…but which is whom?

Crazy for you – here’s the scan to prove it: “Many neuroscientists warn that brain imaging technology cannot read people’s minds and that something as complicated as love transcends simple computer graphics.”

Writing in The Journal of Neurophysiology, the scientists from New York and New Jersey said romance was closer in its neural profile to drives such as hunger, thirst or drug craving than to excitement or affection.

However, as a relationship deepens, the neural activity alters slightly, and in some cases primes those areas involved in long-term attachment.

The research helps explain why love can make someone feel euphoria one minute then anger and anxiety the next, or prompt out-of-character behaviour, such as compulsive phone calling, serenades and yelling from the roof.

It also helps explain why someone can contemplate stalking, murder or suicide when they are rejected by their lover.

See also: my previous thoughts (if not posts — too lazy to see if I wrote all this down online or off) on addiction to the new parts of relationships.

Although this does present me with two interesting thoughts. Yes, simultaneously. One in the left hemisphere, one in the right, if yo umust know…

one: I wonder if it might prove that people who carry out actions like suicide, stalking, etc., might be more prone to addictions like drinking, smoking, etc…

two: fuck. I went off in search of more information and forgot what thought two was. So create your own, think it, ponder it, dwell on it for a while.

Then read more here.

Everyone should do a thorough cleaning of their PC every six months or so.

It’s been two years for me. I know… shame, shame, no biscuit.

But two years is over. All done. Reformatted, reinstalled, stripped down to the core again.

My computer is happy and faster already.

Now, if I could just reformat my brain to rid myself of the memory of five minutes of KEPT. Jerry Hall looking for a boytoy.

I take back everything I ever said about wanting a sugarmama. No more. Nope.

Ick.

Ah, Kurtz…

The Force is a Tool of Satan – Episode III ALERT!: “In this �Final Episode� of the Star Wars, EVIL triumphs using the Force – a greater force they claim than God! This is a Dangerous LIE! This is no mindless entertainment, but an attempt by DEMONS to distract you from your real 75 year mission on planet Earth, to give yourself to Jesus! Do not trust a Yodah puppet from Satan�s dream factory, trust in the Word of the Bible!”

Visible Human Browser

…still, I’d like to suggest, as a starting point of civility, a few pointers for participants in the O.S. war. Consider it one man’s version of, “Can’t we all just get along?”

1. Hate something for its failings, not for its success.
It’s totally fine to criticize something because of its flaws–to hate Windows because it’s bloated and cryptic, for example, or the iPod because it’s too easily scratched.
But condemning something just because it’s the dominant product is just sour grapes. Arguments along the lines of “I hate Bill Gates because he’s rich” or “I hate the iPod because everyone has one” add nothing to the dialogue.

2. No condemning something until you’ve tried it.
If everyone abided by this idea, about 95 percent of all the Windows- Macintosh diatribes would evaporate overnight.
But here it is: If you haven’t tried something, then you really have no basis to comment.

3. Execution matters.
I’m so tired of reading discussions like this:
Person A: “I love Mac OS X Tiger! That Spotlight thing is so cool:
press a keystroke, type a few letters, and get an instantaneous listing every file, folder and program containing that text.”

Person B: “You pathetic loser! It’s called hard-drive indexing, and Windows XP has had it from Day One.”
Of course, the truth is that Windows Indexing Service is to Spotlight as Thomas the Tank Engine is to a bullet train. In Indexing Service, you can’t search with a single keystroke, the speed is nothing like Spotlight’s, you can’t search for metadata (115 kinds of secondary information, like music genre, Photoshop layer names, camera settings in digital photos, etc.), the index isn’t updated in real time as you create or delete documents, and so on.

It goes the other way, too. “I love how Windows XP lets me delete or rename files right in the Open or Save dialog boxes.”

“What’s the big deal? On the Mac, we just switch to the desktop and delete or rename things there.”

Sorry, but that’s just not as good as being able to do it within the dialog boxes.

The bottom line: How well something works and how elegantly it’s been built is also relevant to the “which is better” discussion.

