you know you’re a true expat in exile when……….

you know you’re a true expat in exile when…………………..

you get an email from a friend back home describing a weekend in a traditional theme hotel, complete with tea ceremonies, hot springs and traditional clothing and ‘ye olde foode’,…..

and they say:

” its somewhere i like to take foreigners like you when they come to visit “

:

hehehe, i couldnt help but laugh my ass off at the irony of it all .

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on another note, i’ve been avoiding messenger because i’ve been working on some music.

one of the problems i have is that my speakers are only hifi speakers and not proper monitoring speakers, so half the time when a mix sounds good here, something will be wrong when i play it in the car, too much/little bass etc.

so in the interest of sorting that out, and trying to instill some kind of discipline in myself to properly finish a track instead of just experimenting,….

i’m thinking of sending the tracks out to anyone who wants a listen. this way i’ll be able to get some feed back, discipline myself to finish a track under a deadline, and test the tracks on different systems at the same time.

so if you fancy being an audio guinnea pig leave your email and i’ll set a deadline of next tuesday when i’ll send the track out.

tell me if its too bassy, or too wide, kinda dull or too complicated, and be as harsh as you can when critiquing the track which shouldnt be too hard cos it probably wont be what youre used to listening to.

three week’s notice. as of january 2007……..

three week’s notice.

as of january 2007……

the skunk shall be blogging from here:

aint it purrty ?

whoohooooooooo!!!

i’ll be spending as much time as i can here.

or here

while i try and figure out if this is a WMD or not:

Straw Dogs. If youre not quite sure what to get y…

Straw Dogs.

• If youre not quite sure what to get yourself from amazon for xmass, then i would highly recommend this book. its non-fiction, and its kinda odd. but in a good way.

• i found it in the philosophy section of the barnes & noble in London, and yes i’ll admit i picked it up because of its cover. the title drew me in a little more, then i started reading the inside cover titled “Book of the Year for:” which was a list of people like JG Ballard and Will Self.

• i’m only half way thru it so it really wouldnt be right to give it a review, so heres Amazon’s Editorial on it:

• “In a work of thoroughgoing iconoclasm, British philosopher Gray attacks the belief that humans are different from and superior to animals. Invoking pure Darwinism, he savages every perspective from which humans appear as anything more than a genetic accident that has produced a highly destructive species (homo rapiens)–a species that exterminates other species at a phenomenal rate as our swelling numbers despoil the global environment. Gray explains the human refusal to confront the darker realities of our nature largely as the result of how we have consoled ourselves with the myths of Christianity and its secular offspring, humanism and utopianism. Human vanity, he complains, has even converted science (which should teach us of our insignificant place in nature) into an ideology of progress. But neither hope for progress nor confidence in human morality passes muster with Gray, who envisions a future in which the human population finally contracts as a world politics that grows ever more predatory and brutal shatters all such illusions. As a work of ruthless rigor, this provocative book will force readers to reexamine their own convictions. Bryce ChristensenCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved –This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

• Book Description: Straw Dogs is an exciting, radical work of philosophy, which sets out to challenge our most cherished assumptions about what it means to be human. From Plato to Christianity, from the Enlightenment to Nietzsche, the Western tradition has been based on the belief that humans are radically different from other animals. Taking inspiration from art, poetry, the frontiers of science, and philosophy itself, John Gray argues that the belief in human difference is an illusion and offers instead a post humanist view of the world. Straw Dogs is an exhilarating, sometimes disturbing, book that explores how the world and human life look once humanism has been finally abandoned. “

• you can find it on Amazon here .

• even tho i havent finished it, i can tell you one thing,…. you’ll either love it and reread it over and over again, or you’ll hate it and chuck it out the window because the thought of even donating this garbage would be an insult to literature everywhere.

• i personally love it , but i can see how some might not. the Amazon page actually has two reviews, one loved it one hated it lol.

