this is so totally funny.

This guy builds himself a custom steel-plated bulldozer and proceeds to bulldoze town hall the mayor's house and 5 other buildings. Police "set off three explosions and fired at least 200 rounds at the steel plates welded to the bulldozer, which looked like an upside-down Dumpster. After the third explosion failed, officials cut their way in with a blowtorch..." Crazy dude! The "bulldozer's armor plates consisted of two sheets of half-inch steel with a layer of concrete between them." Of course he then killed himself before the man could get him. Sad, but what a way to go.

• Whoah!** ms. cateyes that's grotesque! I say put his name up for all to see. You have a judgment againt him from a court of law and photo evidence of his obvious total slumlordiness. What a bastard! Like Paul said the same thing happened with the same guy to hodown a couple years ago. If she had published here maybe it needn't ever have happened to you.

Gay pride seemed to have more people than ever. I am constantly surprised to see tha amount of gay people in one day that appear in Buffalo, I wonder if there are just so many gay people here or if we're just louder than in other towns. I mean we're pent up for the winter for so long maybe everybody feels the need to just get up and out. The parade lacked creative floats but had much enthusiasm. I am very egoistic by saying this, but I had like three floats divert their entire attention to me as I was waving off my balcony. It actually made me a bit embarrased, they were the parade, I wasn't the special attraction. I pretend to complain but it was a nice ego booster in these times of post-winter fatness-depression. I need to ride my fucking bike more. I will go before work tomorrow, that's a promise to myself. Go boy go. Ride like the wind. I love riding the bike it's so great. Here we come winds of the East, bear me to Oklahoma. Or at least around town.

Can't we just start calling all people it? It's neutral. You might say it would be confusing, like you're talking to your friend and they don't know whether the stories about Shelly the checkout girl or the magazine in the rack. But it's all about context, you'd get used to it. In German it's quite noraml to call people 'the'. You say "Der ist suess" and it means "the is hot" but really it means he's hot. It's weird. Maybe it doens't work so well, we do need a word that at least means person. It has to be one-syllable for convenience and easily contractionable. Howabout "ze"? it's not already a word and can be contractioned like he/she. Ze's a hottie. I went out with zerm last night and we had an awesome time. There you go Robin, problem solved.

The dyke march was purty neat. We waved/hooted/hollered from the roof-porch and then joined the procession down to Bidwell. Then we stayed a while until Toriani started to play (who was not to bad but a litle rehashed). What's on the agenda now you might ask? I would have to say it's entirely up in the air. Rumor has it there's the triquel to the anything but clothes party tonight. I had an awesome time last year with my balloons and tortoise sweater. Didn't have a single balloon by the time I left.

Oh yeah: welcome all new peeps, I am glad to get some fresh blood in here. Even through the evil advertising mechanism. Which is probably nor evil but just over exploited nowadays. Got to start getting drunk now, toodle-ooh.

next Tuesday, but god-awful early, like 7ish, ick. I would like to see the glorious transit but... My head hurts, blast you flacidness and your dang tasty sweet-drinks. Shoulda stuck with the beer, which doesn't pummel my bod the next day. Pin was fun. I usually spend the wole time wandering around, as if I have an aversion to barstools or lengthy bar conversations. I stumble from one friend to the next, checking to see that they're still there, and as sson as I find them I wave and am gone. Hm. I did talk a lot about girls for some reason (in a naughty way). Might be the space porn we watched at southernyankee's place. Groovy 90's computer graphics and trick camera angles make porn even better. Oh yeah the sneaky aliens with the flashing red eyes helped too. The humans couldn't even tell they were being taken advantage of, who's to say that aliens aren't getting it on with us all the time without our knowledge.

Oh <groan> work in a half hour. Friday though then the weekend, and gay Pride. I wonder if the Christians will creep out of the woodwork again. Can't decide if it's more annoying that they're there at all or fun cause we get to harrass them with our filthy gayness. We'll see.

I've been thinking a lot about rent lately. I really hate it. As an institution. I can't help but think that it's a total usurious act that takes from someone and gives to another at unequal levels. Its origins must be somewhere near the time property itself was established. It couldn't have been too long before someone thought, "well, if I now own this land (which of course had at one time been ownerless or owned-by-all) I might as well let someone else live here...for a price." And so the people that first owned the land, probably some kinda tribal chiefs or respected war leaders, decided to let other people live and work it if a portion of the fruits of their labor was apportioned to the owner for the use of the land. We know where this leads of course, feudal systems-or in worst case scenarios, slavery systems-where the cost of living on a property becomes equal to the wages allotted the workers. This is where rent was invented, it doesn't have pretty origins.

So, I was trying to argue against rent and came up against pretty hard-core reasons. There was the idea that some people just don't want to own their own land (we're talkin current America here). But I don't think that's the case. Given the fact that to have some way to provide shelter and food for self and family a place to live is essential (and in America you can't just opt out-just try to find an arable bit of soil that isn't owned by someone/thing). So everyone has to have it, why not own it. The advantages are obvious. You own capital-something tangible that can be exchanged for other items/services in our society-it has appreciable value. You have control over the use of your property (if you wanna erect a shrine to Hades in the back and take out the back wall for a view, it's your choice). You can use your property as collateral in obtaining credit towards other purchases. With rent you get non-responsibility. You pay the bill and you get occasional repairs. That's the part that bites though. Rent is constantly paid to the owner. When you buy, even through mortgage, every one of your dollars (or at least some percentage) goes back into your pockets as capital. You are paying to own something. When you rent you are paying to be owned by something. You have a landlord to answer to, strict rules of conduct, and you may even get a random visit. And your money is going into their pocket.

For example in my current situation, at the end of this year we will have paid the landlord over $20,000 total for two years. We could have bought a $60,000 house with a mortgage, paid the same amount over two years and our mortgage would be down to $45,000 (interest eats $5,000 or so). Even if now we moved and only got $55,000 for whatever reasons (bad market/neighborhood or whatever). We could pay off our mortgage and have $10,000 to spare, which means our total expenditure for two years was $10,000, half as much as renting. If we imagine making improvements and such (which we did a ton to our apartment without recuperation) so that we could sell for $65,000 (just $5K more than we bought it for), our profit after paying off our mortgage would be $20,000 which is what we spent on mortgage payments. In other words, if our property appreciates less than 10% over two years than we have broken even.

This is not to say that the above process is easy. Obtaining a mortgage is not easy as pie. There're lengthy forms to fill out, incomes to substantiate, and months of finding the house itself. It's a process made much easier if you can initially afford it. So I agree that the process of renting involves a lot less stress and a lot less wherewithal in the first place. It's skewed (as is the US of A in general) to favoring those with the initial capital resources. But, I think my point remains, that it is hard to justify the practice of renting. All it does it take ownership to the next rotten capitalist level of class and caste. Some people are o
wn
ers and some not. And those that are can now make money off those that aren't. It's beautifully and brutally logical. I just can't justify preying on fellow men, even in the name of shelter.