Nerves in patterns on a screen

Of death and dying.

Sat, 27 Jan 2007 03:39:20 GMT

This journal is in its death throes. In fact, it's already dead. It's alive only long enough to let everyone know it's dying. seamusmuadhen is my new journal name. Look me up if you care to. It's friends only.

Tschuess!

-Nick Marshall

Ach! Deutsch! And doublespacing

Tue, 23 Jan 2007 22:07:37 GMT

Earlier today I had a nice long conversation with my Religious Studies Prof. In the course of the discussion he pointed me to a book called "The Manichaen Body: Ritual and blah blah blah". Of course, good old Herman B. Wells doesn't have it, but there is a free electronic copy which is accessible from all IU campuses; All campuses, that is, except IUB. So, I found the proto version of this book in dissertation form, and after wondering through the horribly confusing and labyrinthine sixth floor found it. And it is huge.

This thing is about half the size of the Oxford Latin Dictionary Second Edition. We're talking big. So, I crack it open (this is my first reading of a dissertation) and... IT'S ALL DOUBLE SPACE.

This immediately has me wondering... am I going to type my dissertation in double space? Oh, dear God. Not only does it look horribly unprofessional... it just seems false padding for the ego. No wonder Ph.D students are all hung up on how INCREDIBLY LOOOOONG their dissertation is. The things are double-spaced!

I'm quite proud of this poem I wrote in the last hour or so.

Sun, 21 Jan 2007 04:56:18 GMT

“Of Oillipheist and Rourke”

Stumbling he played his song,
The land in erstwhile green,
And presently he came along
A sleeping beast whose teeth were keen

But foolishly he car’ed not,
as one who trods upon the sod.
Inspiring all who heard his tune
As though I t’were the word of God.

But Satan lays his traps and snares
He slithered quick and with great haste
He slashed the monster with his claws
He slashed and sent the Oillipheist*

Pained by his master’s whip
The serpent-thing roared with rage
And fixed blood eyes upon the man
And fixed his glare upon the page

Believing him to be the source
Of his torment and his rage
Oillipheist devoured the man
Devoured the lad, the singing page

Within snake’s bowels it can get dark
And heaven’s light seems far away.
But such a lad heeds not the night
And in it’s gut, still he played.

For Olde Rourke,-
(This was the lad’s baptismal name),
Was not the type to quake with fear,
And in bars and taverns made he his fame.

And tasted he before his quest
Of that drink which many say
Is better than Egyptian ale
The Irishman’s usquebaugh

Loud he sang and louder crooned
And, wildly, shouted down the stars
He cried obscenities to the moon
And told the gods to kiss his arse.

Old Oillipheist was by this shocked
And turned toward me, narrator-friend,
And said, “I do believe this Irishman
Has offered heaven his rear-end!”

Now this proved too much for Old O,
A serpent bred in England’s land.
Obscenities with in his belly!
Why, for this outrage, he would not stand!

Annoyed more by common Irish talk
Than by old Nick in hell’s dark lair
Oillipheist vomited up Erse’s Son
Whose quick stride showed not a care

Moral:
When faced with demons large and small
An Irishman will have his say
Inspired by the water of life
His curses hold an Orphic sway.

Update

Sat, 20 Jan 2007 01:45:23 GMT

1) I have never felt that sick... EVER. Everytime I vomited, I felt like the gods were clutching at my stomach, fighting over who got to give me the cout de grace of all squeezes. A wonderful little love clutch at the gut.

1.5) My girlfriend can kick all y'all's girlfriends' asses.

2) Speaking of the gods, I'm petitioning them now. Please oh heavenly and infernal authorities and all semi-spiritual beings who happen to pick up on this signal... I need this job. I have to be a FIGs instructor. Not only will this provide an excellent resume building item, but it will also nice to have that $1,000 stipend on top of room and board. please please please please please.

3) Turns out I don't have colon cancer yet. Just hemorrhoids. And I'm not ashamed to write that on a public blog. I'm equally not ashamed to say that I had a digital examination (and to my surprise, that does not mean the doctor grades my computer programming homework). Every guy should have this done. Not because it feels great and makes you really self-confident, but because it could save your life. And I mean that very seriously.

4) ah well...

I'm not sure what to title this...

Mon, 01 Jan 2007 19:56:04 GMT

In fact I'm not really sure what to write. Maybe this can be considered my thoughts on the new year. But whether it t'were a new year or not, I would be feeling similar feelings to those I'm currently experiencing.

I've changed. Alot. I realize that and regardless of whatever I've met with in my studies of philosophy and religion, I must come back again and again to the simple fact that I exist. Regardless of change, there must be some core self. The cartesian cogito is not easily ignored.