• if you happen to be one of those that do hate it, i urge you to keep the book and read it one more time, to try and figure out why you hate it. that in itself will reveal alot about yourself that you may not have previously known.

• its easy to read, in fact its written like a blog,… short chapters here and there, but i wouldnt recommend jumping back and forth.

• because, if youre like me, and you think nietzsche is an arabic swear word, and would make a great club name, then do go thru it properly because the author does skim over stuff that other philosophers have written about.

• if you do get it for xmass tho, read it after new years, cos it is a bit depressing, and we wouldnt want to turn you into Scrooge,…. atleat not until after new years when youve already broken your resolutions .

• but on the upside, its incredibly enlightening, and in a strange sense restores your faith in that fact that there really is nothing to stop you from doing anything you set your mind to.

• oh and if you happen to work on the financial markets, definately get the book, it’ll make the things alot easier for you if you manage to apply what you read

• then again the book kind of applies to just about any job where youre dealing with people in one way or another, whether directly or indirectly.

• one final review of it, my dad read it before i did, and he basically said “if you were really young and had no real direction in your life, this book could seriously fuck you up if you took it at face value” ( i added the swearing cos it seemed an appropriate way to describe his review of it).

• and heres where the title comes from: “heaven and earth are ruthless, and treat the myriad creatures as straw dogs” by Lao Tzu.

Loan Waiver Supporters gather round!!! and let y…

Loan Waiver Supporters gather round!!!

and let your voices be heard!!!

tell everyone of your plight so that they too will understand your point of view that…….

• you dont give a shit about this lil kid, i mean why send aid when hes probably gonna die anyway right?

• because everyone has a God given right to own one of these :

• cos lets face it,…. that car is just soooo much more fun!!!
• besides, how else are you gonna get laid in this country?
• you certainly wont get any action helping this lebanese kid out:

• i mean why waste money on giving him medicine when the israelis probably have a shell with his name on it, and if not then hizballah definately knows where the kids hospital is and will probably one day fire rockets from there, so either way the kid is fucked.

• besides, the government OWES you a house like this, even tho you only sell stamps at the post office:

• and palestine? what a waste right? just more kids dieing everyday, youre right palestine is such a bad “investment”. besides if the money did help to end the fighting, what else are you gonna watch on your stupid 12300 inch big screen TV’s ? you’ll miss out on righteously condeming the israelis and satans america,…. then switch over to watch friends…..

• i guess you’ll just have to settle for travel shows if that does happen.

• but wait!

• if the government did stop feeding the poor, hungry and traumatised that’d be great cos then you can all go on holiday here:

• and do this:

• and you can do it all again next year

• and the year after

• until all the oil runs out and your grandkids are left scratching each other’s balls wondering where it all went wrong.

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Postscript:

• For those that dont know, here in sunny kuwait, there is currently a movement proposing the government write off all personal consumer loans. apparently its gotten so bad that your average kuwaiti is now indebt to the tune of KD20,000 – KD75,000 per household, maybe even per head.

• no one really knows the exact numbers because there is no centralised credit rating system here, so if youre refused at one institution because youre already over your limit, you just have to pop across the road to another one who will probably say yes cos youre not on file yet.

• a local blogger reported on perhaps the worst thing to come out of this whole mess.

• MP’s have apparently been criticising the government for spending millions in barren africa and war torn palestine and lebanon while their own citizens has apparently been “suffering” at home. they are actually questioning the point of sending aid!!!

• now to think this is one thing.

• to actually come out and voice it at a rally, is an entirely new low in just about every manner imaginable.

• i’ve met militant neonazi skinheads with more compassion. but then i guess they didnt live beyond their means.

• let them starve/die so you can enjoy that mercedes 500 whateverthefuckitscallednow.

• let them starve/die so they can pay for your holiday, house, and even holiday home, so you wont have to worry about it at your clerical day job where youre at for only 2 hours a day…..drinking tea and reading the newspapers.

• shame on you.