Just humming, sitting pretty in the wind, marking time and traffic.  No cops, no signs, no  (holyshitwhatisthat.  It looks 50 feet tall from here and bright as hell.  That's no fume burner, that's got to be a real fire.  Should I pull over and call 911?  It's so dark and that flame is lighting up the whole Santa Clarita Valley, there's no way five people haven't reported it yet.) Back to the road and the headlights.  I wonder if that's a real fire.  I wonder.  But I don't really care.

*slam* where do you think you're going, just where, huh?  Ten-thirty.  Check your watch, get up, go, get out of here, get down on that throttle and up to speed.  There's the cops and signs! And railroad tracks, and taillights, and civilization!

"In downtown Mexico City thousands of hipsters in floppy straw hats and long-lapeled jackets over bare chests padded along the main drag, some of them selling crucifixes and weed in the alleys, some of them kneeling in beat chapels next to Mexican burlesque shows in sheds..."

- Jack Kerouac, On the Road

Travel is like a fantasy, an empty, sometimes immoral but endlessly attractive dream?  Like small children we are drawn to it, not in malice but in curiosity because moving objects fascinate us and the sun lights the landscape in bold colors.  There is always something new to see and always something to ward off boredom, whether one sleepily realizes it or not.  The simplicity of life and its weaknesses and appetites, endless appetites are most easily found on the road.  

There is a book written about this and it is called "On the Road" by Jack Kerouac.  I'm going to go finish reading it.  It's awesome.

alone.  I'm the only one awake in the house.  Boyer's asleep in his own bed in his own room in his parents house.  Mr and Mrs have left for midnight mass, and I am left with the hum of the fridg, the gentle breeze from the ceiling fan, and the incessant whine of John's fricking computer fan. *unplug*

silence.

it's good for the psyche.

I distract myself cheerfully by conjuring memories of stained gray lit plastic snowmen, caved-in Santas and rags of lights drooping toothily from eaves.  The fog in the Central Valley blankets all in a cold damp embrace.  Another puke-brown California Christmas.  I'm trying to think of an appropriate quote from Southpark to insert here, but maybe Kakashi can supply me with the proper quote.  No, in fact I'm sure he can.  Something which mocks the phrase "puke-brown".

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night.

Emptiness means safety...

Twin orange ticked dials peer up at me from underneath water drops...the blue dot signifying "brights" casts a magenta aura from the windshield over everything.  As long as there is room to disappear, there is a place to hide.

two lines painted down the middle /

of the county road /

disappears like an old time riddle /

the black damp curtain of the night air washes up over my exposed neck and up my pants legs. I shiver in the cold underneath my stuffed clothing. The left side blinker wakes up.  blink. blink. blink.  No traffic in either direction.   No life, only silence and rain....the air smells of mud and damp sage.

would you pass the guitar around /

glare black twists around the naked white cliff as I let go the clutch.  The reflection of my approaching headlights shimmers a path straight into the rocks.  Swing it, swing the path towards that emptiness alongside the cliff...emptiness is good, it means safety.  If you can't see where you're going, you'll be all right.   The time to start worrying is when your future is staring you in your face like that granite friggin' cliff.

she took the girl left the cradle /

coffee spilled on the kitchen table /

it's been a long day.  Long, frustrated, ill and cold.  Forget it, leave me my wet road home and pocket full of bills and head full of nonsense, it's better that way....

(lyrics by Nancy Griffith, "Other Voices Other Rooms")

Illuminati Aptera. 340 mpg, expected cost $26,000. Hybrid powertrain, and two seats.

But I love the way it looks. Perhaps this car will do for the green car industry what Cirrus did for the aviation industry back in the late nineties. It has a striking resemblance to the Cirrus SR20, the light airplane that revitalized the dormant general aviation industry in 1998:

Cirrus still builds SR20's up in Duluth, MN and is working on a single-engine personal jet:


Pretty.

"Your blood-alchohol level is definitely over the limit.  You're not fit to drive, let alone write."

"What are you talking about?  I'm not drunk; I'm just a little tired.  Can't you tell a tired man from a drunk one?"  

Oh, I didn't know there was a difference. Sorry. I swing around the chair and face the opposite wall.  The computer screen glows purple on half the face I see reflected in the window glass.  The other half isn't there. I'm not drunk.  It's obvious.  I'm delirious.  Or something stupid like that.

The rain continues to fall outside the window, raindrops streaking the glass, slithering down where half the face should be.  The purple glows in the silence.  Somewhere in the background a quavering woman's voice echoes, singing, singing of a painful night behind the wheel, painful tears where happiness should have been found in the darkness and rain next to the freeway.

It's her own damn fault for not staying where she was and waiting patiently.  Screw her.  I turn back to the purple screen and alt-q.  The silence becomes deafening.  I get up from the desk chair, walk to the black window and peer out into the sheet of falling rain.  Take a deep breath.  Remember not to be foolish.  For the present is where reality lies, not in the past, no matter how vividly the past may be brought to life.  Those memories belonged to those times, were relevant to those times only, must not be dredged up from a contented grave...must not....they turn evil and consume all....

