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Today's attitude: [Angry]

A Man without a Party

Once upon a time in an amazing land far away, at a small school on top of a hill. I joined a community of aspiring scholars most of whom were Republican. At the beginning of my journey, I was peripherally Republican, with accompanying views. Yes, I attended Saturday-morning anti-abortion demonstrations in front of a number of medical-"family planning" institutions and swore by government control. However, as my intellect grew, I began to notice the gaping moral cracks in the president of the time (Pres. Bush Sr.), the stupid Limbaughnator, and various other programmers of men. Their obvious and fairly blatant lack of morality and basic humanity slowly wore on me. But what to do? I could not jump on the Democrat bandwagon because they were more "pro-abortion" and, I well-knew then, Clinton was no better morally either. Okay, so there wasn;t one party that reflected all of my views,, but it didn't bother me quite as bad then - I had never studied 'The Titanic'-type more stories, so I wasn't horribly worried about the future.

So what to do then? Ross Perot? -- a weasley business man to solve our county's economic-woes? Maybe,, but he's fishy and manipulatable and interested, still, in more money... And how to see through the Crap-Smoke-screen the press-media puts up "so YOU don't have to think at all" (-John Stewart[Daily Show] :) ).

And then it happened again in 2000, who to pick, AL BORE or W Bushie II? I was able to predict 2 days before the election was complete (to GTA) every single thing that has happened to this country economically and militarily should Bushie II be elected -- and I'm no historian... (give or take the year and method of Sept 11).

And now,, the immoral, butt/war-mongreing crap-for-brains Bushie and his pile of cronies, or the flatterer, can't trust, cant-make-up-his-freaking-mind-about-anything rich-boy Kerry.... Good God!!

Though I know that Ralph Nader is vastly more intelligent than either of the others, I worry that he would develop a Jimmy-Carter-Syndrome -- poor/light charisma fomenting too many disparities in ones own party as well as potentially acting too fast on things that may need to change, slowly.

So what do I do? With certain government mods followed-through with, a certain governor of Arizona might have set the apple pie on the window-sill of the Republican party... but no... not even the slightest temptation in the end. ooo gggrr and there's no way in h-e- (double hockey sticks) I would consider Nazi-man-Buch.

I guess I'm just going to have to Deal with a group of people less intelligent, less moral, less __anything__ than myself or any one of my own friends so these freaks can pay money to _____ (you fill in the blank.. East-coast schools, bribery, advertisements,, etc.)

There is an election coming up for the leader of my own country and I think every last one of them will drive this country into the ground (crappy Atlantis relived). What do I do? No clue here.

Today's Attitude:

[Alien-Dazed/Confused]

The Aliens Must be Crazy
[A little Bob-history and a problem with teacher-student ethics]

There was a time in my life (which I rarely admit to) between 1985 and 1990 when I was a serious UFO/alien freak. I wasn’t just a little bit of a freak, but a lot. I watched all of the documentaries available and as much UFO video I could get my hands on, even keeping track of crop-circle occurrences. In 1989 as the Eastern Communist Block began to fall apart, I began studying physics like a crazy-man with the goal of achieving warp drive or time travel before I was old (30 years old – sorry, didn’t happen except in one of my stories  ). As I dove into relativity, I slowly became painfully aware of the self-limitations involved in Einstein’s version of the theory. At the same time, I was trying to reverse-engineer UFO stuff, but I kept coming to the same horrible realization - I was also figuring out how to fake every single one of the films I was watching. By the time I entered UD, I was fairly jaded toward these ends, but I still kept tabs, and watching with delighted sarcasm as experts on NOVA also were able to reproduce fakes as I predicted – but I figured ALL of them out (to date).

Anyway, my point with all of that – I now (2004) have a student at ITT who believes “the aliens are watching”. He was in my Math I class over a year ago and I always see him in the student lunch-room. For a long time, I thought he was just a very creative person, talking in non-stop metaphors – you know, like that Star Trek The Next Generation episode (“Darmok and Gillard @ Tanagara, on the ocean, his arms wide”, “when the walls fell”, etc), so I played his little game. When he would make an alien or scifi reference, I would place myself temporarily in that state of mind I remember so well and respond in terms of what I uncovered in the late 80’s. Although my information was older than his 20 year old mind contained, I could keep up with his Matrix, X-files and Borg-speak as well as his OMEGA Document #V stuff. Having been disparaged by the Texas A&M campus Hillel (Hebrew Society) for an online relativity article I began to write in ’95, I also understood the feeling of being in trouble by unseen forces that are affecting me, so I threw ambiguous references at him as he threw colorful verbalisms and paranoid thoughts at me.

