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Latest Humorous T-shirt Slogan:
"You Wish!"
This one has to be taken in context to be appreciated. The girl wearing this belly shirt was maybe 5'0" tall, with a muffin top going on, despite the fact that she was clearly in her third trimester of pregnancy. In addition she was wearing a thong that came up past her low-rise jeans and pushed her muffin top down over the edge to really emphasize the roll. I'm not in perfect shape so I don't expect that others should be, but when you are wearing that shirt, along with the rest of the outfit, you open yourself to scrutiny (and perhaps random looks of horror).

It's fun to hate:
The Soccer Moms who insist that they drive gas-guzzling SUV's for the safety of their children despite the fact that they are 6 times more likely to be in a rollover accident than any other vehicle. It's like beating your child unconscious with the butt of your gun so that he will remain on the floor, thus making him less likely to be hit by a random bullet coming through the front window.

When Shadowtwin reigns supreme:
There will be mandatory, passive birth control required to participate in any form of government assistance. If you can't afford to raise your child on your own we are here to help you, but we must first make sure that your reproductive organs are adequately contained. If you don't like that policy all you have to do is support your kids your damn self!
Vote Shadowtwin!


Wildly inaccurate, yet shockingly precise, predictions based completely on happenstance and arbitrary universal fluctuations.
Your Horoscope:


Sagitarius: 11/22-12/21
A typographical error in your Church's newsletter will lead to you performing sex acts on dozens of anonymous strangers in your pursuit of "oral highground."

Capricorn: 12/22-1/19
The stars did recently tell your wife to "listen to her heart" regarding whether or not she should leave you. The stars did not intend for you to listen to her heart. But once you used that bonesaw on her sternum (not trusting the stethoscope which just responded with a cryptic thumping sound), we're pretty sure she made up her mind anyway.

Aquarius: 1/20-2/18
The stars would like to apologize for stating in their last prophecy, "Be wary of the stranger you meet at beach this weekend. The stars aren't sure why, but they don't trust him." Through a cosmic hiccup, that information was supposed to be released this month. The August prophecy should have read, "A dark and handsome stranger will approach you on the beach, profess his love for you, and sweep you away for a jetset marriage. After which you will lead a long, happy, prosperous, healthy life as the Queen of a small island nation." We apologize for any inconvenience this error may have caused.

Pisces: 2/19-3/20
Your new stopwatch will allow you to time how long you can hold your breath underwater down to the thousandth of a second. Unfortunately, poor planning will mean that you are not able to actually share the information with anyone.

Aries: 3/21-4/19
Your innovative new device for beauticians to use while giving pedicures can be wildly successful and make you quite wealthy IF you change the name. Trust us, no one is going to buy a "Ped-O-File".

Taurus: 4/20-5/20
Your Mother always told you to wear clean underwear just in case there was an accident and paramadics had to see them. But as you board that plane today, the stars want you to know that you needn't worry about it. The debris field will be more than 8 square miles, making it impossible to find most human remains. Not to mention that the ensuing fire burned so hot that it disintegrated not only all fabric, but most of the thin metals aboard as well.

Gemini: 5/21-6/21
You just had to get that genital piercing, didn't you? The stars tried to warn you not to, but you went ahead and did it anyway... Now all your worst fears will come to bear when, at a campground this weekend, you run afoul of this guy:


Cancer: 6/22-7/22
The less traveled by areas of the Grand Canyon's north rim offer some of the most breathtaking views of this natural wonder. You will soon find out they also include some of the worst footings and none of the handrails. They do, however, provide equally awe-inspiring, terminal velocity impacts.

Leo: 7/23-8/22
The stars heard your pleas, begging for someone who you could share your love with and embrace for the rest of your life. If you are still single, throw your arms around the closest person to you at 3:44pm GMT on Dcember 9th -That'll be the one. Trust us, you won't have time to be picky...