This leads me again and again and again to the simple realization that I am entirely alone. That when it comes right down to it, everything can be taken away from me except my self. This is the one thing I can truly be said to possess. The rest I have accumulated to my person through theft, lies, and manipulation. Only my self has been acquired/received honestly.

And yet, I'm not ready to revert back to my ways of Ayn Randianism, for I believe in affection and love (even if it all is just an illusion). Illusions can sometimes become realities and in many respects, such matters are entirely personal and not open to the discourse of societal influence.

I have demarcated three perspectives on life and the self. All three seem equally likely even if they are incompatible with one another. All three are present in all religions.

1) We are one
2) We are many
3) We are none.

"Write, & find ecstasy in writing! Work, & be our bed in working! Thrill with the joy of life & death! Ah! thy death shall be lovely: whososeeth it shall be glad. Thy death shall be the seal of the promise of our age long love. Come! lift up thine heart & rejoice! We are one; we are none."
-Aleister Crowley/Aiwass, Liber Al Vel Legis II: 66

The concept of the many is disturbing to me, for it requires me to reevaluate my views on the Cartesian ego, on the notion of self-attainment in all things. How can someone fight my own battles for me? How can someone solve the issues that are pertinent to my own soul? How can Christ die for my sins?

Heaven is illogical, for it is a reward for belief. It is the reward of the weak, those who choose to stop fighting and just give up... let their older brother take the blame for them. How silly.

Hell is illogical for it is the punishment for the strong. Too often strength is equated with evil in both external and internal circumstances, but for what else may be said about the evil, let them never be called weak or inactive.

Taoism made sense at some point for it relies on the mystical equation of the universe to balance itself out (as all math problems ultimately do) but as I thought about it longer, I realized that no math problem balances itself...there must always be a mind contemplating the remarkable values of all this.

One must have Chaos within them to give birth to a dancing Star.

Journey continues, friends. Best of luck to us all in the sense that we are many, we are one, we are none.

Wed, 27 Dec 2006 17:30:48 GMT

The Universe of Magic is in the mind of a man: the setting
is but Illusion even to the thinker.

-The Equinox, Volume I, John St. John, Aleister Crowley

Just... amazing. A vampire president

Wed, 27 Dec 2006 04:32:36 GMT

http://www.freetimes.com/story/4510

Dissatisfaction with certain aspects of the O.T.O

Wed, 27 Dec 2006 02:13:27 GMT

More on Land
Just a few points:

1. Yes, we do accept donations of land.

2. Yes, we have accepted donations of land.
We own a piece of undevelopled property in Northern CA near the Oregon border now, and we are evaluating different alternatives to improve it.

3. Yes, we could refuse to accept a donation of land.
We would likely do this if the property were a hazardous waste dump, or a leaking, abandoned lead mine, or would otherwise have a net negative value.

4. Yes, we could accept a donation of land and turn around and sell it immediately.
We would likely do this if the property had no legal access, or if it were otherwise unuseable for any conceivable OTO-related purpose. We would not do this if the land could be put to good use by a local body and the members of that local body wanted to use it.

5. No, donating land will not automatically get you invited to the VII*. It would factor into the consideration, however.

6. No, donating land is not strictly a prerequisite for advancement to the VII*. Other kinds of significant material donations can be considered, and the donation provision can be deferred until later if an SGIG position needs to be filled.

7. No, we will not require a donor to set up a property management corporation before accepting a donation of land. We will set up the corporation.

from the blog of Sabazius (the only X degree member of the Ordo Templi Orientis in America.)

This sounds like selling spiritual information to me. (It would factor into the consideration, however?) WTF

Mon, 25 Dec 2006 23:25:17 GMT

I'm lonely.

mmm Yeats

Thu, 21 Dec 2006 02:25:53 GMT

Lapis Lazuli

by William Butler Yeats

I HAVE heard that hysterical women say
They are sick of the palette and fiddle-bow.
Of poets that are always gay,
For everybody knows or else should know
That if nothing drastic is done
Aeroplane and Zeppelin will come out.
Pitch like King Billy bomb-balls in
Until the town lie beaten flat.
All perform their tragic play,
There struts Hamlet, there is Lear,
That's Ophelia, that Cordelia;
Yet they, should the last scene be there,
The great stage curtain about to drop,
If worthy their prominent part in the play,
Do not break up their lines to weep.
They know that Hamlet and Lear are gay;
Gaiety transfiguring all that dread.
All men have aimed at, found and lost;
Black out; Heaven blazing into the head:
Tragedy wrought to its uttermost.
Though Hamlet rambles and Lear rages,
And all the drop-scenes drop at once
Upon a hundred thousand stages,
It cannot grow by an inch or an ounce.