It is slowly occurring to me that maybe all the other students were right – the guy does talk to himself constantly and has recently mentioned that violence might occur to him within a two-month span from now. Sure we, as Americans, are currently worried about terrorism, nuclear threats, etc but he seems to genuinely believe that there are aliens watching his every move and prodding him when he doesn’t do what they want. Yes, it does sound like some of the Abnormal Psych documentaries I’ve seen as my dad reviewed them in the 70’s and 80’s as well as stuff I’ve seen on TLC.

My Ethical dilemma: I am in pretty deep because of the way I have been the only one who seems (from his point of view) to understand what he is going through – or even talk to. I would like to mention that he does still function, easily passing classes, eating and the basics. It is possible that this is his best/only way of getting attention. However, what I am worried about is that maybe he really does have a deep separation from reality. Have I done damage by throwing odd ambiguous answers to his freak questions? I cured my odd paranoia through extensive study about the phenomena involved, should I encourage him to do the same? I looked into groups that he has mentioned before and it’s pretty dark, psychotic online drivel. My question is, do I allow him, as long as he is functioning normally to develop out of it permanently on his own, or send him to somewhere for psychological help that may inadvertently allow him to revert back later?

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Today's Attitude:

[Happy]

Teacher of the Quarter!

I figure it won't last long so I might as well gloat while the getting's good: Yesterday, my picture was officially posted at IIT-Seattle as the first "Teacher of the Quarter" in over a year. Apparently I impressed some students - I wanna know who they are... All I know is that I'm pretty hard - lots of students fail and have to retake my math classes and there's always one in every physics class... You'd think that they'd hate me...

I guess the ones who respond to student surveys are the same maticulous ones who do all of the homework and test corrections when I offer them -- my tests are d@m& hard.

I figured someone in the office would hold a grudge because GTA and I snagged the walmart-high-end digital camera at the Christmas raffle-party... or hmm, maybe they thought I might be swayed to stay since they now know of my efforts to leave and move to Texas.

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Today's Attitude: [Crazed/Ecstatic!]

The DARK CRYSTAL LIMITED MUSIC DOUBLE-CD SET IS OUT!

I just bought me a copy! I have been waiting for this for years. Stephanie's first gift to me was the Vinyl Record Original Sound Track to the dark crystal. I also had half-no-good copies from Napster way-back when. I am a serious Trevor Jones fan and I've waited for 10 years for this - I am soooo happy!

It's got the original soundtrack on one CD and the entire movie (final cut) score on the other. I am in hog heaven - and have been listening to it all day - It's simple pleasures that bring me smiles!

You can buy it on 'BuySoundTrax.com' or 'Ebay'... oh, and rock stupid students - thanks for seeing that with me when it came to the Inwood a few years ago - and JPW, thanks for the paperback :) ! It may be some silly Jim Henson creation to some but it was my very first inspiration toward the wilder world of physics I now find myself in. Maybe I'll blog about it later if you are interested.

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Today's Attitude: [Humerous/weird]

UD's New President

Yesterdey ushered in yet a new era at UD. In the past ten years, UD has been plagued by wild, weird things - Sasseen's UD-property inequities and the opus dei vs. Fr. Milam Joseph crusades going back and forth - but this time, 'GalaxyQuest's' lead doctor has been appointed - Dr Lazarus. So, I say "By Grapthar's Hammer, I will follow you to the end!"

:)

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Today's Attitude: [sad]

Weird Al Yankovic's Parents Killed in Home Accident
Mirrored from http://www.weirdal.com/msg.htm

"On April 9, my mom and dad, Nick and Mary Yankovic, passed away in their home in Fallbrook, California. It was the result of a terrible accident – that morning they had started a fire in the fireplace with the flue closed, and were asphyxiated by carbon monoxide poisoning.
Suzanne called me that afternoon on the bus to give me the news, so that I would hear about it before the wire services picked it up.

Needless to say, I feel pretty much the way you would expect me to feel – shocked and devastated beyond words. I loved my parents so much, and this all still seems like a horrible nightmare that I can’t wake up from.

I want to thank my family, friends and fans for the incredible outpouring of love and support that they’ve shown me. It’s wonderful to know that there are so many people around the world who truly loved my parents, and also nice to know that I am not alone in my grief.

