The few "strippers" who were around when we first started up may remember the forum, where users could debate/converse in an online discussion (we also featured recipe, events, and car-pooling sections). Since then, mostly in an attempt to code the entire site by hand, we have neglected to update this feature. I've noticed that users still comment on each other's journals without having a special section to do so. On this same note, we fear that if there are too many places to comment, users may only write on one or the other and neglect their own journals. What do you think? Should we revisit the idea? Or is having your own journal, where you can reference the other journals, adequate to your needs? Feel free to talk about it on your own journal. Depending on the response I will work on bringing the forum back to the strip (ie: convincing Paul it's a good idea).

Found this neato tape at Amvets the other day. It is Indian Love Call by "Yodeling" Kenny Roberts. Absolutely amazing stuff. I've included a sample yodel for your listening pleasure-just click on my pic to your right. I don't know what's more to say. I really like yodeling and can do it a little bit, but boy-oh-boy have I got far to go before I match skills with Mr. Roberts. I don't know that any Indians will yet come to my love call. I will perservere, and maybe some day the hook of my ululating voice will catch some Indian unawares and they will be mine, all mine. Hua-ha-ha!

The last three words of the day from dictionary.com are just dumb. I can't believe that anyone really knows them, or if maybe three people do they can't use them because no one would know what the fuck they were talking about without the aid of a dictionary. I feel that I know enough random words that nobody knows already and so if I haven't heard it before (unless it's highly technical or specific jargon) then it's so out there as to be nigh worthless. Here they are:

concinnity: elegance - used chiefly of literary style.
peripatetic: walking about or traveling from place to place.
frangible: capable of being broken; easily broken. (frangible my ass, c'mon already!)

We have a new federal spending bill. Very nice, now I'll finally get the real pay raise of 4% instead of P-Bush's measley 1.7%. But, wait a minute, what's this...? (excerpts from movingideas.com )

"On January 22, the U.S. Senate passed the $328 billion omnibus appropriations bill which includes appropriations for the fiscal year 2004. Senators approved the measure 65-28, a month after House passage."
Several new rules, not directly related to spending have been bundled into the bill. They include provisions on:
-Overtime Pay
-Federal Extension of Unemployment Benefits
-Corporate Control of the Media
read on

I was having a conversation today about world problems (what's new, eh?) and came upon the topic of Pharmaceutical companies. I didn't really know many facts on the topic, so was left with a few examples of why I feel they are souless monsters (along with HMOs and weapon makers). So I went on the web to try to get some more facts, here are some tidbits:

-the price of commonly-used drugs has risen at more than twice the rate of inflation for over ten years
-the absence of pharmaceutical price containment in the US leaves consumers paying two to three times as much as consumers in other countries, including neighbors Canada and Mexico
-the prescription drug industry is America’s most profitable industry, with taxable income increasing from $16 billion to nearly $25 billion from 1990 to 1996
-17 percent of pharmaceutical industry sales translate to after-tax profit, compared to an average of 5 percent for other industries
-from 1993-1996 drug compaines paid an effective tax rate of 16.2 percent compared to a 27.3 percent average paid by other major industrial categories.
-total pharmaceutical lobbying expenditures for 1998 exceeded $73 million, and for 1997 were more than $74 million
-campaign contributions favor republicans over democrats almost 2:1

-mass media advertising for prescription drugs has risen steadily and sharply — from $1.1 billion in 1997 to $2.5 billion in 2000.
-because of patent protection laws, which delay the entry of far less expensive generics, 90% of drugs sold are brand name (intellectual property rights on drugs can now extend to almost twenty years, up from about eight years in 1980)
-Two-thirds of new drugs approved in 1989–2000 used active ingredients already on the market (translation: R&D money is being spent not on making new drugs but on 'tweaking' already existing drugs or adding other ingredients in order to extend the life of the patent (up to three add. years), and to avoid long delays testing safety and efficacy)
-Taxpayer dollars have funded the basic research, as well as the preclinical and clinical research, for many of the cancer and all of the important AIDS drugs on the market (drug companies received $27.4 billion in income tax credits, including the research and experimentation credit, from 1990 - 1996)
-drug company advertising spending is outpacing R&D spending by as much as three times
-most R&D money is budgeted towards developing so-called "blockbuster" drugs (Viagra for example) whose profit margin is up to ten times higher than other drugs
-here's something recent: "the pipeline of new treatments is drying up as drug firms -citing poor financial returns- focus instead on chronic conditions, such as high cholesterol, where medicines are taken for years rather than curing patients in one or two weeks."

In short, making medicine is about making money. Drug companies are bound by the same rules as the rest of corporate America, revenues must rise continuously. Because it's categorized in a different manner than other companies it reaps tax breaks and subsidies that make it ridiculously profitable. Too bad this profit comes at the cost of our health.

Sources include:
Open Secrets.org
National Institue for Health Care Management
NY Senior.org

I couldn't sleep well last night. I think that I may have eaten at too late of an hour or something. I tossed and turned for an hour or two. Eventually I decided to relieve some stress the old fashioned way (matt joined me in the endeavor). I find sometimes that a little physical exertion is just the thing to wind taut muscles down. I added some green maria to make sure. Returning to bed, I battled hazy dreams and tangential thought patterns, but still was unable to find release. After awhile I stopped fighting and let my mind wander the paths that came easiest, at the moment they proved to be mathemeatical.