On their own feet they came, or On shipboard,'
Camel-back; horse-back, ass-back, mule-back,
Old civilisations put to the sword.
Then they and their wisdom went to rack:
No handiwork of Callimachus,
Who handled marble as if it were bronze,
Made draperies that seemed to rise
When sea-wind swept the corner, stands;
His long lamp-chimney shaped like the stem
Of a slender palm, stood but a day;
All things fall and are built again,
And those that build them again are gay.

Two Chinamen, behind them a third,
Are carved in lapis lazuli,
Over them flies a long-legged bird,
A symbol of longevity;
The third, doubtless a serving-man,
Carries a musical instmment.
Every discoloration of the stone,
Every accidental crack or dent,
Seems a water-course or an avalanche,
Or lofty slope where it still snows
Though doubtless plum or cherry-branch
Sweetens the little half-way house
Those Chinamen climb towards, and I
Delight to imagine them seated there;
There, on the mountain and the sky,
On all the tragic scene they stare.
One asks for mournful melodies;
Accomplished fingers begin to play.
Their eyes mid many wrinkles, their eyes,
Their ancient, glittering eyes, are gay.

Lettrism

Tue, 19 Dec 2006 15:51:18 GMT

Excerpts from Introduction à une Nouvelle Poésie et une Nouvelle Musique. Paris: Gallimard, 1947.

MANIFESTO OF LETTERIST POETRY
A Commonplaces about Words

Pathetic I   	The flourishing of bursts of energy dies beyond us.
	      	All delirium is expansive.
    		All impulses escape stereotyping.
Still I  	An intimate experience maintains curious specifics.
Pathetic II  	Discharges are transmitted by notions.
       		What a difference between our fluctuations and the 
		brutality of words.
       		Transitions always arise between feeling and
		speech. 

Still II      	The word is the first stereotype.
Pathetic III  	What a difference between the organism and the sources. 
         	Notions - what an inherited dictionary.  Tarzan learns 
		in his father's book to call tigers cats.
       		Naming the Unknown by the Forever.
Still III     	The translated word does not express.
Pathetic IV   	The rigidity of forms impedes their transmission.
       		These words are so heavy that the flow fails to carry 
		them. Temperaments die before arriving at the goal 
		    (firing blanks). 
          	    No word is capable of carrying the impulses one
          	    wants to send with it.
Still IV     	WORDS       allow psychic alterations to disappear.
       		Speech      resists effervescence.
       		Notions     require expansion to equivalent formulas.
   WORDS                    Fracture our rhythm.
     by their               Assassinate sensitivity.
     mechanism,             Thoughtlessly uniform
     fossilization,         tortured inspiration.
     stability              Twist tensions.
     and aging              Reveal poetic exaltations as useless. 
                            Create politeness.
                            Invent diplomats.
                            Promote the use of analogies
                            Substitute for true emissions.
Pathetic V    	If one economizes on the riches of the soul, one dries 
		    up the left-over along with the  words.
Still V         Prevent the flow from molding itself on the cosmos.
       		Form species in sentiments.
     WORDS      Destroy sinuosities.
                Result from the need to determine things.
                Help the elderly remember by forcing the young to forget.
Pathetic VI     Every victory of the young has been a victory over words. 
        	Every victory over words has been a fresh, young victory.
Still VI        Summarize without knowing how to receive.
        	It is the tyranny of the simple over the long-winded.
     WORDS 	Discern too concretely to leave room for the mind.
        	Forget the true measures of expression: suggestions.
        	Let infrarealities disappear.
        	Sift without restoring.
Pathetic VII    One learns words as one learns good manners. 
        	Without words and manners it is impossible to appear in
		      society.
        	It is by making progress in words that one makes progress
                      socially. 
Still VII       Kill fleeting evocations.
        	Slow down short-cuts and approximations.
SPEECH  	Is always vice-versa for not being identical.
        	Eliminates solitary individuals who would like to
        	rejoin society.
        	Forces men who would like to say "Otherwise"
        	      to say "Thus."
        	Introduces stuttering.
Pathetic VIII 	The carpentry of the word built to last forever obliges men
         	      to construct according to patterns, like children.
        	There is no appreciation of value in a word.
Still VIII    	Words are the great levellers.
Pathetic IX     Notions limit opening onto depths by merely standing
         	      ajar.
Still IX 	Words are family garments.
        	Poets enlarge words every year.
        	Words already have been mended so much they are in stitches.
Pathetic X    	People think it is impossible to break words.
Still X  	Unique feelings are so unique that they can not be 
		      popularized. Feelings without words in the dictionary
                      disappear.
Pathetic XI     Every year thousands of feelings disappear for lack
                      of a concrete form.
Still XI 	Feelings demand living space.
        	How remarkable the poet's disheartened absorption in words. 
        	Things and nothings to communicate become daily more
		      imperious.
Pathetic XII    Efforts at destruction witness to the need to 
         	rebuild.
Still XII       How long will people hold out in the shrunken domain of
         	      words?
Pathetic XIII   The poet suffers indirectly:
                Words remain the work of the poet, his existence, his job.