I take some small measure of comfort in knowing that they died peacefully, and that they never had to suffer through the pain and loneliness of living without each other. I'm also grateful that they both lived long enough to see me happily married to Suzanne, and particularly happy that they got to meet our beautiful baby daughter Nina. She filled their lives with so much joy this last year. Nina may be too young to remember playing with her grandparents when she gets older, but don’t worry, we’ll have some great videotape to show her.

Many people have wondered what’s going to happen with the tour. I briefly considered canceling some shows, but I ultimately decided that it would be better for me personally to continue working. Plus, I’ve heard from so many people over the years that my music has cheered them up in times of tragedy… well, I thought maybe my music would help me too.

So far, it has. Going up on stage in front of thousands of supportive fans is a cathartic and somewhat therapeutic experience for me right now. I don’t know if I can say that the concerts really take my mind off of the tragedy, but at least they give me a break from sobbing all the time.

Anyway, I have decided not to cancel any shows – the tour will continue as planned. However, I have decided to put a moratorium on all interviews and meet-and-greets for the time being – I just feel like I need some time alone right now.

The funeral will be a very small, intimate service with only the immediate family attending, so please, I ask that you respect our privacy. Just knowing that your thoughts are with us at this time is more than enough, but if you care to contribute anything, in lieu of flowers, Suzanne and I suggest a donation to the Natural Resources Defense Council in my parents’ name.

One thing I would like to ask everybody to do, though… please, go out and get carbon monoxide detectors for yourself and your loved ones. If my parents had had one in their home, there’s a very good chance that they would still be with us today.

In fairness to the memory of my mother, I should point out some errors that appeared in the press. Although she was starting to have a problem with short-term memory loss (she was taking medication for it), my mother was never diagnosed with Alzheimer’s.

As long as I’m pointing out errors that the press has made, it was my Aunt Dot who found my parents when she was bringing them lunch that day, as she routinely did (and not a group of relatives concerned that they “hadn’t heard from them in a while” – the family was close and caring and saw each other several times a day). Also, my aunts and uncles all live in separate houses (not together, as some articles implied), and for what it’s worth, I am not represented by the William Morris Agency either.

I don’t know how much else I can say about my parents that I haven’t already said in interviews over the years. Although I always found it a little uncomfortable, my dad talked a lot about death. He mentioned a few times that he was planning to go on a diet so that his “casket would be easier to carry.” I guess that’s where I got my sick sense of humor from. And he was always talking about how much he was looking forward to seeing his old army buddies again (in the next life). I sure hope they’re having a great reunion right now.

As unthinkable as this tragedy is to me, I just know that my mom and dad were very much at peace with the world and with their lives. And I guess I can take a small amount of comfort in that too.

Thank you all again for your overwhelming kindness and support. It means more to me than you can ever know.

Love,
Al"

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Today's Attitude:


[Washed-up Critic]


'Signs' vs 'The One'
[WARNING!!! Spoilers below! - Read no further or be spoiled.]

I must admit that I would have gone my whole life without seeing 'Signs' with Mel Gibson, but Anna, The Jelly Pinched Wolf, Kiki (et al.) expressed some feelings about it, so I was curious. While we were down at the local corporate money-sucking outlet, Blockbuster Video, Goof Troop Ag and I were hungry for a couple of movies. From the hype, I had figured that 'Signs' would be an incredible movie and that whatever I picked for the second movie would not be as good.

I had put off renting Jet Li's martial arts movie entitled 'The One' because I was always aiming at other favorites when I went on a renting spree. However, last weekend, GTA and I grabbed one of two copies from the shelf and rented it along with 'Signs'. We watched the two movies and came to a horrible realization - we must have horribly different tastes than the rest of the world. This is something I used to tell myself on a regular basis to keep me from jumping on band-wagons, but actually experiencing my reaction to each movie, it slapped me in the face how different I must freaking be.

GTA was tired, so I put in the Jet Li movie first, assuming we would watch 'Signs' on Sunday. As I got sucked into the movie's mystique, I found some of it correlating to my personal world-view and there was some suspension of disbelief, but cool scifi otherwise - nothing I couldn't get past to be entertained. GTA started to wake up and was pulled in just as I was, entertained by this scifi martial arts movie and were thoroughly entertained. Admittedly, it was not quite 'Indiana Jones', of course, but in my mind it was on the order of at least a '5th Element' or 'Cube'. We both saw where some other genre's were borrowed/stolen/included but were still impressed by new ideas explored. We were both very surprised that we liked it. We did not get around to watching 'Signs' until Saturday, before Easter.

