Surrounding buildings of asbestos once were wood
Intentions perhaps counterpoising those noble and good
A drunk tackles his woman in the street
Conclusion: “Fuck this neighborhood”

Managed not to write anything for the past week, waiting for the hammer to come down with the thugged-out highschool dropouts who jumped me last weekend. Between the ASP baton I picked up and my CRKT M16-03, I figure it will be interesting to see what happens. (There are more interesting things in my arsenal, but I’m not about to wield them while drinking)

So I’m sitting around, it’s 01:20 on a Sunday, I’m bolstering my defenses against rampant paranoia with some liquid courage while I admire the quatrains of Omar Khayyam (and those who would dare attempt his style), and I find it is time to smoke a cigarette.

I am outside for thirty seconds before Crystal and her Guardian/Assailant are walking by.

Guardian/Assailant is pleading with Crystal that she stop and reconsider something. (Every other word out of his mouth is her name, it’s far from endearing, even to the ear of a casual eavesdropper)

Crystal keeps walking.

Guardian/Assailant speeds, preparing to take down Crystal in the middle of the street (while she is crossing it to get away from him). He has earned the title of Assailant - what kind of man tackles a woman in the street?

Crystal, swinging her purse just a moment before, eats pavement. (At this point it’s obvious that they are romantically involved - she would have had something to say about this street-tackle-maneuver if she did not know him)

Guardian/Assailant positions himself over Crystal, effectively preventing her from breaking free. Breaking free would be a Good Idea, given that they’re on the street and only drunks are out driving at this hour and there is a fair likelihood of pedestrian casualty if they remain in the road much longer.

Crystal lies there.

At this point, I am considering extinguishing my cigarette. I have my knife in hand. It really looks as though Crystal needs to get out of the street. Guardian/Assailant’s goals be damned.

A female voice calls out: “DO YOU WANT ME TO CALL THE POLICE?” (My crisis of conscience is averted)

“Well, that’s a refreshing thought… in 30 minutes, they’ll have this all sorted out.” I think to myself (I’ve seen them in action recently - if you order a pizza on one line while calling in an assault on the other, you’ll be eating pizza when the police officer arrives to inquire about what became of that assault you were so excited about not so long ago).

Police do not solve problems. Police act as a dressing for the wound, something to soak up the blood and misery, reposition the event as inevitable, and name the criminals and the victims. They do not protect, they rarely intervene in serious matters - they clean up (and file ever-so-important paperwork).

Regardless, Guardian/Assailant lets Crystal up when he hears mention of police.

Crystal resumes walking away. She is stumbling more quickly, now.

Guardian/Assailant maintains pursuit and volume: If anyone did not already know the name of Guardian/Assailant’s VIP/Victim, it’s “Crystal”, “Crystal”, “Crystal”.

Whatever happened when they made it up the block, I will never know.

I do, however, know that I finished my cigarette…

… just in time to see a beige Jeep speeding back down the block, Guardian/Assailant in pursuit on foot.

“Crystal, no! No, Crystal, NO! DON’T DO THIS!”

He ran after the Jeep as fast as he could, for as long as he could.

Guardian/Assailant has earned the title of Guardian - he’s drunk, he knows it, and he knows Crystal is just as badly inebriated. He had good intentions (at least insofar as preventing her from putting a key in the ignition was a concern).

A concerned citizen would have done more than watch the drama unfold, but I am of the opinion that one cannot save people from themselves…

… and there are far more pressing matters.

Omar Khayyam and his rubaiyat, for example.

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Apologies if this post features poor grammar, word choice, or spelling. I just got mugged by a couple thugs down by the 7-11.

What happened?

I was walking up to the local 7-11 at around 1:10 AM. Some guy was yelling “Hey, your sister is hot” at a couple walking down the block. I figured “Hey, we’ve got a qualified douchebag on the premises here!” as I approached the beer depot.

Turns out that I end up face-to-face with the guy who was doing the yelling as I approach my late-night repository of all things alcoholic.

“You got any white?” asks the 6′3″ 250-some pound douchebag.

“You know, yeah-o…”

“No.”

I proceed into the store, the clerk asks me if I’m in to pick up my night cap, and I say “yup” - my singular goal was to acquire a beer so I could return to chatting with friends and browsing the internet in peace.

My purchase is paid for with a few quick swipes and prods at the payment console, I put the beers in my bag, wish the clerk a good evening, and head out.

