutes in length. Originally it was just a ballad of lost love, but then Morrison added the part about the murderer in it, who's basically an Oedipus figure. There's many other songs I could say. . .but I've got to go to work.

I turned 18 this October 12th. I don't really remember too vividly what happened that day, because it wasn't too important to me, at all. I believe what I did was have some friends come over to my friend Ryan's house, and we just played some games. . .that's it.

every breath breathless every sense senseless every word, wordless falling from the page upon the blackness of a universe too useless all is nebulous disassociated, unneeded pointless, without meaning and me, with tired eyes achy joints and my bones protruding from my skin and me, brain feeling dead i am lying dormant dead everything said unsaid, every motion motionless a hamster in cage on a spinning wheel running, running still in place, not going anywhere i stumble over from nothingness, i cradle the wishes upon a star so far, so far away in the ever-spanning boring sky every muscle in this formless form pushes to the future where dreams die couldn't fly without any wings, i dig into the terrain rain falls uselessly torrenting, wettening exercising impunity feeling its thinning away the erosion hangs the noose for my head, i would like to sleep would like to disappear over the spectrum of all time but dormant dead i've things to do, holding imagination in withering, dying hands

[quote]Women who are fat as slobs, who are piles of lard, who are alienating all men to stay away from them - to be as far away as possible - snort their way all around, in this world being pigs and swine well, a pig may not be all too fine but its orgasm lasts for hours on end and i do not think i can quite know what a feeling that must be for all accounts, i would rather be a pig bred to be slaughtered and eaten by the masses just to have that orgasm throttle this body all around[/quote] As for the topic at hand, I would say women definitely are told how to appear in our society, more than men. Personally, I tend to find a girl who's a little chubby to be more attractive than one that isn't. I guess it may be that women are supposed to have more body fat than men.

i'm an anachronism in this day and age (i belong in the future, swallowed in its sullen sullied suffuse somber cheeks) the past can kiss my ***, i don't dwell on it. today another dull day yesterday a smudge on the fine print in the teeming culmination of other yesterdays. tomorrow hopeless but hopeful a scouring landscape sculpting itself with fine firm shapely hands. (i belong in the future, dead in a grave a forgotten name whose pointless time here was forgotten) my voice will curve its tendrils into the opening of tomorrow sleuthing time open, undoing the stiches, it will seep into the wide-eyed oblivion of the unknown and will echo back to me carefully. i will hear the reverberations of wallowing stillness. i will hear the lisping of the impossible. i will know man is a marked son of a ***** being hunted by god with the sternest damnation worn high. (in the future our selves are our nots, our others found, our entire knowing forgot too confused to know the lay of the smudging days) one day all you know will be in the shoals and banks of yesterday in the whimpers of the past. (and i'm an anachronism i shun the past and want to be delievered to sweet nothing)

My religion means jack **** to me, because I have none. I am agnostic. I don't care if there's a god or isn't. I believe that our understanding of god at this point is beyond us. I believe that there's likely more than just one god, contrary to most religions' monotheistic beliefs.