In preparation for this movie, GTA grabbed my arm, expecting the movie to be dark and scary. The beginning of the movie was certainly eerie and looked a bit like a Speilberg mixed with Stephen King, but as the movie continued, suspension of disbelief became a bit thick. GTA and I both have independently explored the 'phenomenon' of crop circles, so we were not affected by that at all - in fact, we were laughing and cracking jokes (I came up with a few witty ones,, I wish I could remember them now).

We did have some shivers. I had the Sony sound-system maxed out and I think the scariest part of the movie was the dog barking shortly before he is killed by the child. The hand coming out from under the pantry door was good too. Other than that, I felt the movie lacked any real emotion. The 'mystical christian' references were thick, but handlable, but I felt like the plot of the movie was a bit contrived. The 'miracle' idea was similar to that in 'Pulp Fiction' which I liked, the way it was done in 'Pulp Fiction' but not as much in 'Signs'. The 'predictions' made by the wife in her final moments were interesting but rushed... I was waiting for inspiration or emotions to well up in me, but none came only disappointment. It had the same scifi effect on my subconscious mind as 'Mission to Mars' - ok special effects, ok scifi/spiritual ideas, ok, ok, ok,, but nothing new, except that the aliens are on a raid instead of attempting to remain and they melt like the Wicked Witch of the West from the 'Wizard of Oz'... "ooo, What a world, what a world.... aaaeeeiiaaaauuuuoooooo!" Let's get out our water-guns and shoot-em-up!...or better yet,, use holy water! - I just couldn't get in the mood.

My (apparently) unpopular opinion would have to be NOT to recommend this movie - to ANYONE. I welcome disagreements - sorry about any offenses that might be taken, but GTA and I were very sorry we spent the $3.50 on renting the movie and, instead, wished we had rented Mel Brooks' "History of the World" again...

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Today's Attitude:


[Stressed Beyond Belief]


Begging for Work at ITT Technical Institute
    - "You too can make your life more stressful at ITT."

*It seems as if I'm on a weird-s#!t-a-thon lately:

• Bob Dylan CD free with Victoria secret purchase until Saturday, 4/10
  
  
• Weird Al Yankovic just came out with a new music-video CD with 'Best Videos' from his entire career at http://www.weirdal.com... ugh... I must resist,, ugh,, musssst resisssssst...
  
  
• GoofTroopAg's company resended their offer for a move to Austin. In despiration we will again target DFW for the fall, instead of Austin!
  
  
• I successfully begged and pleaded to ITT for 7 classes over the (next) summer quarter after telling them I was leaving a couple of weeks ago.
  
  
• GoofTroopAg and I have a favorite show which is, what we call, "Nerd Baywatch" (loose clothing, lots of running, etc) - AKA 'True Calling'... Yet another Fox-funded black-hole we've fallen into.
  
  
• I went to an ultrasound doctor to get my private parts scanned for tumors.
  
  
• GTA's mom's cat, Danny, passed away - an important family member has been lost.
  
  
• I realized that I've been using out-of-town checks for a year or so - not paying attention to the address, but no one has cared.
  
  
• It's 9:15PM and I still have to make a test, grade homework and write a CGI script for my HTML class.... AAAAhhhh!
  
  
• My wife accused me of wanting to "blow up the arc", like Tweek (from South Park [in place of Indiana Jones, of course]). *Okok, so this last one IS an exaggeration, but the others are true.

So my question is... Why me?!?,, and I know well that the answer is not 42!

Today's Attitude:
[Physicist]

NIKOLA TESLA

Most people who know me understand that my physics aspirations have pitted me against the work of Albert Einstein. In the years I spent at Texas A&M, while obtaining my master's degree, I discovered my idealized patron of physics, Nikola Tesla.

My explorations into atmospheric electricity began at UD in late '93 after the Superconducting Super-Collider (Waxahachie, TX) bit the dust, due to an inept congress after having spent $6 Billion - my foot in the door of physics was severed and I have been professionally limping, ever since. I worked for a short time with atmospheric electricity on my own at UD but did not get very far because it was not something that was well-known in a quantitative way by anybody.

