All Thoughts Being Equal

Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing My rating: 5 of 5 stars Shackleton's doomed voyage―an attempt to cross the Antarctic continent―pretty much can't be described in any other way than "incredible." The preface to the book tells us two remarkable facts: first, that what Shackleton and his expedition were attempting to do would not actually be accomplished until the 1950s, with the full gauntlet of modern machines and electric heat; and second, that no human being died or even suffered grievous physical injury over the course of the entire ordeal. Then we dive in to the narrative itself, and as soon as the Endurance becomes ironically trapped and crushed by ice floes, it's just one damn thing after another. Even having been assured by the preface that everyone survives, you swear up and down, even shout aloud, "No! Someone's going to die! Nobody can survive that!" Reading what the expeditionary force end...

or, Thoughts on a Libertarian Party Convention The Libertarian Party of Washington State (LP-WA) held their party convention in Bellingham this Saturday, 20 April 2013. On a lark—me being a fan of liberty and the event being free if you didn't want food—I decided to go. An afternoon of short speaker presentations followed. This being an event by libertarians, for libertarians, I was treated to a collection of mostly-similar messages; nevertheless, I was intrigued by the nuanced differences embedded in that homogeneity.

It may or may not be a secret that I am a huge fan of the mythos of H.P. Lovecraft, and the other writers of pulp fiction who knew him. In contrast to more modern creators of horror, who legitimately frighten with in-your-face monsters and death (but not too obvious)—I'm thinking of the movie The Descent along with Stephen King's 'Salem's Lot , very much inspired by Lovecraft actually—Lovecraft's "cosmic horror" conveys that sense of bleakness in the face of a universe that very much does not give a fuck about you. The realization that mankind's petty notions of morality, our flimsy models and scientific pretexts, all fail to grasp the true unwavering indifference of the rest of reality... that's a pretty weird feeling. And while I don't accept Lovecraft's philosophy that the universe is ultimately unknowable—science marches on!—it's easy to see the creeping horror of just how much of the universe is hostile to human life, or barely co...

After attending a highly entertaining and informative debate between the candidates for President of the Associated Students of Western Washington University, I can say that I will gladly and enthusiastically vote in the elections next week. That might seem a little weird. But the thing is, last year I didn't have the first clue about any of the candidates running for either President or VP. Except the incumbents, maybe. But I felt that voting on an incumbent, knowing nothing about their goals for the coming year, their accomplishments in the previous year, or even their eligibility compared to a challenger, would be an irresponsible waste of my vote. So I didn't vote. This year will be different. The debate was lively and extremely well-moderated. Everything ran quite smoothly; if two soft chimes don't count, nobody went into overtime with long-winded exhortations. The moderators' questions were direct (literally), pointed, and very often loaded. It was great to...

So I gave a rather glowing review of True Grit in my last post , and in fact I plan to see it for a third time in theaters up here in Bellingham. Needless to say, I liked that movie. So why, on my second viewing, did I choose to see that over a second shot at TRON: Legacy (and even when the latter was offered in 3-D)?

The man (Dude?) has been rather prolific of late. I first saw him in Iron Man , where he played Obadiah “TONY STARK! BUILT THIS! IN A CAVE! WITH A BUNCH OF SCRAPS!” Stane, the bad bald guy who likes making money off of things that blow up. I have never, regrettably, seen The Big Lebowski , but that’s just a result of my slowness in watching Cohen brothers movies. (I watched No Country For Old Men only a couple weeks ago; it was excellent, excellent, excellent.) Okay, speaking of the Cohens, let’s start with the good news: True Grit . Again I have not had time to tap the source material(s), either the original movie or the original-original book, but I did watch my roommate play Red Dead Redemption so I feel qualified to judge this 2010 remake on its modern Old-West aesthetic.