V I?m lying here and I?m thinking, thinking about Laurice, thinking about everything. You know how it is, you lie in your bed and thoughts leak into you. Come into you. It can?t be helped, and happens. What I?m thinking is, we?re just organic machines. We?re machines, built by nature. Built by evolution. We?d like to think we?ve got a soul. We?d like to think there?s love, there?s a God, that our existence has a real meaning, we can change the world, that there?s good and evil. We?d like to think, but none of it?s true. All we are is, is a teeming mass of people. A mass of cells, of atoms. Of tissues. Of organs. And like the cogs in a clock, like a car, like any machine, all of what we?re made of works in concert to create what we are. Pain?s not real. It?s just created in the brain, and relayed to us. It?s a defense mechanism. It?s our body telling us not to hurt ourselves, not to kill ourselves. It?s the self-perpetuating power of the human. Of all other animals. It?s survival. We humans, we go against nature. We create our own natures. We?ve got clothes, we?ve got stores, buildings, computers, TVs. Guns, plastic surgery. We?re not happy with a sunset. We?re not happy with just sitting out in the open woods, the moon shimmering up there. We?re not happy with an open field, we?re not happy but with what we make as nature. Naturally, we?d be naked. It?s the way nature made us. Dogs get to walk around naked. Cats do. Rats do. Squirrels, raccoons, elephants. Any animal known to man but himself is naked. Naturally, we?d live out in nature, unchanged. We?d not assimilate areas, not urbanize them. Not build houses, not build skyscrapers, not build roads. Everything in the world, it?s synthetic. Women, they?re supposed to wear this ridiculous make up. They?re supposed to be thin, they?re supposed to be what?s labeled as ?beautiful.? Beautiful, meaning they?ve got to make a lot of sacrifices. They?ve got to either drop dead, or get pretty. They?re supposed to be obsessed with looking beautiful. They?re supposed to cry and get all pissed when they don?t have big tits, so they go out and get a breast augmentation. They?re supposed to look at their nose and think it?s too wide, it?s not thin enough, so they need to go get a nose job. Their *****, they?re not good enough for anybody, they?re ugly, they?ve got to get an *** job. Their face, it?s ugly, they?ve got to go under the knife, change that. Widen the space between their eyebrows. Get fuller lips. Womens? chests, they?re too fat, holy ****, they?ve got to get liposuction. They?ve got to starve themselves, not eat anything. Become anorexic. Become bulimic. Barf up all their food. And in reality, all we are, is flesh machines. Our heart beats, supplying our body with blood, which allows everything to get nourished consistently. Our lungs breathe in the air to oxygenize our blood. Our brain controls all of our autonomic processes. It controls the heartbeat. It controls breathing. It controls sex drive, the need to keep our species alive. We?re the products of evolution. In our world today, there?s no natural selection. Natural selection, that?s when nature allows the better-suited genes to survive. For example, if a mentally handicapped guy named Bob was born in nature, he?d die. For example, if someone with dwarfism was born in nature, they?d die. For example, if George Bush was born in nature, he?d die. But instead, the worse genes keep going on. Genes which make it so someone?s more prone to cancer, so someone?s more prone to getting obese, just like every other American. With our societies, organized as they are, being a veritable cesspool, bad genes are all over the place. Everyone?s ******* screwed. In essence, we?re inhibiting evolution. Slowing it down. Making it go in reverse, even. It?s because we fight against nature, we make our own nature, a hell with roads, people squirming all over the place, businesses, commerce, machines we?ve made. We?re fighting viruses, bacteria, and natural selection?s making the tougher ones survive. Say Donald ruptured his heart. In nature, he?d die, but since we?ve got heart transplants, Donald survives. Say Larry?s got cancer, and does Chemo. In nature, he?d die, but since he got the Chemo, he lives. And goes on and has sex with Lisa, and has kids who pass on his cancer gene, and then their kids go have sex when they?re old enough, and pass on the cancer until who the hell knows when, to the point where every human on the earth is dying from cancer. We might as well