4. Don’t make grandiose purchasing plans by guessing on technology’s future.

This pointer is directed exclusively at Mac-bashers, particularly the ones on the nation’s boards of education.
If you decide to standardize on Windows across all schools, fine. But make sure you have legitimate reasons like economics or the need to run some Windows-only software suite.

“We want the kids to learn what they’ll one day use in the business world,” however, is NOT a good reason. If you think you know what anyone will be using in 2020 (when today’s first graders will graduate from college), you must have a heck of a magical crystal ball.

Truth is, by 2020, no operating system will look anything like it does today. By 2020, we may well be using holography or tablets or glorified cellphones instead of computers. Claiming to know what company’s operating system today’s kids will be using when they graduate college, or how that software will work, is nonsense.

5. Consider that they may have a point.
Neither side’s members should be allowed to cover their ears and sing “Blah blah blah!” at the top of their lungs when they hear an argument that could rock their worldview. As long as the points are factual, fair and substantive, you should consider them.

Remember: Apple and Microsoft routinely play O.S. leapfrog and regularly adopt each other’s feature ideas; eventually, aficionados in both camps will enjoy similar enhancements to the computing experience. As we carry on the never-ending debate, try to generate more light and less heat. Only then can we discover what aspects of system software are truly valuable, and thereby usher them into existence for everyone to enjoy.

[more here]

This is our last goodbye
I hate to feel the love between us die
But it’s over
Just hear this and then I’ll go :
you gave me more to live for,
more than you’ll ever know.

This is our last embrace,
must I dream and always see your face
Why can’t we overcome this wall
Baby, maybe it is just because I didn’t know you at all.

Kiss me, please,
Kiss me
But kiss me out of desire, babe, and not consolation
You know,
it makes me so angry ’cause I know that in time
I’ll only make you cry, this is our last goodbye.

Did you say “no, this can’t happen to me,”
and did you rush to the phone to call?
Was there a voice unkind in the back of your mind saying,
“maybe… you didn’t know him at all.”

Well, the bells out in the church tower chime
Burning clues into this heart of mine
Thinking so hard on her soft eyes and the memory
Of her sighs that, “it’s over… it’s over…”

(Jeff Buckley, LAST GOODBYE)

A while back — a long while back — I was introduced to various bits of ambient music: Harold Budd, Brian Eno, etc. Daniel’s doing.

Over the years, I’ve found bits and pieces here and there. Some Daniel Lanois, some random pieces from soundtracks. But the stuff that I really fall into is non-commercially viable. Not nearly enough people drive around at sunset and turn their stereos up to illegal volumes with wandering indie-film noodling in the CD player.

Go find either disc by Aurore Rien — TELESTHESIA or SEDATIVE FRO THE CELESTIAL BLUE. Follow with a healthy dose of Mono’s WALKING CLOUDS AND DEEP RED SKY, FLAG FLUTTERED AND THE SUN SHINED. Cap it off with TELEGRAPHS IN NEGATIVE – MOUTHS TRAPPED IN STATIC by Set Fire To Flames.

Enhance with a lovely 20 mg (adjust to taste) of your favorite pain killer.

If you haven’t imagined twenty perfect short films about nothing by the time you’re through, there’s no place for you on the festival circuit.

–

I think the best kind of history is that which is closed off to you. No going back. No fixing your wrongs. Point of no return. Death.

It’s certainly not the easiest history to deal with, to accept. It hurts like hell if it’s worth anything. You would give anything and everything to change things back to the way they were, to the way they could have been, to the way things should be.

But you can’t, and so you’re forced to learn. Two options: figure it out and don’t take that path again, should you be so lucky ever to have that option; or relive the pain, over and over.

Roll that rock, Sisyphus.

–

If the joys of the world don’t inspire you to move forward and reach out with everything you possess to gain what you desire, then you have no business ever having anything at all.

The only option for those who refuse to live is death — and what a waste is that?

Sometimes divining purpose and meaning is purpose and meaning enough, n’est ce pas?