The day (or universal family)

My father never told me
that it was all such a joke
even though it still means something

My mother never told me
that it hurts to break people
but that it just means nothing

My father once told me
that hard work and dedication
was all it took

My mother once told me
that lying was not good
and that the only friends you truly have are family

Well, it means something
and that's just the way it is

It hurts to break people
and there's no way around it

It does work; the work
but this isn't what it is

I lied a lot as a kid
and now I don't, I really don't, but I still do

And friends, well, they're just
the best friends

And it all means nothing
but I love my mom and my dad
just the same

Mule Train by Frankie Laine

Mule train, yeah, yeah.
Mule train: clippetty-clopping over hill and plain.
Seems as how they’ll never stop.
Clippetty-clop, clippetty-clop, clippetty, clippetty,
clippetty, clippetty, clippetty-clopping along.

There’s a plug of chaw tobaccy for a rancher in Corolla;
A guitar for a cowboy way out in Arizona;
A dress of callico for a pretty Navajo.
Get along mule, get along.

Mule train, yeah, yeah.
Mule train: clippetty-clopping along the mountain chain.
Seems as though they're gonna recah the top.
Clippetty-clop, clippetty-clop, clippetty, clippetty, c
lippetty, clippetty, clippetty-clopping along.

There’s some cotton thread and needle for the folks away out yonder.
A shovel for a miner who left his home to wander.
Some rheumatism pills for the settlers in the hills.
Get along mule, get along.

Mule train, yeah, yeah.
Mule train: clippetty-clopping through the wind and rain.
They'll keep going till they drop.
Clippetty-clop, clippetty-clop, clippetty, clippetty,
clippetty, clippetty, clippetty-clopping along.

There’s a letter full of sadness and it’s black around the border.
A pair of boots for someone who had them made to order.
A Bible in the pack for the Reverend Mr Black.
Get along mule, get along.

Get along mule, get along. (Mule train.)
Get along, get along.

Last Thursday

While waiting for my bus on main street, I watched many people walking by. There was one man who lifted the lid of a city trash receptacle, took out a bunch of "Timmy's" cups, and proceeded to "roll up the rim to win". He grinned wildly, looked over at me sitting on the transit bench and  and said "free coffee and a doughnut"! Next, he placed a stone on the curb by nudging it with his foot, then kicked it into oncoming traffic. He snickered as it hit a vehicle's hub cap with a "ting"! 

Next, an elderly lady walked by. She had a walker/cart that was missing a wheel, and squeaked as it moved. She had one shoe with a thick sole, presumable to counter a shorter leg. The combined sound of her clip clop, and squeak was like music to me. I couldn't help but to watch in fascination, paying close attention to the cart and shoes, the objects that made the sounds. It made me think of the patterns that go unnoticed around us, how we are often out of sync with the rest of the world, trying to clap out our own rhythms. It made me think that even in the face of immense struggle, there are people who just keep clip clopping along to the beat. Then my bus came and my little introspective metaphor moment vanished.

 Look at the picture.
cart and shoe

Pour un soir seulment

Paradis Perdu-- Jean LeLoup

This is a song by Jean LeLoup, translated by E.L. Tempete.


Will you come with us, o stranger?
Where will you stay on this soil,
on this soil,
once you're used to it?

Not much time left before Friday
when you leave or stay,
It's all over.
Never come back to this paradise. Lost.


1.
Across the sea exists a country we've said was impossible,
like the Garden of Eden,
across the sea exists a country as beautiful as madness

Where live a people perfectly healthy, perfectly
welcoming
Who bathe all day beneath the falls and the rocks,
And the rapids and the rivers,
the water as pure and light as the air.

No need to plant,
the wheat pushes itself into harvest, you await the moose,
Glimpse the great beast we call the bison,
The mountains so covered with sheep that we say
they have sprung from the very soil,

Across the sea exists a country as pleasant as paradise,
and the women? So beautiful.

Will you come with us,
will you come with us,
o stranger?

Where will you stay on this soil,
where will you stay on this soil,
once you are used to it?


There's not much time left before Friday
where you stay or leave,
it's all finished,
to never return to this lost paradise.



2.
There will be immediate storms and wind,
there will be blizzards, seas of oil,
There will be murderous waves,
There will be eels and disease,
There will be sharks and scorpions, epidemic,
There will be
there will be

the mutineers,

And many among you will lay aside their lives
to find their destinies.