Guess who is waiting for me in the parking lot? It’s that chubby fucker that was yelling at an unattainable woman and asking me for narcotics a moment ago.

His friend, equally stocky though hanging back in the shadows, is not far off.

Chubby starts walking towards me too quickly as I near the gas pumps.

“What’s in your backpack?” says Chubby.

“Nothing.”

“No, what’s in it?” Chubby says, moving into my personal space with a quickening stride.

“What the hell?” I say, thinking for a moment that I had left the house after dark without a knife. Doing so was foolish, though I have never had occasion to draw my blade in the past.

Chubby grabs me, throws me up against the gas pump. My face hits it with a satisfying “thud”.

I spin around and Chubby is putting up his dukes like he anticipates a brawl. There are two problems with this: (a) I am not going to get into a fight with a guy who is twice my size over my own property and (b) I know that his buddy isn’t far off.

I waste a moment turning to look at the entrance to the 7-11. This is exactly one moment too long. Chubby’s buddy charges from the shadows and pushes me to the ground while clutching at my backpack.

(What Chubby and his buddy do not understand is that I’ve got some expensive electronics in my bag, in addition to the beer, and there is a great deal of sentimental value attached to them - not to mention confidential business data. I would fight to the death for the contents of my backpack or my wallet, and this is why I will ensure that lethal force accompanies me wherever I go in the future)

I hit the ground hard. My right arm is still a throbbing mess, though none of the asphalt (thankfully) managed to embed itself in my flesh as it will tend to do.

Regaining a sprinter’s position, I made it back to the store.

I am not embarrassed to admit that I ran from a situation that was heavily stacked against me, though I am still shaking with shock, anger, and the “would-have-been” moments that accompany my recollection. These drunk fuckers would be bleeding and/or dead right now if I had maintained my personal security policy.

Back in the store, I see the assailants flee across the street while the store clerk asks me what happened.

I briefly relay that “those guys in the parking lot tried to jump me”.

“What the hell?” he says (and I make a note to tell him that that is exactly what I said). “I can’t call the cops, I didn’t see it happen and it wasn’t here in the store.”

“But I can call the cops…” I say, though at this point I really don’t want to be talking to cops - I just want to be “safe” (whatever that means - I’m not feeling like my present accommodations are exactly secure at the moment).

The clerk tells me that I’m cool to stick around the store for a while, and that I should call a taxi.

I hang out for a while.

The clerk and I go out for a smoke. He attempts to school me on self-defense, at which point I remind him that I’m slightly inebriated and I’m much smaller than either of the guys who attacked me (one guy, I would’ve taken my chances - two big guys is a little much).

After staring off in the direction that the attackers fled for a minute or two, I elect to get home under my own power. Quickly.

By the time I am home, my right arm is more-or-less immobilized with pain, my knees are jelly, and I’m feeling what some might call an “adrenaline rush”.

So, tonight, I talked to a real-live operator. She wasn’t especially articulate, but she did get the police the correct information, because I got to talk to them as well.

This is the first time I have been properly jumped.

I have been held up at gunpoint, but that precludes being thrown about (it’s all about the gun, especially if you haven’t got one) and rarely ends badly if you surrender your dinero muy rapido.

To Chubby and pals: I am thinking about carrying around some Abrin or Ricin, now. Just for you. (and possibly to make a buck or two)

I’ll sell it to you as “yeah-o”.

Bitches.

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For I am The Operator, your Operator, a kind Operator, a spiteful and a jealous Operator…

… an Operator who is not a cheesy web search directory, nor another cheesy web search directory, nor a redirect to an incomplete biking, hiking, and geocaching resource.

You will probably also notice that this is “Operator Speaking” and not “Operator Singing” - I am very displeased to find that a poseur metal band will likely be competing with me in my quest to become the one-and-only Operator of the internet.

There can be only one.

Let’s examine this up-and-coming Warner Brothers act while it is still in its larval stage, shall we?

In all fairness, I was hopeful that I’d have something good to listen to. I gave Operator a chance… and they failed at music on so many levels, I had to begin hating them 30 seconds into their debut single “Soulcrusher”.

First and foremost, consider the act’s domain - OperatorMusic.com (registered 2006-03-01). Clever, no? No doubt they queried Operator.com and found that owning such “prime web real estate” would cost more than the band could hope to make on five platinum records. (For the record, Operator-Speaking.com was registered 2005-10-11)

Left with a $10 domain, they had some money to spend on their Public Image, tattoos, and album art (I would guess that they also spent some money on new instruments, though you would not guess it if you heard them play).