just commit suicide already. We might as well not even exist. Because inevitably, our race?s going to go extinct. That?s something that can?t be stopped. For example, the sun?s going to become a red giant, eventually, when it?s all used up. It?ll swallow the Earth whole then. For example, a meteor could hit the Earth at any time, it?s just a matter of time. For example, we?ll fight pithy wars, and maybe we?ll nuke the **** out of each other, and we?ll all die from radiation. For example, the AIDs virus evolves so it can become airborne, and we all die like ******* flies. It?s all against us. The human race is a collection of star-crossed lovers. We love to learn, to find out things, but our own love is probably going to kill us, or show us how we?re going to get killed, and become extinct. There?s probably already some other race out there, some aliens with bulbous eyes, sinuous movement, who?ll outlast us anyway. We?re pretty insignificant. Maybe they?re significant. Maybe, we could hook up with these aliens, have some tentacle sex, and get a cross-breeding of our two races, and create an uber-race to rape the entire world. Or not. I?m going to bed. First, I?ll think about Laurice, then I?ll wake up tomorrow, and go to my classes. VI I sit in my class. There?s some teacher up there, blabbering on forever. Some students, they?ve got their hands on their chin, they?re listening to what?s being heard. Other students, they?re reading from their books. Other students aren?t even here, and in the big assembly hall, there?s empty desks. This is what you pay for. This is college. You have to go through this **** in order to get a degree, so you can get some job so you can get money so you can stay alive. You have to listen to some lecturer go on and on about some subject which doesn?t mean jack ****, which never will mean jack **** in the long run to you. Maybe you?ll absorb something that you?ll remember, maybe you?ll learn some interesting fact. Maybe. But when it comes down to it, what matters is experience. It?s when you put what you?ve learned into action, actually do something with it. That?s when you remember it. More than half the **** you learn in college, you won?t even use at your job. It?s such a waste of time. For some people, it?s a party. A big party. Get drunk each night, have sex. Get wasted. ?Shitfaced,? as they say. For some people, it?s working hard as hell. They get some part-time ****** job, then they study and do homework when they?re not in class, and they go to all their classes ? perfect attendance. There?s people like me, who just ?go through the motions.? People who are doing what they have to do, even if they don?t like it. People who are apathetical monsters. Who really could give a big **** less. Who just want to make it through life, and get the most out of it doing what they like to do, not the stupid **** like college. The instructor might as well not even be saying anything. You might as well just drop dead right there. This is the rest of your life. More and more and more dulling down, more ****, more indoctrination. Brain washing. Soon enough, you?ll lose yourself. Soon enough, you?ll become what you didn?t want to be. You?ll be what you thought you?d told yourself never to become. You?ll be another passing face in this place. You?ll work most of your life, you?ll get your money. Have your funeral. Get buried. Maybe have kids. This is it. You?ll be another forgotten name. Sitting here in class, I just don?t care. But I make myself care. Me, the crazy bastard, I just think of Laurice. I just think about how I?d like to be sleeping, forever. How I?d like to not even exist. The instructor?s writing some useless, humdrum **** on the board. Some formula, which is pointless. I?d just like to close my eyes. I?d just like to give up. But I can?t, I?m ******. I?ve got to listen, retain this information. I do it because I have to. I do it because there?s no other way. You?ve just got to push yourself again and remind yourself, this is the rest of your life. More slaving away. More useless garbage, with a few good, more bad moments. This is your upheaval. This is it. Your life. The bell rings, people get up. I view all the beautiful women, the organic machines, built by cells, by tissues, by genes, by DNA. Each moment, they?re aging. Each moment, their beauty they?ve got, it?s fading. Right now they?re at their prime. They?re ready to have their brains ****** out Get to work. Got to make the next generation, so we can keep this going.