B Innovation I 

Destruction of WORDS for LETTERS

ISIDORE ISOU    Believes in the potential elevation beyond WORDS; wants 
		  the development of transmissions where nothing is
                  lost in the process; offers a verb equal to a shock. By 
		  the overload of expansion the forms leap up by themselves.
ISIDORE ISOU    Begins the destruction of words for letters.
ISIDORE ISOU    Wants letters to pull in among themselves all desires.
ISIDORE ISOU    Makes people stop using foregone conclusions, words.
ISIDORE ISOU    Shows another way out between WORDS and RENUNCIATION:
                   LETTERS. He will create emotions against language, for the
                   pleasure of the tongue.
          	It consists of teaching that letters have a destination
		   other than words.
ISOU            Will unmake words into their letters.
                Each poet will integrate everything into Everything
                Everything must be revealed by letters.
POETRY CAN NO LONGER BE REMADE.

ISIDORE ISOU IS STARTING
     A NEW VEIN OF LYRICISM.
           Anyone who can not leave words behind can stay back with them!




C Innovation II: The Order of Letters 

This does not mean    destroying words for other words.
               	      Nor forging notions to specify their nuances.
                      Nor mixing terms to make them hold more meaning.
But it does mean      TAKING ALL LETTERS AS A WHOLE; UNFOLDING BEFORE DAZZLED
               		SPECTATORS MARVELS CREATED FROM LETTERS (DEBRIS FROM 
			THE DESTRUCTION);
               	      CREATING AN ARCHITECTURE OF LETTRIC RHYTHMS; 
		      ACCUMULATING FLUCTUATING LETTERS IN A PRECISE FRAME; 
		      ELABORATING SPLENDIDLY THE CUSTOMARY COOING; 
		      COAGULATING THE CRUMBS OF LETTERS FOR A REAL MEAL; 
		      RESUSCITATING THE JUMBLE IN A DENSER ORDER;
               	      MAKING UNDERSTANDABLE AND TANGIBLE THE INCOMPREHENSIBLE 
		        AND VAGUE; CONCRETIZING SILENCE;
                        WRITING THE NOTHINGNESS.
It is                 the role of the poet to advance toward subversive 
                      sources.
                      the obligation of the poet to advance in the black and 
		      burdened depths of the unknown.
                      the craft of the poet to open one more treasure-room 
		      door for the common man.
There will be a poet's message in new signs.  The ordering of letters is called:
            LETTERISM.
      It is not a poetic school, but a solitary attitude.
      AT THIS MOMENT: LETTERISM = ISIDORE ISOU.
      Isou is awaiting his successors in poetry!
      (Do they already exist somewhere, ready to burst forth into history 
      through books?)
EXCUSES FOR WORDS INTRODUCED INTO LITERATURE
      There are things which are existent only in the strength of their name.
      there are others which exist, but lacking a name are unacknowledged.
            Every idea needs a calling card to make itself known.
            Ideas are known by the name of their creator.
      It is more objective to name them after themselves.
            LETTERISM IS AN IDEA THAT
            WILL BE LAMENTED BY ITS REPUTATION
      Letterics is a material that can always be demonstrated. 
      Letterics seeds already existing:
            NONSENSE WORDS;
            WORDS WITH HIDDEN MEANINGS IN THEIR LETTERS;
            ONOMATOPOEIAS.
      If this material existed before, it didn't have a name to recognize it by. 
      Letterics works will be those made entirely out of this element, but with
            suitable rules and genres!
      The word exists and has the right to perpetuate itself.
      ISOU IS CALLING ATTENTION TO ITS EXISTENCE.
      It is up to the Letterist to develop Letterism. 
            Letterism is offering a DIFFERENT poetry.
            LETTERISM imposes a NEW POETRY.
            THE LETTERIC AVALANCHE IS ANNOUNCED.
         					1942.

James....still.

Tue, 19 Dec 2006 05:32:26 GMT

James is still getting sick. And he's moaning in his sleep. Mom's with him. Hopefully that will help.