Virgo: 8/23-9/22
The stars have piled up most of your things on the front porch. You can stay at a friend's house, but you aren't coming back home until you admit what you did and apologize. The stars' Mother was right about you... (you must have really pissed them off; the stars were in tears while they told me this)

Libra: 9/23-10/22
The stars have been doing a little thinking and a lot of math. The population of planet earth is roughly 6,796,590,704. That means that roughly 566,382,558 people share each astrological sign. About 18,620,796 have the same birthday. Based on average life expectancy as many as 248,277 people were born on the same day, in the same year, for every zodiac sign. How can one statement possibly predict the future of all of them? Ehh, fuck it. "A full moon while Venus is rising is an omen of good things to come."

Scorpio: 10/23-11/21
They say you never know how you are going to react to a crisis. After a home invasion this weekend you will: You will scream, "Do whatever you want to my wife, but leave me alone!" You will then create a distraction by throwing your newborn at the assailant as you dive through the window to safety. Now you know.

Music lost to history:

Aerosmith - Dream On When I started doing these, I could never have imagined that I would be putting an Aerosmith song here. Since I was born in 1974, this song is well before my generation. It was recorded in 1972 and released in 1983 on Aerosmith's Self-Titled Album, but to read the information on it at Wikipedia most of us would become familiar with it from a re-release in 1976.

Like most of the music being released in the late 60's/early 70's that was pushing the rock-n-roll envelope, Dream On relies heavily on solid composition and and melody. Before the era of the modern effects processor, these bands had no distortion to hide behind (or very little), and synthesized instruments hadn't yet made their way into music. In that way the music always sounds more raw to us today because, quite simply, it was. While it seems laughable to think about today, music like this was so far removed from the bubble-gum pop of the 50's that it still wasn't accepted into the mainstream. As the baby-boomers became the target demographic, the rock-n-roll movement really started to pick up speed, with bands like Led Zeppelin and Aerosmith clearing the path for the much darker and heavier bands like Black Sabbath.

While I (and most of my generation) are probably far more familiar with the Aerosmith of the late 80's and early 90's, the reason this song makes it onto my MLtH page comes down to one thing: Age. Not necessarily the age of the song; In fact, as I sat down to do the research for this today, I had no idea when it was released, but would have guessed (closely) the mid 70's. Tyler was born March 26, 1948, meaning that this song was written when he was only 24 years old. I'm not sure why, but I have always thought this song was pretty amazing given his age at composition. I suppose it is human nature to wax poetic about the days of yore and the imminent passage of time, but the melody sets a mood that makes you feel it right along with him. As the song nears the end and his lyrics become more more frenzied, you can almost feel the pain (longing?) in his voice. Listen to it with headphones and no distraction sometime, you'll see what I mean.

I wrote a short bit some time ago about Kelly Sweet's cover of this song (see the video on Youtube). While I have since gotten over the initial hatred I felt towards the cover of the song, I still just can't like it. The words are there; she hits the notes; but I just can't hear it in her voice. As if there is somthing very personal about the song and Tyler's deliverance of the lyrics that just can't be duplicated. At least to me.

That said, I have heard Aerosmith doing the song with an orchestra, and it also seems to lack the passion of the original. So perhaps the thing that I like so much about it is the under-produced, raw sound of it, or it may be that I am still hearing it through the ears of that impressionable youth that heard if for the first time in a dusty old Van with my Uncle Art. Either way, it seems it is Lost to History.

Music Lost to History Archive


I Can't Believe it's Not Porn!
WhorePresents.comYep, it's not porn. It's not a site with gifts for sale either, which is probably a good thing since I can't imagine that any woman would be at all flattered to get a gift -no matter how nice- in a box that says "Whore Presents.com" on it.

Daily Reading:
BlackChampagne
Magazine Man
Shane Nickerson
Wil Wheaton
Boners
Hoyazo's Poker Blog

My reading list changes from time to time, and there are many sites that I visit that are not on the list. They are listed in the order that I visit them, enjoy!