[quote]I only have one question. Why did you censor yourself? I am unsure exactly what your aim is with this piece (other than shock value), but surely censoring yourself dilutes whatever impact the piece may have. [/quote] The censor is still on in this forum, James. [quote]I edited your thread title to inlcude the ratin of PG-13 for Language. It might be sensored, but it's still there, so I'm going to count it. Try not to forget the rating next time, okay? -- Lady Asphyxia[/quote] Yeah, I'm sorry about that. I forgot to.

Pink Floyd is all I've to say.

I pull words out of my a*s and smear them around and make pretty s**t masterpieces [font=Verdana][size=1][color=red]I edited your thread title to inlcude the ratin of PG-13 for Language. It might be sensored, but it's still there, so I'm going to count it. Try not to forget the rating next time, okay? -- Lady Asphyxia[/color][/size][/font]

Yes. I plan to make it a novel if possible, perhaps a novella - it is already up to 11 chapters. III Sometimes, you just disappear. It?s the greatest feeling you?ll ever feel. It?s a thing you live for. When you lie back, and you just disappear. When you lull off, and you just escape, you?re no longer here in this world. No longer in its struggles. You?re not in the humdrum. Not in the reality. It?s when things keep going on, but you?re not there. It?s where you?re still existing, but there?s no pain. There?s no anything, but this feeling you?re gone. You?ve disappeared. People, they take drugs to feel like that. People, they have sex to feel like that. People die, to feel it all the time. It?s not a feeling you feel often. It?s not something that?s always there. You can?t force it, because it won?t come if you do. Disappearing like that, it?s how you wish life was. You wish it wasn?t so much suffering, wasn?t so much let-down after let-down, take-down after take-down. Wasn?t such a disappointment. It?s the closest to dying, but not dying, when I was in her arms, sleeping. When you sleep, you?re weightless. You have no weight. When Laurice and I were in each other?s arms, lying there on the rocky surface of the tombstone, the crickets chirping, looking at the stars. We were gone. We weren?t there. We were somewhere else, someplace you never thought existed, someplace you thought was imagination. Laurice and I, we?re in bliss. We don?t know anything then, but each other, and we close our eyes. Your mind, your mental self, it still remains, but the physical?s blurred. It?s almost as if the mental?s physical. As if there?s no difference between the two. Like they?re one. That type of feeling, that type of moment, it?s nothing you?d give up for the world. Somehow, it makes it worth it to live. IV The sun comes up, rises its happy self to the sky. Laurice and I, we kept sleeping, disappearing. We?re woke up by this old woman coming to a grave there. She?s this orthodox woman, she?s obese. She says, ?Wake on up, now!? We react. Our eyes come open, and we look around. It?s those few seconds when you?re coming back into place, where you?re coming back from disappearing. Where your mind?s blank. Where nothing matters and it?s okay you feel none of it matters. When it?s okay to be an apathetical monster. Startled, we let go of each other, and scathe around the ground for our clothes. I find her bra. She finds my boxers. We switch articles of clothing, then scathe around some more. I find my jeans, my shirt, she finds her clothes, too. We put everything on, quick. She?s still looking at us, the sun?s lighting her up. She makes the cross around her with her hand, says, ?Father, son, holy spirit, amen.? She says, ?I hope He will forgive you two, for what you?ve done. Adultery, lechery, copulation, fornication! A deadly sin.? We say nothing. We want this old bag to go along her way. She says, ?And Jesus, he died upon the cross, he suffered for these sins, so you?ll be forgiven. So you?ll go to heaven. Satan has his nefarious grip upon you two. You?re getting closer to hell already.? I say, ?We?re sorry.? If there?s sarcasm in my voice, or not, I don?t know. She says, ?Sorry? To me? You should be sorry to Him, if you want to be absolved. You?ve committed a wretched sin, after all. You?ve got to pay penance for it. I?d suggest going to the church, and telling your sin, so you can be forgiven.? By this time, I?d like to scream at her to shut the hell up, she?s ruining how great last night was. I say nothing, though. These old women, living to die, they don?t have a clue what?s it like to live. To give into your impulses. To satisfy yourself. She finally turns around, her fat, it wobbles with her, as she goes into the distance, with a flower in hand, putting it upon a grave a ways away. It?s probably her dead husband. She probably thinks the dumb ****?s in heaven, like she thinks she?ll be. I squint, to see if I can see what she?s doing now. It looks like her lips?re moving. She must be telling a goddamn prayer. I say to Laurice, ?Religious zealots, can?t leave home and not find one.? She says, her hair a sexy tangle from sleeping on it, ?Got that right.? I?m sure my hair?s all sticking up, too. I say, ?Let?s get the hell out of here, shall we, kids?? So we go to my car. And leave. On the way to her house, to drop her off, I tell her, ?Last night was wonderful.? She says, ?Yeah, and what else is new?? I say, ?Nothing else?s new.? And I give her a grin. And she gives me a grin. I want to touch her hair. I say, ?I?ve got something that?s new, actually.? She says, ?What?? I say, ?Your hair looks really sexy this morning, I want to touch it.? She says, ?And you were calling who perverse lately?? I say, ?Like I said, I?m a crazy bastard. I?ve got a libido the size of the titanic.? ?I?m sure my tits are more titanic.? ?I?m pretty sure they are. But, it?s the way we men are, you know. Especially me, a crazy bastard. Sex is on our mind quite often, especially when women have sexy black hair going whichway over. Us crazy bastards like it. It drives us mad.? She says, ?These so-called ?crazy bastards? sound like some kind of cult. I?d like to join.? ?Maybe you?ll get to. You?ve got to learn from me first, the number one crazy bastard.? We pull into her driveway. I say, ?And here we are, queen. Your royal cottage.? She says, ?Sure is ****** for a royal cottage. I?m disappointed, king, I expected better.? ?Maybe someday,? I say. ?First, the king has to get a good job.? We step outside. We step up to each other, and wrap our arms around each other. We give each other a parting kiss on the lips, and I grab her hair. She gives a smile about me touching her hair. I say, ?Parting is such sweet sorrow.? She says, ?You can go ahead and lament all about leaving me, get in a mire and everything. I?m going to go to my cottage now.? She turns, and she?s walking away. I can?t help but grin at her witticism. I watch her butt as she waddles away, womanly and attractive. I watch her black hair, all over and sexy. When she?s slammed the door to her royal cottage, I step into my wagon ? it?s got quite a lot of horsepower, but not as much as me ? and I return to my royal gallows, my dorm. The place with bars, where the only way to obtain the key is to procure it by a degree, by paying money and getting an education in a specified field. Then, I can eventually be king of my own castle.