And I found this article on Chaos Magick interesting

Snagged from Chaos Matrix
GO UNDERGROUND and be a CHAOS MAGICIAN
From Joel Biroco's "The Exorcist of Revolution." (1986)

----------------------------------------

----------------------------------------
What is this world of hatred and strife and war and hatred and strife and war. Is it, perchance, a world of hatred and strife and war and of hatred and strife and war. The answer is YES it fucking well is and I want out. I want the underground of life where I am now, the underground of life. But where is this you may ask and how can I get there. Well, if you are working then walk Out straight away, get on a bus and go home and say fuck you employer and be quick with my last pay cheque. Say fuck to giving notice, if you can't walk out just like that then you won't be able to hack the underground. Then get yourself a garret to starve in and sign on the dole. Be prepared for being fucked around for weeks and months before you see any money, especially if you walked out on your job. Now say to yourself I'm finished with all that shit. So that's about the equivalent of dipping your big toe into the waters of the underground before wading in. Now stuff your central nervous system with hallucinogens listening to Beethoven's Ninth/The Cure/just about anything at full blast for months. Buy a second-hand aquarium and set it up in your garret, it doesn't matter if the glass is cracked you're going to use it for growing psilocybin cubensis mushrooms. When the weather gets warmer start sowing the marijuana seeds. Think of yourself as being on the run from the law, or forever one step ahead of the posse, or the landlord of a brothel. You're not "living" any more, you're "holding out". Then find an artform in which to work, start drawing in pen and ink, buy a battered typewriter. Become reclusive, don't shave, grow a beard, keep your hair unkempt, throw things on the floor, keep chickens in your room. Recite "Property is theft" ten times a day or until it seems obvious. Read books like Dostoyevsky's "Notes from Underground", Orwell's "Down and Out in Paris and London", Raoul Vaneigem's "The Revolution of Everyday Life" and Miyamoto Musashi's "A Book of Five Rings. Swot up on your Burroughs, Beckett, Celine, Kerousc, Coctesu, Rimbaud, Hesse, Poe, Baudelaire, Lautreamont, Nietzsche, Joyce, Stein. That's a decent start, now the water's up to your waist and the tide seems to be taking you further away from the shore and "The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin" seems strangely subversive. Now read "Desert Island BIFF" just to make absolutely sure you don't turn into a jerk. At this stage there are two directions you can go in - back to your parents' home and beg to be taken back in because you've found the big wide world too harsh, or onward. Or the former followed by the latter if you need a breathing space. Now get stuck into Crowley, read "Magick" and "The Magical Record of the Beast 666". Read the works of Austin Osman Spare and start casting sigils. Spend more on incense than clothes. In fact don't buy any new clothes at all. Give money to tramps even though you can't afford to on the grounds that you might be a tramp yourself one day and you're the kind of person who will be able to help you out of a jam. This is the way you start to see the world of the underground. Wall all around Central London every week or two and simply observe. Just stand and stare. Sit on the pavement in Covent Garden all day long watching people come an go, watch street entertainers and practice saying you're broke when asked for money merely by the look on your face, do it until it no longer feels like an affectation of poverty, feel what is rich about being poor. Never spend more than a fiver in one go unless it's in order to distribute your art, print your writings or produce a magazine. Eat less meals if by doing so you can have a more diverse range of Letraset at your disposal. Learn what can be done with lentils. After a while you'll start to experience the underground as a real place, and you'll get more and more enmeshed in it, then will come the point at which you can start making your own rules, you don't have to be a tramp, you don't have to be living with bedbugs for your only company, but as a result of enduring this kind of lifestyle for a while you'll learn to see what the underground is and you'll be able to move freely within it. You won't need more than a glance to pick out the pimps the plain-clothes cops the pushers the three-card-monty lookouts the spivs the touts the knifeboys the freelance journalists the computer whizz-kids looking for recruitment by a master criminal, all these people will tell you what they are uncontrollably. You, on the other hand, as a chaos magician, will have the subjective impression you project to others completely under control, you can at will project the aura of any one of the above and more, or blend invisibly as just another face in the crowd, according to your desires and purpose. Here is the secret of the underground - to merge - to stalk it without affectation. You can only merge into something when you know what it is you're trying to merge into, and there is nowhere where there are more lessons to be learnt than the underground, it exists on a different magical plane to that environment frequented by those who try to be magicians in the hustle and bustle of commuters, the nine-to-fivers. Magick works with greater effectiveness in the underground because the urgency caused by chaos is substantially greater than that experienced by those who immerse their lives in the framework of an imposed order. Just as an ordinary man has the potential to become a hero when thrust into a dangerous position by fate that he would have thought he was not up to if there had been time to think about it, so can an average magician become a great magician when his environment is chaos, the difference being that the chaos is deliberately procured and approached slowly and stealthily like one might try to walk past a sleeping tiger. One places oneself in dangerous situations carefully in order to gain the co-operation and strength of the tiger, and eventually its stealth - the merging with one's surroundings in order to walk unseen and unheard, to literally pounce upon the object of your desires. That is chaos magick.
Sure, you can be a magician in the world of work and mundaneness but you'll never be the kind of magician you could have been, a chaos magician is an underground magician, those magicians who tell you that you can be a chaos magician whilst still tied to conformity are simply those magicians who lack the strength and conviction to let go of their conformity, for which they have battled for years to possess through a misguided allegiance to hard slog. They are excited by the idea of chaos and of plunging themselves into it but they are afraid of letting go and so they make of their chaos magick something without chaos, something which can be carried on over a weekend in order to fit in with the demands of a working routine. Don't let anyone convince you this is chaos magick, don't let anyone glamourise magick of a lesser character through use of the epithet "chaos". Chaos magick can't be marketed and sold to the masses, it can only be lived. Anything else is nine-to-five magick, which you may use for securing payrises and promotion.