It's very difficult to entertain notions of a realistic four-dimensional model. What does it look like? It goes everywhere a three-dimensional one would (left/right (x), forward/backward (y), and up/down (z)) plus somewhere else, where? Yet I figure that since we can comprehend something that has four-dimensions, at least mathematically with four variables, we should be able to envision it. The prevailing ideas of our time are based on the idea of space-time, meaning three-dimensional space plus a fourth variable, time. Time, however presents a geometrical problem in that, at least in our experience, it travels in only one direction, towards the future. One can travel through space but not time (though think how much better we are at traveling thorugh space with the help of technology, maybe we just haven't figured time out). Soon enough my mind balked at trying to construct this model. I had spinning mobius strips combined with three-dimensional graphs flitting through my head but never resolved anything.

Next I started thinking about how I could simplify the problem for my little head to understand. I though well if there are too many variables what you do is differentiate. Hmmm... A little differentiation never hurt nobody. A good example of what differentiation does is a physical one between position, velocity, and acceleration. By differentiating an equation you are able to find a rate of change. In our example, velocity is the rate of change of position, and acceleration is the rate of change of velocity. So, I thought last night as I drifted in the transitory delusions before slumber, if we had an equation expressing relationships between space and time (a four-dimensional equation), we could differntiate in respect to one of them to get an equation expressing the rate of change in, say time. Maybe I could understand that.

Soon I became more asleep than not, and my thoughts became less coherent. Somehow Trisha ended up in there. Don't know where she came from though. And she sure didn't help with the math. Thanks a lot Trisha.

First of all I want to assure Sara that her journal writing is not in vain and that I appreciate her writing all the time, and find it ironically amusing that she's become one of the most frequesnt posters though she lives a couple thousand miles away. Love to you. And check out the crochet entry for your props and cred.

Secondly I just played that stupid game Paul always plays (second life) and laughed my ass silly for about a half hour making my avatar beautiful. Here are the final results.

I especially like the jutting brow that actually goes past the hairline. That's nice. We're reaching the outer limits of ugliness now.

I finally broke down and bought myself some skis. I have ben going cross couuntry for the last two years and really enjoyed it, but never bought skis because it's only like $15 to rent them. Well, anyways, I went with my friend Dave last Sunday to go night skiing and we got there at the wrong time and it was closed, and then the next day we tried to go and the rental shop we used didn't rent cross country skis anymore. I felt kinda bad for Dave and added that to my desire to own them and managed to beat out my fear of spending more than $100 on anything. So I have skis now. I think I am in love with them. Holly got some too and today we went to the park (Delaware that is) and skiid (is that right?) for almost two hours. I didn't realize how fun it would be just in the park. You wouldn't imagine it, but you can go all over; the park, down by the river, the cool path thing in between. I don't even have to drive to get to the park, I can just walk down to Bidwell and ski from there. Cool, eh?

The party was a total success, thanks everyone for coming, and I apolize for passing out so early (about 4). I was wearing a green shirt for the record, not a red silky one as Matthew's journal shows it (check Chamille's journal (southernyankee) for the real version), maybe he was trying to match my beady red eyes. Oh Matt is becoming the little photoshop artist isn't he?

Lastly we have the highest ranking official in the Bush administration yet to admit that the evidence used to thrust the nation into war was ummm, well... maybe not so perfect. Ironically it was Powell himself who detailed in depth this "evidence" to the UN and the world before the war when we still pretended to care what the rest of the world wants.

CBS has declined to air the winning MoveOn ad on Superbowl airtime. Here's what their email has to say and where you can go to send a message directly to those bastards at CBS.

"During this year's Super Bowl, you'll see ads sponsored by beer companies, tobacco companies, and the Bush White House.1 But you won't see the winning ad in MoveOn.org Voter Fund's Bush in 30 Seconds ad contest. CBS refuses to air it.2

Meanwhile, the White House is on the verge of signing into law a deal which Senator John McCain (R-AZ) says is custom-tailored for CBS and Fox,3 allowing the two networks to grow much bigger. CBS lobbied hard for this rule change; MoveOn.org members across the country lobbied against it; and now our ad has been rejected while the White House ad will be played. It looks an awful lot like CBS is playing politics with the right to free speech.

Of course, this is bigger than just the MoveOn.org Voter Fund. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) submitted an ad that was also rejected.4 But this isn't even a progressive-vs.-conservative issue. The airwaves are publicly owned, so we have a fundamental right to hear viewpoints from across the ideological spectrum. That's why we need to let CBS know that this practice of arbitrarily turning down ads that may be "controversial" -- especially if they're controversial simply because they take on the President -- just isn't right.

To sign our petition to CBS, go to:


We'll deliver the petition by email directly to CBS headquarters."

That's right, I've finally taken up my long-awaited dream of crocheting. You may ask yourself why any 24 year old male would choose such a granny-like craft. Well, mostly I am a very bored 24 year old who's almost perpetually laid off, this would be the number one predicating factor. Another big reason is that both my grandmas crocheted and would always give me quilts and such for special occassions. I learned a little bit how to do it when I was a kid, but never enough to actually make anything. It's not really all that complicated, I started this scarf the day after I learned the stitches. It is very time consuming, however; so far the scarf is about a foot long and has absorbed about 4-5 hours of my life. I think there should be some kind of machinery involved, though that might make it less of a craft. I will trudge on till it is finished and then I will make smaller things, like mittens, booties, hats, penis cozies, and tortoise sweaters.

• I will now mention that Sara (iriesara) really helped me get down the basics that enabled me to come so far since then in the crocheting art. Thanks Sara!!**