And if one day we see that promised land,
be careful of who you meet,
many have been thrown overboard and drowned.
There will be the beaches made of quicksand,
You will have to be patient, find the sheltered bays and estuaries.

Across the sea is a land like heaven,
where dwell a people as soft as madness,

And in arriving, you'll probably have to kill a few soldiers,
butcher their leader and the idiot missionary,
Kill all who believed in Me,
And you'll have to paint your ships a different colour
and never return
to this paradise. Lost.

Torontovilletown/Royal Mountain

Torontovilletown/Royal Mountain

in these cities
des villes
sans fueilles
and nothing to leave
or a falling
leaf in the
morning outside
against grey
tree-planting sky
un ciel gris est gelée
all so frozen and high and
wearing a garbage bag
to rester sec
or it's a far grey town now,
a different city where
no one speaks
the same language
here
and there
are other ways to look at this we
suppose there was a
warm fall day she was
wearing the sweater he'd
gotten her and
wondering how the weather was
where he was now
and she
was looking down on
boul rene levesque
watching the sun
push over
mont
real
the hill that will
disappear as we will
disappear and the
stars will guide all to
somewhere so
long so gone
far from toronto
far from the royal mountain
with the rivers on
all sides closing in
again
like their
time has come
back or
never left and
ours is all
finished we should
be grateful we
had a good run un
bon cours it wasn't
much it was yeah
c'etait rien que
magique et
coleur nothing but
far away cities and skies still
living here
coming to
life now in
these old sturdy boots with
new ways to
pronounce our
names.

" >

boite en valise, marcel duchamp

Placing a bunch of multiples of his work into a suitcase, Duchamp claimed that all of his best work could fit in one box. This one has all the duchamp classics! Take yours home today!

Samian-- La Paix de Braves

Rap Québecois ft. Loco Locass

R.I.P Margaret Moth

CNN camerawoman Margaret Moth died on Sunday of cancer.

Moth was famous for her fearlessness and her flair, and with good reason. She was actually shot in the face in Sarajevo while on assignment, only to survive and eventually go back to work. She also changed her name to "have her own," rather than continue on with her father's that was handed down to her.

check out this documentary about her...it's appropriately called "fearless"

Posted on behalf of Sarah C.

Rule 8

there's the right way and the wrong way
and my way
and your way

there’s rules for this
and that
and definitely that

where you start
depends
on where you finish

you start with the buttons
then the legs,
the arms,
the body

but
be quick with the rest
even gingerbread men deserve a humane death

Special Thanks to the Piano Nobile Gallery Curator, Justin Waterman.

lost forever

lost forever
©2010 GregOakes.com

words exhausted
everyday routine
words never known
outside my mind
occasionally shared by another
i'm not alone
my consoling shoulder
so many feelings
profound proclamations
momentary pleasures
lost forever
i feel alone
what would have been
if only those words were heard
and experienced by others
how would i be perceived
if those words were shared
with the world

~go

trapeze

Olivia attended circus camp over the spring break. A great program for precocious kids with energy to burn. The pics are a little fuzzy but Olivia is the little figure on the trapeze. Photo credit-Olivia took a picture of her framed photo souvenir from circus camp-the frame was also made by Olivia.

Creatures of habit

Reality and the rabbit are out of phase within their limits:
Tests were done all around the world on the social relations of exclusion
While the starbursts of plants shook their heads
Seeing repetitions leading to habit;
Oh those wily rabbits

Here is an interesting set of photos of an annual procession to the Monument of Freedom in Latvia. The Latvians who march in the procession (and fought under the Nazi's) say that they are commemorating compatriots killed in the war, while protesters accuse them of whitewashing history and having Nazi sympathies. Interesting debate could be had here about humanity. Does the life of a fallen soldier amount to less if they were fighting for the bad guys? Is the Pope a bad guy, he was a Nazi Youth after all. At what point does history cleans us of our mistakes or misbeliefs? Wolfboy has often posted photos and posts about War Veterans and the respect that he has for them without any one of us really countering his position. Do the photos of this event change our perception of things? I don't know, I guess I just started thinking aloud.

Riel on Rabble

click here

Their best in my eyes

Resourceful

Who knows?

One of my students used this sentence:

"Economic evaluations are important in dentistry for many reasons. They can inform policies regarding manpower and other resources, they can determine whether or which interventions are cost-effective and they can help ascertain how the profession and the general population values new and existing treatments."