The Band

Operator bleeds machismo, angst, and testosterone-laced sweat - just what the Warner Brothers focus group wanted!

But don’t take my word for it - visit OperatorMusic.com and take a listen, or join me in spamming their MySpace page with comments regarding Johnny Strong (AKA Beefy Tattooed-McBeef) and his homoerotic appeal.

… or take a gander at the beef-machine’s Ultimate Training workout …

Posted in Rants, Site | No Comments »

A wise piece of general internet etiquette reads: “Do not feed the trolls.” One would do well to remember this…

… but what of the petty, manipulative people you meet in your everyday existence? What of the pathological liars, the drama queens, the shifty gossips, and the parasitic leeches who pass themselves off as salesmen?

I do not know the solution - how they may somehow help themselves - but I can say with absolute authority on this matter, to those affected by manipulative people: get them out of your life.

I was looking for a way to segue into an exposition on predatory sales and marketing tactics after reading What I Learned Buying a Rug in Turkey (still working on Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior - a book which categorizes emotional loopholes which rob people of rational thinking).

So, to preface the following, I present the lessons from the Turkish Rug Merchant (these guidelines are textbook-grade material for the manipulatively-minded):

• Reciprocation: we try to repay what another person has provided us
• Commitment and consistency: we desire to be consistent with what we have already done
• Social proof: we tend to rely on what other people are doing to determine our own actions
• Liking: we tend to go along with and follow people we like
• Authority: we feel a sense of duty to follow someone who has authority
• Scarcity: opportunities seem more valuable to us when their availability is limited

- Mitchell Weisburgh of PILOTed

Now, to the grist of the post…

Protecting the Guilty: The following text message conversation is provided with one omission. A name has been removed. If you were a party to this conversation, you can rest assured that no one else knows exactly who you are.

… but the clever ones may very well make educated guesses.

Background: Unnamed works in sales. (Or did, last time I checked)

Unnamed has been romantically involved with several people with whom I have had long acquaintance. For my part, I tried to be tolerant. I have had multiple discussions with those of my acquaintance regarding the negative influence Unnamed had upon their lives, especially following Unnamed’s “desperate cry for help”.

The event in question happened loudly, aggressively, and in perfect synchronization with Unnamed’s then-ex-boyfriend’s attempts at dating others. Apparently, Unnamed wanted him for her company still.

Unnamed’s ploy effectively brought her then-ex-boyfriend back to her side… it was clever enough, but we all know that one who truly intends to die does not call others to say “I’m going to kill myself now” before unleashing razors and pills.

Unnamed has gone on to interfere in my own romantic relationships, when she decided she would be “best friends” with my girlfriend at the time. The sheer volume of “let’s be friends” messages and calls seemed disproportionate, given that Unnamed had never spent much time getting to know her.

I knew this was coming sooner or later, I just did not expect it to be so virulent…

Unnamed is a reasonably attractive woman (though, borrowing from Frank Zappa, “What’s the ugliest part of your body?“).

Her “damsel in distress” ambush would work on most any male who did not have some concept of her past exploits and the damage she has wrought in others’ lives… and she knows this. This act was her trump card.

Unnamed and those like her are gangrenous limbs: they must be amputated from society before they infect others.

Deal with the manipulative people in your life. Dispense with the bad blood in your family, the ones who use their filial ties as part of a guilt trip. Create as much physical space as possible (you know, before the Earth’s curvature works to your disadvantage and you start getting closer again). Leave no forwarding address. Change your phone number. I know I will.

Any manipulator who has his or her act together has a good shot at politics, and it is likely that people whose moral compass is skewed in the way Unnamed demonstrates are already running this show.

Manipulative people have taken the time and effort to learn how to deal with those around them. Learn to recognize manipulation and defend yourself.

Posted in Journal, Rants | 1 Comment »

I am the Operator, and I approve of this message.

I realize that most of the material posted in recent memory is comical - otherwise it would be bleak.

Posted in Comical | No Comments »

Truth in advertising.

So, do you? I know I do, now.

Posted in Comical | No Comments »

In a departure from the usual questionably-related material, I would like to direct your attention to BoxHead Games, a place to practice zombie elimination in a virtual environment.