What your life is immersed in will be what you use your magick to affect. If your life is immersed in the underground and you become concerned about such nebulous subjects as rebellion and revolution and romance your magick will naturally be directed into this arena and enable you to live what others are only content to talk about. This then is the underground. If you are holding down a steady job and pursuing a "career" it also stands to reason that your magick, your drives and desires, will be fuelled to take you in a direction you think you want to go in, to further you in what you are presently pursuing, without regard to your more romantic hopes of which you are so convinced that you never make the slightest effort to realise them. No, onward to your very own mortgage and bank loan for that wonderful car and the ever more rabid consumption which follows as a natural result of following the path that you are following. Such people recognise art only through the emotion of acute jealousy.

It can't be helped and it doesn't matter, it doesn't matter to me that is, but it might matter to you if this is you I am writing about. What is, after all, your motivation for getting into magick, your motivation for reading a CHAOS text. Insight? Power? Most power-hungry magicians fuck themselves up sooner or later, so no doubt it is insight you're after. Ask yourself what insight there is in pursuing a useless career, kidding yourself that your high-flight aspirations lead to wondrous marvels. I'm not talking to the doomed, manual labourers and people who dig the roads and read electricity meters, I'm talking to those who glorify dead-end jobs in publishing, the media, banking, social work, advertising, and convince themselves their lives have meaning, purpose, and, above all, that most magical of dead-end words - prospects. Ask yourself, just how long will it be before you start buying your first shares? What a life! Give me the turmoil of chaos anyday, rather allow my magick to resemble the goings-on in a subterranean Chinese kitchen cum alchemists cave than the goings-on in your average air-conditioned office complex. Do you think about these things? Do you think you ought to think about these things? What do you want your life to be, do you know most people never ever think about this, rather they settle for the short-term option qf seeing something develop out of a lifestyle they hate, their catharsis being the accumulation of material goods. Ask yourself, what will ever develop out of an existence you hate? Isn't it better to turn your back on all of it and plunge yourself into a lifestyle you love and say fuck to poverty this is what I want my life to be, let my art be my catharsis for the malaise such poverty invokes. Isn't it altogether more likely that something will eventually develop out of a lifestyle you love, that your need to raise yourself above poverty will eventually be satisfied, by magical means, because you have had the courage to throw yourself into the driving urgency of chaos. These are all important things to consider. By all means be a nine-to-five magician, you don't have to be a chaos magician, it's not compulsory, but don't be a nine-to-five magician if you secretly desire to be a chaos magician because one doesn't lead to the other. This is the fundamental difference between chaos magick and other forms of magick and why chaos is the magick for now, for as long as now lasts. The magick that evolves out of chaos magick (for even chaos magick will only last as long as it does) will be the treasure of those who have had the courage to embrace chaos now,all the rest will have to content themselves with the realisation that they will be peddling a bicycle with a puncture uphill for evermore. Chaos is happening now, not next week, not next month, not next year. You can't get into chaos later if you've come across it now, this is your one and only chance, the only people who can get into chaos later on are those who are yet to hear about it. Real Pied Piper of Hamelin stuff this. You see, chaos is that thing which is instantly recognised by those it is meant for, that is what it is all about. If you are reading this and saying to yourself now that this is for you then find that strength within yourself to grasp it and make it your own. If you are reading this now and saying this isn't for me then that is because it isn't for you, you're an outsider who has got ahold of this publication by an unfortunate accident, so back off, that is an appropriate reaction. We will feel no sense of loss not to have your company I assure you, we will happen without you and inspire of you. If you can't see the urgency and what needs to be done then you are blind and I cast a spell to cast you into the pit. May Satan spike you with his dung fork and place hydrofluoric acid in your contact lense containers. You bastards live through what we do and what we die for, so we have no sense of regret in cutting ourselves off from you and saying "Fuck You Conformist!" What is it you conform to but conformity itself? Fuck You!