I have problems with the use of "manpower and other resources".

I want to change it to "human and other resources" (read human resources and other resources).

At first I think it should not be written that way because of gender discrimination, and then I think I'm a pansy for caring about that.

But it's true, doesn't sound good, especially if the written word ultimately shapes our brains (in and along with the environment). The words literally structure themselves in to our thoughts, our habits, our actions.

Anyways, but then I think, is "human and other resources" any better.

What have I done?

I've made human beings resources, meaning I've dehumanised them.

Literally, I have de-'powered' them.

This is no good, and I think reflects something about how we think about running our society.

These are my thoughts on this sunny day of the everlasting covenant.

I mean this philosophically

To me, theism is far more obvious than atheism. When I look at the world, I see g-d much more clearly than I see nothing.

Social ontology

A morphogenetic field is a hypothetical biological (including social) field that contains the information necessary to shape the exact form of a living thing, also shaping its behaviour and coordination with other beings.

Detail of "Steps"

Ancient Stuff-brave new world

Why is it even important to study all this ancient stuff? Who cares whether these monuments were made 3000 years ago or 30 000 years ago. Does it have any impact on anything we are doing now? In a Brave New World all ancient history is repressed in order to make the society more pure. Why am I obsessed with this poppycock? And moreover, why am I constantly compelled to ejaculate my thoughts and the record of my experiences all over this virtual medium? In a Brave New World the society has been specifically engineered to produce a perfectly content consumerist population in order to generate perpetual stability. In a world of stability there is no room nor need for heroes. Is there an alternative? Rumour has it that there is another goal for life other than stability or contentment. Rather the evolution of the soul through gradual refinement of consiousness. Maybe this is where the study of ancient civilization gains importance. Maybe we should figure out if there is an alternative to the way our current civilization is headed based on an accurate knowledge of what our predecessors were doing. Allow me to get back to the narrative;

We left Isla del Sol and the ruins there to return to Puno across the border in Peru. There are several ancient sacred sights Id heard about in this region that we decided to check out. Just off the highway is this thing called the Muru Doorway. Id seen pictures and read on numourous obscure websites about strange goings on at this sight. Space aliens, intergalactic doorway, etc. So we decided to spend the night. Basically its this really odd carving in the rock amongst this odd rocky formation that boarders the lake. The overall formation was strange enough that you can tell peoples living here would automatically consider it as sacred. The carving though is very very weird. I dont really know why anyone would go to the trouble of carving something out of the rock like this and I pondered it a long time. This local kid came out from behind a rock selling unusual pebbles. His name was hilariously Socrates. He told me that the portal opens in the night but I didnt buy his bobbles. My companion and I set up our tent within view of the gateway. The night was clear and I made a long observation of the stars. When It got really dark I heard some noises in the hills and thought that there were bandits. For an eternity I listented, thinking I would need to pull out some korean moves in defence of my guitar and my sleeping companion. Eventually, resigned to my fate I curled up in a ball in the tent. Next morning I felt like a baby. Next time, you guys will come with me and maybe we ll have the courage to pass through that goshdarnd portal. I feel like the cowardly lion. Anyways, next day all the locals were asking me if I went through the portal and I had to admit that I was too woosy. I have a feeling that the portal is the real deal. Also I was high on San Pedro cactus powder that I bought from the witches in La PAz. It makes all your senses really strong and everything is really intense. Dont judge me for manipulating and experimenting with my state of consiousness unless you want to also judge all of the ancient preists and kings and seekers of this area too. (San Pedro is so great. I wish I could bring a bag of the powder back to canada. It just charges your whole body and mind up and you can feel it in your jaw. Also your voice feels like its coming from a different place and gets deeper)

So next day we took a long day trip to the ruins of Tihuanaco. Here is another site where there's all these crazy stories and no one knows what the truth is. Apparently this place is the oldest known ruin in the world. It was a ruin even when the Incas were here. And yet, it seems the most modern. Incredibly straight and smooth MASSIVE stones fit perfectly and carved with exact angles. Made me think of the Winnipeg Art gallery. Modern Style. They say that the stones came from a quarry across the lake which boggles the mind. How did these people do this crazy shit? Who in god's name where they? Apparently, the stones were also carved perfectly into pipes in order to having running water in the place. The museum says that these people were contemporary with the Greeks but sources on the internet put it back way farther. I guess the idea is that this place held really old civilization because its so high and was sort of an island during the great flood. Everyone here is talking about the great flood and this whole area as being the last refuge for whowever was living back then. Noah? Everyone is talking about this dude Viracocha who was a white guys with a beard. He survived the flood and replanted society. Then he hopped back on his boat in the pacific ocean and said he'd be back later. Standard history doesnt even acknowledge a great flood as far as I know. The other really weird thing is in the ajacent museum they had like 20 cone headed skulls. Even little tiny child cone headed skulls. The standard veiw about that is that these people used splints to form the skulls at a houng age. Nobody knows why. To my mind, wouldnt these oddly shaped skulls have an effect on the size, shape and function of the brain? Also very strange is that these types of skulls have been found on the oposite side of the planet in ancient europe dating from roughly the same time period.