[QUOTE=Charles]This image I've constructed accurately illustrates my feelings on the subject. It's just amusing when you actually have a tangible representation of the subject matter people are entertaining. I myself am very sentimental when it comes to harming animals, accidentally or otherwise. Like children, they're in a position of pure innocence, but we're hardly talking about animal abuse here. I certainly don't find any amusement on the subject of running down hapless creatures. So, I can only respond by saying "Hey, what can you do." :shrugs: [img]http://img19.exs.cx/img19/3226/roadkill.gif[/img][/QUOTE] Charles, you're hilarious. Will you marry me and bear forth many children?

[quote]One can only experience things through one's own perception.[/quote] While this is true, I think it's fair to say that we as humans eventually develop the cognitive abilities to try to think and see like someone else - to be able to understand why they're the way they are, and to be able to see how they see the world. Although this seeing is still from our own perception, it's kind of like a guesswork at seeing things from another's perspective. There are those who can't see from another's perspective in this guesswork sense - we often call them close-minded. On the opposite spectrum, those that can readily perceive other's perceptions via guesswork are open-minded. There's also an impairment a child might develop called autism. It's basically an inability to understand other's feelings. You know, it's the whole thing when you were a kid, and you hit Johnny, and the teacher asked you, "And how do you think that made Johhny feel?" Kids with autism can't understand how Johnny felt. They're egotistical and introverted because of mental impairment - and it's not their fault. [quote]To those who have complete faith in the laws of nature, our perception is a direct result of various physical masses located within our bodies. [/quote] So basically, these "physical masses" would be the organs? Mainly, the brain? The eyes? And what is exactly "faith in the laws of nature"? Would you explain what this means in a more in-depth way? Does it involve god (I'm thinking of your faith thread here), or is it simply the truths that science has told us about nature - natural selection, etc? [quote]Death is final and removes all functionality of the required masses which results in an end to the perception of said dead individual.[/quote] I'd agree with this. When you die, the functionality of you as a being - and your perception - die, and your organs die as well, which were what gave you your perception. [quote]Permanent loss of perception is nonexistence.[/quote] If someone loses their sight, or their brain gets damaged in some way which completely hinders their perception of the world, they would still exist. [quote]Now, from this individual's perception there is no past, present, or future. Nothing ever happened. The individual, from this nonexistent perspective, never existed at all.[/quote] I point to my above reply. To the individual he never existed at all, but to other's perceptions he exists. He's still alive. [quote]To this I respond, "How does this matter at all to the dead guy who no longer exists?"[/quote] It doesn't matter. It isn't able to matter to him, because he no longer exists to himself, but to others he's still alive. Or, if he's dead, he's remembered in their memories and perceptions. [quote]Time is relative, do you agree? If you cease to exist, time ceases to pass for you. Time and life may continue from our perspective, but when that person poofs out of existence, time ends for him. From this hypothetical non-existent perspective, there is no difference between one second and 100 trillion years. By then, everyone is dead, anyway. When that happens, there are no perspectives (that we know of) and if life is only found on our planet (which is rather remarkable to begin with), then the universe will do whatever universes do for about an eternity until life is formed again, and perspectives come to be once again. [/quote] What exists now had to exist before I could exist, because without the earth existing before me I couldn't've existed. Thus, things exist even if we aren't there to perceive them. It's just as James said. Also, adding onto the whole non-existence thing: Others can carry on our memory, but those who have our memory will one day die. Perhaps they will pass on the memory of us to a second generation, and that generation will pass it on to the next, etc. But, thinking in the long-term. Human beings will one day be extinct, and once that happens, you really do cease to exist. Therefore, life is rather pointless if what you do during your time will eventually just go to waste anyway. Sure, in the present, what we do will change things - but way far away in the future, when mankind's done, we won't have mattered. Some of what we've done will still exist, and perhaps we'll leave behind a fossil record, but we'll be like dinosaurs. Our existence will be known, if there is intelligent life out there (which I believe there is), if they were to find us. But our achievments - us as people, how we were and what we were like - will be forgotten. Or perhaps, say this alien life finds some of our literature and language (that is, if it survives) - and they learn how to speak our language and read it. Then they'd learn something about us. But, at this point, there are 6 billion people upon the earth, and only a small number of them matter. Therfore, they will be remembered, but everyone else will be a forgotten name and person. But, as vast as the universe is, what are the chances they'd find us? The alien race which would find us would inevitably go extinct as well. Perhaps they would continue hopping from planet to planet, but eventually they'd exhaust all resources on every planet that's habitable. Perhaps the universe is infinite, but to me, there's always new things appearing in it. As the old are destroyed, the new are made. And also, perhaps there's parts of the universe that are just blank - that have nothing in them, and eventually will have something in them. The point is, there isn't an infinite number of habitable planets, where you can get the resources required to live. Eventually all life dies and our memory will fade, and this other lifeform's memory will fade. Eventually, the sun will become a red giant and swallow the earth and everything on it. With it, all we've created here will be gone. But perhaps we will have more highly developed space travel by then, and will have gone and found another habitable planet? But, if we don't leave the earth before it's inevitably destroyed - it could even be from a meteor, perhaps - everything we are and did would truly be almost gone, except for our satellites and whatever else we have. Also, one day, will the universe end, as a whole? Will another be made? Or does it exist forever?