You never know when you will need the skills developed by spending hours eliminating virtual zombies.

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After entirely too much time spent reading and worrying about the likes of phylum platyhelminthes and phylum nematoda, and phylum apicomplexa, I have begun making comparisons between the natural world (in which parasites often thrive) and the abstract man-made realms which have yet to enumerate or adequately model evolved organisms (which is not to say that there are not already analogous slimy things which thrive).

I have encountered a constant stream of tangential ideas while studying these parasites (particularly parasitic worms), and I doubt that I will cover them all in this post.

My sincere thanks to Ovamed for adding unforeseen complexity to this issue by offering “mastery over parasitism”. Snopes remains ever doubtful, though it seems no surprise that the specious history of tapeworms as a patent medicine trend should re-emerge into the Zeitgeist as a pharma product.

The parasite’s infection vectors are many, though each species is confined to a seemingly-delicate lifecycle which requires multiple hosts to infect. Hardly delicate, though. This is a numbers game. The number of hosts which may be infected notwithstanding, the species requires only one successful gestation cycle to multiply its numbers dramatically.

The parasite’s infection/attack vector is often the path of least resistance. Being eaten allows immediate access to the host and the host’s ever-so-palatable internals, a remarkable (if oftentimes microscopic) Trojan Horse. Many species appear to use the host as both feeding and breeding ground, paralleling the activity of a viral agent, siphoning off the host’s resources to reproduce.

Interestingly enough, the parasite is often taking advantage of its host’s evolutionary advantage to further its own ends - upon being eaten, the parasitic organism awaits the consumption of its host to climb up a rung on the food chain, as is notably observed in the Taenia solium and Echinococcus granulosus species.

There is apparently no controversy over whether the protozoan Toxoplasma gondii actually influences its hosts to expose them to greater likelihood of being eaten.

T. gondii infections have the ability to change the behavior of rats and mice, making them drawn to rather than fearful of the scent of cats. This effect is advantageous to the parasite, which will be able to sexually reproduce if its host is eaten by a cat. The infection is almost surgical in its precision, as it does not affect a rat’s other fears such as the fear of open spaces or of unfamiliar smelling food. There has been speculation that human behavior may also be affected in some ways, and correlations have been found between latent Toxoplasma infections and various characteristics such as decreased novelty-seeking behavior, slower reactions, feelings of insecurity, and neuroticism.

Whether or not parasitic infections play any interesting cat-and-mouse games with human hosts remains a matter of conjecture and study. I would not be surprised if this influence is far more common than present science can readily understand.

Whether or not parasitic infections play the immune system of the host against each other … I expect that this behavior would be the logical result of evolutionary war games.

Groups of people are particularly vulnerable to parasitic behavior. Consider those who, lacking any impairment, beg for money by feigning disability.

Richard Dawkins posited that ideas replicate in a manner not unlike genetic material. The dissemination of propaganda (and the effectiveness of propaganda saturation on many individuals) has grown as propaganda has disguised itself with increasing effectiveness to mimic the face value and usefulness of factual information. (Consider the manipulation of the host species by Toxoplasma gondii)

How many opinions do we hold which have no value to ourselves? Were these opinions spread for the purpose of enriching others?

Does it not benefit the industry which sells food if each consumer carries a small cache of tapeworms?

This topic has certainly captured my interest … there will doubtless be more of this parasite drivel later.

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Hello. I am the Operator, and I approve of this message.

Pendulum is my new favorite musical act.

Posted in Comical, Miscellaneous | No Comments »

There has never been a better time to be a person. The bright minds and busy hands behind technology will never cease to bring us edifying new inventions perfectly-suited to the purpose of spreading love and joy.

In an era when the only way to cow terr’rists is by being the biggest, meanest, bomb-droppingest terr’rist on the block, I bring you: The WASP Tactical Knife.

Today our soldiers face many new challenges and to overcome those challenges they deserve the most advanced equipment that is available to them. A simple knife is OK to have, but when it comes down to the last line of defense you want to be carrying something that will get the job done.

Yes, soldiers - if the tons of explosives you dropped from the sky didn’t kill everyone quite as well as you’d planned, you can pick up a knife which injects lethally-cold gas and stab those bombed-out civilians until they accept the freedom which you have so magnanimously brought to their hovels.

In other news, a thug in London decides to spend a few hundred pounds on his new weapon of choice.

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