Thursday - 01.09.03

12:30 AM -

....just got off the phone with david. he called to thank us for a christmas gift that kris and i sent him and anh.

i forgot how energizing it is to talk with him. i've been working on stuff for the nohtv site again, and it was a strange coincidence for him to call me....literally while i'm rolling site ideas through my head.

i can honestly say that i'm more commited now to redo/renew nohtv more than i have at any other point in the last couple of years.....

now that i've settled in some with my new 'career', and i've been getting creative urges again, i'm feeling more optimistic about it than i thought i ever would again.......

of course, this posting could just come back to haunt me later........

ron

10:00 PM -

SPACE SH*T!

i was 'dumpster diving' on ebay, and came upon this fine gem of an item:

Fecal Bag

On Apollo flights, fecal matter was sealed in a Fecal Bag with a liquid germicide and sealed again in an outer bag. This solid waste was then placed into a Sanitation Box built into the spacecraft. The design of the Apollo fecal bag was the same as the Gemini bag, and although Apollo XVI did try a different version of the bag, its efficiency was seen as being the same as the older style bags.

This fecal bag is marked as follows: By Dialectrix Corp. For Fairchild, Republic OW/WMS Collection Unit PN 115D402104-101 Rev f S.N. C.H. 1848 Date 10-72 "Cleaned for Fairchild Industries" Specification No. MS115S0011

This is an unused bag in original wrapper. The carbon in the filter has begun to break down; overall, in terrific condition.

the original auction can be found here.

ron

07:20 PM -

did i mention that the british are f*cked?

you see, they're the home of cheese racing.

yup....you read that right.....CHEESE RACING.

some limey heroin addict with nothing better to do but play with velveeta and fire learned that if you throw the wrapped cheese on a grill, the plastic won't melt but the cheese will bubble. this causes the plastic 'bubble' to inflate.

'wow', they thought, 'wait till i show my friends next time they stagger over, desperate for a hit'.

just when i thought the american culture couldn't look sillier......oh.....wait......we still look sillier........

ron

03:17 PM - I thought I would test out the emailing feature of blog from my work machine to make sure it's working...... it won't load until later tonight, but i wanted to see what it looks like..... ron

11:09 PM -

so tonight's experiment has been a success.....and quite an enlightening one at that......

i'll do a little more finagling over the next couple of days to try to get everything set up for 'anytime posting'.

maybe i'll even get a few friends in on it to help add some 'real' entertaining content.......

goodnight for now....

ron

11:06 PM -

10:54 PM -

10:22 PM - trying again in "client" mode......

09:38 PM -

well, the previous message got here ok. i guess blog's dial-up ability is working........gonna play some more with it now.....

ron

09:28 PM -

trying out blog's ability to log on to post message.......hope this works....

ron

08:45 PM -

well......so far so good. the posts have uploaded ok.

now to learn what this thing is capable of........

ron

08:41 PM -

today i download the new(est) version of blog (7.0). there seems to be all kinds of bells and whistles attached to it, so i felt that i had to give it a try.

i just hope that i'm not going to lose what i've done so far in the process of using 7.0

ron

10:14 PM -

have you ever heard a child scream?

I don't mean an "i want that toy" scream, or a "give me ice cream" scream......not even a scream brought on by a swift smack to the ass.

i'm talking about the sound of a child whose having a tube stuck in their arm. and in this tube are a couple of wires that are being pushed up about a foot into their veins.......and the sound the kid makes is unlike anything i've ever heard in my life.

they're crying and begging and hacking and coughing and using every last bit of energy they have to push out the last bit of air from their lungs because the pain is unlike anything they (or most people) have ever experienced in their lives. and just when the last bit of air escapes their mouths, they sucking twice as much back in and starting up all over again......and you're wondering why they don't just pass out because you can't understand how they're able to handle the lack of oxygen on top of the ripping pain that's pushing further up into their arm.

and it isn't just a momentary thing. it isn't over after a minute or two. this can be a process involving almost a half-hour.....all the while, other parents must be wondering 'what are they DOING to that child!', or 'what if they do that to MY child'......and all you can do is bury yourself in paperwork, trying to ignore the screams that just continue on.

then work is over, and it's time to head home. you get on the shuttle, but the scream still echoes in your head. you hear some idle banter from a couple of middle aged trilobites, and you try to focus on that.....hoping that it will pull you away from the howls bouncing around in your brain.

you get to the train station.....the cry almost a distant memory.....when you hear a train come up the track. steel scrapes steel in a high pitched whirl of electric sparks, painful in it's familiarity. painful because it's of the same timbre. the same metallic taste and texture that you had been trying to spit out of your mouth. the taste that made you suck another cigarette, hoping to ease the memory and cover up the rusty taste that flowed over your tongue when you bit the inside of your mouth, wishing that it would take your mind off of the poor kid that wailed ceaselessly in your head.

but nothing works. all that eases the memory of sound is time.....and that only turns the volume down a little......

the other day I heard a child scream........