[size=1][color=red] I've been here since April 8th, 2002. . .so that makes me a member here about 2 and then some years. I've really been slackening on the posting for months on end, but now I've come back, I guess. I used to be a mod way back when. James recruited me, and so I was mod of Otaku Lounge. Back then, Charles was still just mod of the Playstation forum, and we had lots of fun being mods together - I had fun being mods with everyone else, as well. Well, then I was mod of the poetry forum, on v6, and then I got laid off my modship when v7 came around. I was happy to mod when I did, and hopefully I made some kind of a positive influence of some sort on the boards. [/size][/color]

[QUOTE=Siren] Something as simple as "outcome" versus "resolution," for example. Those two words are not interchangeable. They seem like they mean the same thing, but they don't...far from it, really. [/QUOTE] Well, to me, the difference between these two words is pretty obvious. "Outcome" is what happens at the very end, whereas "resolution" is when something's [i]resolved[/i] - meaning, all loose ends are knotted, tied, and aren't laid to dangle. Whereas with outcome, the loose ends could still be flayed, unknotted, untied, laid to dangle. I think I'd tend to agree with you on needing to pay closer attention to writing. As for the thesis, here's how I'd personally rewrite it (although it may not suit your fancy): "Judgment Day is not prevented in Terminator 2 because the conflict, actions, and outcome of the films are not affected by humans; instead they are dictated by machines - the symbols of Fate in the Terminator films - and because of this, any human effort to alter the future is a futile gesture.? That's just my personal take on it. Take it or leave it as you wish. The roughest part of it, for me, I shall bold: [quote]"Judgment Day is not prevented in Terminator 2, because the conflict, actions, and outcome of the films are not affected by humans, instead dictated by machines, [b]the symbols of Fate in the Terminator films[/b], and because of this, any human effort to alter the future is a futile gesture.? [/quote] As a whole the thesis statement was a little too compressed for my tastes. I had to read through it a few times before I fully linked all parts of it together and got my full understanding of what you were saying. A thing worth doing may be to break the thesis into two sentences? Or is that allowed, by your professor? Whatever the case, it's a solid thesis, but hard to first understand because it's so compressed and dotted with commas all over the place. I'm excited to see the paper - your past ones have been good. Mainly the Smith/ Ahab paper.

I'd rather save the $50, and I did. I've got my regular iPod right here in my lap right now, giving me a lap dance of arousing proportions.

I've heard a few songs by them, and I was impressed. They are a really good band, definitely. This best-of collection sounds pretty good, though.

Ah, where's Tony when you need him. . . Anyway, [i]Lest We Forget[/i] is a waste of time for me. I own most of the albums which have the songs this compliation has on it. Except for the new song, anyway. Marilyn Manson is a great musician, though. Few people do give him a chance. . .they always consider he's bad, since he's gotten that kind of a rap from the Columbine Shooting and et cetera. I guess this compilation is good for those who haven't heard any Manson nor given him a chance, though. Pick it up if you want to actually give him a chance. You'll be surprised, I guarantee.