It was at the behest of Boxing Alcibiades, one night in the summer of '95 over coffee at the old Hwy-183 Denney's Site not far from Campus, that I began looking into electronic weapons. Though I think his interest was regarding universal weaponry, my ethics directed me more toward defensive and stun weapons. Still, his forcing me to explain everything I understood and did not understand about such possibilities fired up my mind again.

During the spring of '96, I created theoretical protocols for some of my first experiments of 'new' phenomena, but lacked the permission to use a lab at A&M. It was not until my wife (now), Goof Troop Ag, who allowed me access to all of the lab equipment I would need, over which she had been given charge. Some of the effects I observed were the following: St. Elmo's Fire shooting from my fingers; current running on the outside of wires (visibly - like blood vessels); boiling sound from my shoes and glasses; momentum (mostly spinning)derived from glowing emissions; and collection of charge by distant capacitors. For a short time, I thought that I had pioneered a great series of discoveries, that is, until I read about Nikola Tesla.

Much Like my experience with Walter Ritz (Friend/Intellectual opponent of Einstein who died in 1909), I discovered that Nikola Tesla had also predicted and demonstrated what I had seen. My experimental methodology was very different than his, but many of the wild effects were the same. So, I put myself to the task of researching this man... Who was Nikola Tesla anyway? Why have I not read or heard about him if he has done such revolutionary work? The answers to my questions gave me stern warnings.

As I researched further, I discovered that Tesla's errors were the following: (1) a serious lack of business sense, (2) the inability to document and organize his work, (3) the impatience/inability to explain to physicists why they had never seen these effects before and what was really going on behind them, (4) spending too much time using trial and error [like alchemists of old] rather than coming up with his own generalized equations in order to make steps, (5) taking research funds from J.P. Morgan and not doing exactly what he told Mr. Morgan he would do, and (6) not legally pursuing MARCONI for patent infringement for his first 4 mass-produced radio designs [He would be awarded a victory over Marconi by the US Supreme Court, a mere 5 months after he died in 1943]. These errors opened my eyes from rabid idealism into a more conservative world of caution - not only would I have to be careful with my 'recreations' of Tesla's work, but with my observations on Emission Relativity (Ritz-related) too. I took the first step that year and produced some of my first emission-relativity equations that no one had ever seen before.

From what I have read, Nikola Tesla was a serious genius! In fact, as I read more, I found that his objections to Einstein's relativity were similar to my own, but he was so busy with pushing the envelope on atmospherics that he never explored relativity in any great detail that we know of. I had found the master I sought by going to A&M, but unfortunately, he was long dead.

I read about Tesla's idea for the Death Ray and was reminded of my discussions with Boxing Alcibiades - it seemed like at a reasonable power, it could make a great stun weapon and at an even greater power, a great defensive weapon against missiles as well as tornados/other atmospheric phenomena. Thus, I covered all of the material available to me as of mid '98 and found that the British attempted his design and it did not work - it looked like a combination of the giant Death Star weapon from the original Star Wars Movie and Ming's weapon from the original Flash Gordon series. But the question still remained, how can you figure out what he was doing unless you have his experience or understand the physics behind it. Lacking his personal Live-body experience and an apparent lack of supernatural talent, I chose to explore the latter.

3 Years later, I arrived at a number of equations and explanations using basic Newtonian, Faradaic and Maxwellian physics to come up with a design. By the end of my theoretical explorations, I believe I uncovered the physics behind Tesla's Death Ray. The direction that my experimental endeavors took was different in a way that it would be difficult to produce (what I call) "Tesla's Earth-RLC Loop & Resonance effect." I worked in the lab with huge direct currents and alternating currents with wildly varying frequencies and phases - and got most of the effects you would read about in the books if you looked for them. For the 'big one', from my theoretical projections, I would have to set up Tesla's strict high-frequency and phase controls, plus alot of power and exhaustively numerous trials to calibrate the thing.

Studying under Tesla (the dead Physicist) has led me to the nitty gritties of lightening, St. Elmo's fire, "death rays" (which are too expansive to post here and will take me a while still to put to paper) and even to a respect and possible interest in the Arthurian figure, Merlin.

The question that still remains is, even though I believe that I understand how to make a powerful new defense/weapon, would it be a good idea to pursue it? Could it end up being used as a weapon like Nuclear Fission was used to proliferate enormously explosive bombs and missiles? I am tempted to say, "There's always someone crazy enough.", then would my only ethical recourse be to "not discover" it?