All in all, I don't know what the heck is going on on this planet and I dont think anyone else knows for sure either.

barbie! she's just like us!

Fibinacci

still trying to break down my drawing barrier

Orsismo

Just back from the Island of the Sun on lake Titicaca. Wow, they say the sun was born there and I don't doubt it. Although everyday at night it rains and storms like a hurricane and the temperature drops, during the day the sun is so hot Ive roasted a whole layer of my skin like a lizard. Its because we re so close to the sun I think. The island has the perfect climate for agriculture and its been completely transformed for thousands of years by different cultures to have graded steps for growing. We walked over the whole thing. It sure is nice seeing donkeys and pigs and sheeps and shepherds and lamas. It definately feels like stepping back in time. All the people are still dressed like witches but some of them have cell phones. There's ancient crumbled temples all over the place. On one side there's a hippy beach where all these long hairs are living with their dreadlocks and cooking fires. This lake is like a giant puddle sitting way up in the mountains. Apparently its left over from the great flood and thats why there's traces of the great antidiluvian civilizations here. I asked a little girl about it and she said that its good to leave coca leaves as offerings to the gods. I asked her if it was for jesus or for the panchamama (mother nature) and she said it was all the same. For heaven's sake, the suppression of the coca plant by our nations is a crime. As shown by its widespread worship and reverance here its obviosly a gift from the gods albeit the devil may be the one who taught how to synthesize into cocaine. Now we ve left Bolivia and are on the peruvian side of the lake again. We re headed to a place called the Muru Doorway that apparently is a stargate into another dimension. Legend has it that this dude named Amaru, a high Incan preist was fleeing the Conquistadors with this magical sacred object called the Sun Disc. And apparently he fled through this door. Apprently the locals stay clear of it. People have been known to disapear into it for days. We re going to camp outside of it. I just read Brave New World. Found an artist´s dossier by this guy named Mosho. He makes art based on the ruins and ancient cultures around here. He made his own style of art and called it ORsism0. Here´s a youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2qrG-aunos. And here's some good quotes from him. I think I may convert to Orsism;

-Mosho worked non stop to find his own artistic language. He made various imaginary journey's and always came back with great finds, with encounters with himself.

-An Orsist painter will be one that creates their art thinking of themselves as a small god destined to stop time after receiving the gifts of the founding gods of all humanity. The artist will feel under teh power of strange cosmic forces to paint the othe side of divinty and life.

Last night I dreamt that I solocited help for my music from Burton. Anyone know how I can get in contact with Burton?

"Cut Out Filter" + "Levels" =

we got both kinds of music, Organum AND Polyphony!

Organum (pronounced /ˈɔrɡənəm/, though the stress is sometimes placed on the second syllable, from Ancient Greek ὄργανον - organon "organ, instrument, tool" [1]) in general is a plainchant melody with at least one added voice to enhance the harmony, developed in the Middle Ages. Depending on the mode and form of the chant, a supporting bourdon may be sung on the same text, or the melody is followed in parallel motion (parallel organum) or a combination thereof. As no real independent second voice exists this is a form of heterophony. In its earliest stages, organum involved two musical voices: a Gregorian chant melody, and the same melody transposed by a consonant interval, usually a perfect fifth or fourth. In these cases often the composition began and ended on a unison, the added voice keeping to the initial tone until the first part has reached a fifth or fourth, from where both voices proceed in parallel harmony, with the reverse process at the end. Organum was originally improvised; while one singer performed a notated melody (the vox principalis), another singer—singing "by ear"—provided the unnotated second melody (the vox organalis). Over time, composers began to write added parts that were not just simple transpositions, thus creating true polyphony.

Team Canada Men's Hockey Team 2010