James

Tue, 19 Dec 2006 03:25:38 GMT

James has been throwing up intermittently for the past hour or so. Something about the ghost tour, the tons of junkfood, or his sunstroke finally got to him.

I couldn't do much for him as the sound of vomiting makes my nerves freeze. There are few things I really can't handle, and that is one of them.

Poor guy.

Vacation

Mon, 18 Dec 2006 22:47:27 GMT

So, I've been on vacation in South Carolina for the past three days.

The car ride down here was a bit nerve wracking as I was being driven by my parents neither of whom had gotten much sleep. We encountered a number of accidents along the way including one particularly bad one involving two semis. "Man, after viewing all that shrapnel, I'm wide awake" is not the most comforting of phrases to hear coming from the driver of the vehicle in which you happen to be the occupant.

The condo we are staying at is incredible. Two stories are linked by one of those windy, helix like staircases, the kind you see in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade... you know, in that library scene? We have a veranda or a piazza or whatever you want to call it looking directly out over the beach. From where I'm typing right now I can hear the powerful surf striking the ground with its foam.

And if I thought my place was luxurious it is NOTHING compared to some of the three and four story "houses" around here. I'd say the land alone is priced around three mil, and these are probably just the "summer homes". It's all really quite a disgusting show of wealth. I mean, who honestly needs all this? By contrast, you go into the city of Charleston and are accosted by beggars and peeling walls.

Strangely enough, the age for entering a bar is nonexistent, but the drinking age is still 21. Probably for the best. I still really dislike the taste of alcohol and I have no great need for any of it right now.

I went for a walk along the beach last night under the stars. The sky was extremely clear and you could make out many a celestial body.

We toured several decommissioned vessels: an aircraft carrier, a submarine, a destroyer. Loads of fun for my stepfather and his father. I found myself getting bored pretty quick. You can only look at that stuff so long, say a little prayer of thanks that you'll never have to get involved in that sort of thing, and then you just gotta get out of there. Claustrophobia was acting up big time.

But oh, I don't have to writer papers or study for anything or take tests or listen to lectures or ANYTHING.

Ah.... vacation.

Everyone Laugh at the Thelemite.

Fri, 15 Dec 2006 22:34:20 GMT

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YU49qqyMRVU

Pretty damn bizarre.

Ten random things about me

Thu, 14 Dec 2006 18:03:26 GMT

Unus: I can never commit to anything. I go through life in great cycles. This is most notable in my religion and my religious sense, where I've been known to go from Christianity to Crowleyanity to Taoism to Zen back to Crowleyanity on to Renaissance Magic, and off in some left field direction like Kundalini Yoga.

Duo: In keeping with the above, Change and I have a pretty odd relationship. Sometimes Change comes home, tells me she's been out shopping, but I immediately start to get suspicious and wonder if she's been out clubbing. (I mean, who honestly needs to wear that much freakin' makeup to buy a pair of shoes?) Sometimes Change really starts to get on me about my drinking and I retaliate with insults about her addiction to Days of Our Lives. Eventually, our anger turns into the most fiery lust imaginable, and we rip off each other's clothes, tupping rampantly in the living room. I tell you I feel sorry for our oldest, Result.

Tres: I'm a philosophy and religious studies major, which means I'm like a wondering samuraii. Neither camp really wants me, as I am interested in examining both sides from the other's angle. Philosophers dislike my constantly bringing religion into the picture and religious scholars would rather talk about anthropological causes than outcomes in philosophical worldviews and gestalts. Ah well.

Quatro: I really love deep masculine voices. I understand the feminine desire to wrap oneself around such a voice and wish that my own was more akin to an Orson Welles or a Don La Fontaine than a Woody Allen.

Quinque: Nature and I don't really get along, no matter how much I wish we did. The sun is too bright. The grass makes me break out. Bugs freak the hell out fo me. Yeah... nature not so cool.

Sex: M.

Septem: I have one. It's between my left and right aortas. Andreas Vesalius was the first Renaissance scholar to realize that there were no pores there (as was generally believed by Galen).

Octo: An octo is a term used to describe the size of a typical leaf as from a book. Terry Pratchett makes use of (parodies) the term when he refers to the Book that holds the eight spells of creation of Discworld in his comic fantasy series. In actuality, an Octavo is just a book containing octos.

Novem: There is nothing new under the sun.