Peace and quite reigns in the grounds crew office as the entire crew is off taking finals and getting ready to leave for Christmas break.

I have a few minor chores to perform, four plant lists to finalize, an archive of plans to make.

The BMW dilemma is on the back burner for now. The owner is not in a rush to get rid of it. I'm thinking my original idea of starting out on Suzi was merited. If vehicles and the rebuilding thereof is to be part of my life, experience gained in working on a motorcycle first will be more rewarding than working on a car first.

Okay, so that differentiation stuff.

"According as the content of the notion or conception of God or consciousness is determined, so too is the attitude of the subject to him; or to put it otherwise so too is self consciousness in worship determined...."

"It was therefore a one-sided view if the natural theology of former times looked upon God as object of consciousness only...it could never in reality get beyond the idea of an essence. It was inconsistent, for if actually carried out it must have led to the other, the subjective side, that of self consciousness."

A notion defined by man determines an attitude of man; if self consciousness in worship is ignored, then does God become subjective. I'm not quite following this twist. Is it that familiarity breeds contempt; lack of respect for the notion of God leads man (who originates the conception) back to himself since lack of respect by defintion lowers the object to the same level (or lower) as oneself? Or is it simply that the presence of God as a concept (essence) only leads man who seeks to worship him back to himself (who originates the conception). Perhaps these two are not fundamentally different views.

"It is just as one sided to concieve of religion as something subjective only, thus in fact making the subjective aspect the only one. So regarded worship is absolutely sterile and empty; it's action is a movement which makes no advance, it's attitude toward God a relation to nullity, an aiming at nothing."

Reverse extrapolation from this paragraph can help me with the previous one. Advance (progress forward from one extreme to another) and relation (the being or state of advancing) are integral parts of cultus, then. So if God exists as essence, there can be no relation since 'essence' (object) is an extreme of a different kind from 'man' (subject). Advance from one to the next is then also impossible since comparison of two extremes varying in kind is impossible (apples and oranges). But I'm not sure that this is exactly what Hegel wishes to conclude in the first paragraph. There IS a Cartesian move taking place in here somewhere; I sense it.

So I have the opportunity to buy a 1976 BMW 2002 for cheap.

But my finances are such right now that I'd have to sell Suzi to do it.

They'd be about equally expensive to, ehem, fix up. Suzi would be a couple hundred cheaper, I'm guessing.

I'm not sure if I'm quite ready to own a four-wheeled vehicle again.

Not sure. But I must admit to myself that over the last couple of months I would not have been able to do without my roommate's car. A 3-drawer plastic cabinet simply cannot be strapped to a motorcycle. On the other hand I'm not buying 3-drawer plastic cabinets all the time. Additionally, Suzi costs me nothing to keep (insurance $23 a year), whereas this car would cost insurance just sitting there. I can begin work on her whenenver I have the money. On the other hand a car would be nice in the rain. On the other hand I harbor dreams of riding an old motorcycle across the country. On the other hand I could just as easily harbor dreams of riding an old BMW car across country - OH and it would SAVE ME MONEY ON MOTELS because I could SLEEP IN IT!!! On the other hand, cars are by definition bottomless pits of money, on the other hand motorcycles are only half of bottomless pits of money. Cars have an electrical system. BMW's have a crappy electrical system. Oh wait, Suzuki used Lucas electronics on its motorbikes so Suzi has an even worse electrical system. On the other hand the BMW electrical system is bigger and more complicated. On the other hand...oh help.

*pain and agony*

Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion

G.W.F. Hegel

What object we have before us in the philosophy of religion

I. The relation of the philosophy of religion to its presuppositions and to the principles of the time
1) The severance of religion from the free worldly consciousness
2) The position of the Philosophy of Religion relative to Philosophy and to Religion
a. The attitude of philosophy to religion generally
b. The relation of the philosophy of religion to the system of philosophy
c. The relation of the philosophy of religion to positive religion.
d. The relation of the Philosophy of Religion to the Current Principles of the Religious Consciousness
e. Philosophy and the Prevalent Indifference to Definite Dogmas
f. The Historical Treatment of Dogmas
g. Philosophy and Immediate Knowledge

3) Preliminary Questions
4) Division of the Subject
a. The General Notion or Conception of Religion
b. The Moment of Universality
c. The Moment of Particularity, or the Sphere of Differentiation
d. The annulling of the Differentiation, or Worship
e. Of Judgment, or Definite Religion
f. Revealed Religion

No, I'm not crazy. I really want to know what he thinks. I really care. Hegel is key. Without Hegel I will never attain the basic understanding of modern theology that I seek.

So prepare yourselves for a drier, healthier, less practical more theoretical more philosophical bent to this journal. The imagination has been joined by the mind. (It's about damn time, really.)

Further discussion on the Annulling of the Differentiation to come. I need to work this out.

"son of a BITCH!"

- Jack Bauer