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Shadowtwin.com: On Alcoholism (the addiction not the disease)



Wednesday, August 20, 2008
 

On Alcoholism (the addiction not the disease)

In a casual conversation with a co-worker today, the subject of alcohol came up. Since I quit drinking I have been of the mind that while quitting drinking is a great accomplishment, it is also a personal one, and not one that I really run around telling everyone about. If asked directly, however, I do freely admit to having been an alcoholic. And this was the sticking point in the conversation. Having been an alcoholic.

First and foremost, I would like to say that I don't think anyone who has never personally had a substance abuse problem is capable of forming an educated opinion on the subject. You can read all you want to about, and know a lot about it, but without living through it you just don't know what it is like -much in the same way that I don't know what it is like to fly a rocket to space, even though I have read a great deal about it. Doctors are able to diagnose the substance abuse problem, but all they can really do is recommend detox and/or some form of third-party program to help deal with it.

In the conversation today, the co-worker said that I had a disease, and the fact that I hadn't drank for a couple years didn't mean that I wasn't an alcoholic anymore. This is where I call bullshit. I think the key point I want to make here is that I never claimed that I had a disease. That is an important point for me to make. Calling alcoholism a disease seems (to me at least) to absolve someone of blame. I disagree with that 100%. I had a very serious addiction, but it was entirely self-induced. I don't think a disease can be self-induced. There may have been factors that made me more susceptible to becoming an alcoholic, but again I had to make the choices to send me down the road to alcoholism. That's far different than suffering from a disease. You don't have much of a choice over whether you are going to have Parkinson's Disease, for instance. I always maintained that what I had was a compulsion; an addiction. Much in the same way that I used to have an almost subconscious compulsion to bite my fingernails. I was able to overcome that as well, and to my knowledge no one has ever referred to nail biting as a disease.

Since I don't believe that I had a disease, I think that since I quit I am just not an alcoholic anymore. I am not a "recovering alcoholic". I quit, I am done, end of story.

The co-worker went on to say that quitting without a 12-step program is extremely difficult to do. I agree with that completely: it was hard as fuck. But I did it. He then went on to say that I had completed most of the steps of the program, just that I had done it on my own. I disagree. Here are the original twelve steps, borrowed from the Wikipedia entry for Alcoholics Anonymous:

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His Will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

Let's just start with point one, the argument won't get past there anyway. "We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—that our lives had become unmanageable." I will agree to the latter part of that sentence, my life had become unmanageable. The first part, however, is the polar opposite of what it took for me to quit drinking. I did not admit that I was powerless over alcohol; I forced myself to admit that the alcohol was powerless over me. It was entirely my decision whether or not I would drink it, and I decided not to. That is really skipping past the reality of how difficult it was to maintain the willpower, the weeks I went with literally no sleep as my body waited for me to administer a dose of the depressant, the mornings that I would wake up trembling, knowing that with just one drink my body would relax. But that is what it took to beat this addiction, so that is what I did.

Don't get me wrong, I know that AA works for a lot of people, and if you are an alcoholic you should use whatever means are necessary to reach the sober end. For me probably the biggest part was that I never said that I was going to "quit drinking forever". Instead I made a choice each morning to not drink that day. If I needed to, I reasoned, I could go ahead and have a drink the next day. And the next day I would make the same decision. And then a couple of months passed, having decided not to drink each day. That is still the philosophy I use today, though I rarely even think about alcohol anymore. And if I decide to have a beer with my friends one day, I don't think that will automatically make me an alcoholic relapsing, I think it will just be me having a beer with my friends. The me that was an alcoholic lost the battle a long time ago.

Take this post for what it's worth to you. I just wanted to get it out there that for some admitting they are powerless over alcohol may not be what it takes to beat the addiction. To admit that you are powerless over something can be really like giving up control completely, and feeling like you have no control is what leads a lot of people to alcohol in the first place.

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