Decem: It's December. It's Christmas. And I'm going to South Carolina. I feel like Macauly Caulkin in Home Alone. "There are no Christmas trees in Florida...How can you have Christmas without a Christmas tree, Mom?"
(December used to be the tenth month until the egos of Julius Caesar and Augustus Ceasar had to be appeased with the inclusion of two more months.)

Tue, 12 Dec 2006 04:12:34 GMT

This has been the year for bad paper writing.

Seriously, if anyone looks back on this as a judgement of my ability at the present time (whenever that may be) these papers never happened.

I didn't write them.

I stole them.

From internet.

Because I'm a cheater.

Better to be a cheater than to actually have this crap on your record.

Yeah, of course I am.

Sun, 10 Dec 2006 02:40:51 GMT

You are The Magician

Skill, wisdom, adaptation. Craft, cunning, depending on dignity.

Eleoquent and charismatic both verbally and in writing, you are clever, witty, inventive and persuasive.

The Magician is the male power of creation, creation by willpower and desire. In that ancient sense, it is the ability to make things so just by speaking them aloud. Reflecting this is the fact that the Magician is represented by Mercury. He represents the gift of tongues, a smooth talker, a salesman. Also clever with the slight of hand and a medicine man - either a real doctor or someone trying to sell you snake oil.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

Stephen Colbert makes it official.

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 21:34:41 GMT

Maybe that's a little overkill there Steve-o.

I am very...disappointed.

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 21:19:34 GMT

So, I turned in my final bit of trash to Senchuk today in Personal Identity and Survival. Only to discover that ANOTHER final bit of trash, ANOTHER EIGHT PAGE PAPER, is required. The Due date is Wednesday the thirteenth.

Wait a minute, Nick. Don't you have another eight page paper due on that Wednesday for your ideas and experience class?

That's correct, Nick. I do.

Don't you also have an examination that will stress the boundaries of your ability to absorb obscure knowledge? I'm speaking, of course, of your Renaissance Botany and Anatomy exam on next Tuesday.

Yes, that too is correct.

And don't you also have a quiz in Greek tommorrow, along with the final exam on Monday?

Yeppers.

Do you not also have two transcriptions of Newton's writings due on Thursday of next week?

Verily, tis so.

So how do you intend to do all this?

I have no idea.

Keep in mind that Senchuk has throughout the semester changed the syllabus when it suits him. He has also neglected posting the percent value of his quizzes and tests.

And that is why I am so very very disappointed.

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 03:20:51 GMT

My god I'm bored.

But I don't want to do anything.

Reading gives me a headache.

Studying is completely out.

I can't work on my transcription.

For the first time in a long time... I'm wanting some TV.

Now, Please. Read from Card.

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 05:41:51 GMT

I Am.

(I am)

Sofa King

(sofa king)

We Todd Ed

(we todd ed)

Now repeat fast.

Hum de dum

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 05:19:33 GMT

In other news. Wow, Greek. Half of it is almost over. Look out Plato. Ethelw ton psuxayn.

And uh... Renaissance Botany and Anatomy. Lesson learned: don't take a class your only semi interested in.

And Personal Identity and Survival? Don't take a class from a professor whom you know is terrible from experience. You won't learn any more than if you had tried to to teach yourself. Also, don't listen to people who tell you that it's not the professor's fault. You're a fairly smart guy. You know people. You can make perfectly sound judgements for yourself.

Hookah is bad for the lungs. Even if you can blow some kickass smoke rings.

When the going gets tough, the smart watch Aqua Teen and "We LIKE THE MOON!!!"

You may know the etymological root of many words. You may find it fascinating. No one else does. (Except your girlfriend).

The library is a marvelous place. You can learn a lot. Except when you're in college. When you're in college, you should stick to the required reading material. Unless you're UBER SMART.

That's enough lessons for today. Please turn in your copybook to your teacher or head of class.

Next time we will discuss rock and roll.

homework schmomework

Sat, 25 Nov 2006 04:33:35 GMT

Jess and I have done very little in the way of advancing our academic careers.

It's been a marvelous weekend. Full of video games, good food, and on the spur divinations.

Speaking of which, tonight, I finally figured out how yarrow stalk counting works. Now I can be pretentious even among the pretentious I Chingers.

It's strange, but I'm actually feeling more of a connection to the Yarrow than the Tarot these days. I hope this isn't signaling one of my radical changes of interest. I've already got myself set up to study Neoplatonic philosophy. And there's no way I'm going back to studying chinese.

Later, all. Here's to good food and good friends.

Some people said no way. But I laid it all down gave it all away...

Sun, 19 Nov 2006 18:02:24 GMT

Writing another philosophy paper... blech.