Happy Tofurkey Day!

Don't think of this as a "Thanksgiving" post. After all, I take that notion to heart that it wouldn't be thanksgiving without the turkey, and since I'm not having turkey, it's not thanksgiving. Philosophered.

That's not to say I'm not giving thanks. So I thought I'd diverge from my normal world of philosophical musings and far too sporadic life updates to slow it down a bit with some aspects of life that make me happy. While I sit at home, slow cooking a vegan chili and getting ahead on a few journal readings, here's a list of things I'm grateful for:

I'm grateful the fact that more and more people are accepting a loving tenderness towards the wider world around them, in whatever manner they manifest that, be it through striving for peace, environmental change, or more of a small-town economy.

I'm grateful for my parents' kindness and acceptance of others; their unconditional love not only for their sons and our many faults, but towards random people that pass through their lives in the time it takes to offer a joke, a smile, or a simple courtesy.

I'm grateful for my brother's loyalty.

I'm grateful for this white Thursday afternoon and for the smells of a delicious meal in the works, a cat by my side, and friends within reach.

I'm grateful for the opprotunity to do what I love without having to worry about money or tomorrow.

I'm grateful for the potential that exists in a moment's action, and the absorbing, persistent, fulfilling nature of Life once you make that first move.

I'm grateful for wandering conversations with friends from the past that pick right up where we left off regardless of the months or years in between.

I'm grateful for you.

Namaste'.

On Invincibility

If you're like me, you survive death-defying feats about once every three days. And I'm not talking about the tightrope with a safety net here; we're talking look-ma-no-hands-watch-out-for-that-semi! Ok...maybe not once every three days. But it happens a lot. Each time, do you wonder why your still alive? Seriously, why haven't I died yet?

I think it comes down to one of two possiblities: either I have catlike reflexes and a spider-sense for imminent danger, or another JBP gets killed and out of the two of us I just keep getting the lucky draw. For example, it's possible I died twice on the way home today. In the first instance, a car turned in front of me and there's a possible world (think, Sliding Glass Doors) where I slammed into the side of the car and went flying over it (cracking my neck as I bounced once off the roof) to land in a puddle in a world-silencing "hummmphck" as the misty pavement takes on a characteristic red sheen. But I, not that guy (who, might I add, has shared in every single one of my life experiences, only separated off in his own world), am in this world. An arbitrary distinction, right? Logically speaking, for any set of compossible statements about each of my close-calls, it is necessarily true that at least one of us died in that situation and that at least one of us lived. And the kicker is, there's no distinction between me being the one or the other. True, I have causal efficaciousness to this life, but I can't cause the other JBP to do or not do anything anymore than I can call him up and reminisce about that time at band camp when I (and, hence, he)...well, you get the idea. So, maybe I am banking my own life on both my catlike reflexes and my twin getting killed. But is the fact that I get to choose if I live or die any better in the long run? Since it's logically necessary (which is much more necessary than just causally necessary) that one of us dies, I'm killing him as I apply the brakes.

Who've you killed lately?

Attachment: A Bad Rap

MonoCulture

So Do We Get Our Light

"It is not a dream, it is a simple feat of scientific electrical engineering, only expensive — blind, faint-hearted, doubting world! […] Humanity is not yet sufficiently advanced to be willingly led by the discoverer's keen searching sense. But who knows? Perhaps it is better in this present world of ours that a revolutionary idea or invention instead of being helped and patted, be hampered and ill-treated in its adolescence — by want of means, by selfish interest, pedantry, stupidity and ignorance; that it be attacked and stifled; that it pass through bitter trials and tribulations, through the strife of commercial existence. So do we get our light. So all that was great in the past was ridiculed, condemned, combatted, suppressed — only to emerge all the more powerfully, all the more triumphantly from the struggle."

--Nikola Tesla

The title of this post is linked to a damn interesting article on Tesla's wireless technology. This is for nerds and non-nerds alike, as there are some really cool ideas and potentials here that fate (and western economy) failed to bring to fruition.

Westbrae

For awhile now, part of my weekly grocery shopping extravaganza has been picking up a can of Westbrae organic corn. I normally heat it up, throw half of it into a baked potato with salsa for lunch, and keep the other half as a side for some later meal. Turns out, though, I never bothered to take a close look at the can. Westbrae is not only a supplier of organic produce, they're also a supporter of the vegetarian lifestyle. Given, they have a vested interest in promoting more vegetables in peoples' diets. But the interesting thing is the vegetarian food pyramid they show on their cans. Instead of being a daily intake system, it's actually divided by tiers of how often each catagory should be eaten. Take a look:

How cool is that? I would say I pretty much have been following that to the 't' without ever really thinking about it. But I thought you might find it interesting to see how a vegetarian's diet is actually broken down. It's not all pastas, or all vegetables, etc. But it's a good balance between energy, protein, and a sufficient distribution of fats and oils...and it's all delicious.

The Third Reason

Three classic reasons to go vegetarian:

1) You don't kill sentient beings. This both decreases the overall pain in the world and increases the overall pleasure (the utilitarian perspective)
2) You eat a healthier, more complete diet able to not only sustain but promote your well-being regardless of your age, stage in life, or how much protein your daily activities require.
3) It's better for the environment.

I've mentioned reasons 1 and 2 before, but I don't know how public the third reason is or how much you may know about it. So, here's a video (linked to Live Earth's webpage):



Not pleasant? True, but it happens (no, really, there's a famous quote to back me up on that one). And the fact remains that for one person to go vegetarian, they would singularly have a more positive impact on the environment than if they switched to a hybrid and lived the perfect energy-conservative lifestyle. What the video doesn't do a great job of explaining is the big picture of animal production; consider the massive trucks, machines, buildings, processing, McWrappers, waste product (those parts we don't eat), waste product (which the video showed), etc. that go into transporting and producing one cow's worth of meat.

However, what the video was excellent at was not proposing a large paradigm shift. One day a week, "say...Tuesdays," is all that's necessary to make a huge impact on the environment (and the overall utility of the world and your own health, to boot).

"They Remind Me of Who I AM"

Another beautiful film, spliced from the longer version of Ashes and Snow.

Fear or Laziness?

or, Impeccably Imperfect

"Actually, the gap between, say, Plato or Nietzsche and the average human is greater than the gap between that [super-]chimpanzee and the average human. The realm of the real spirit -- the true artist, the saint, the philosopher -- is rarely achieved. Why so few?"

I've been wrestling with a comment SLC left me a few posts ago. In the most convivial manner, I have no doubt, SLC lovingly suggested I not be so hard on myself. In her words, I seem to forget that I'm not a deity. While I'll readily admit I'm increadibly demanding of myself, I view it more as an attempt to be impeccable rather than to be perfect.

The difference is subtle, but, at least for me, it is exceedingly important. To be impeccable, as I use the term, is to have no internal, self-derived faults. In the words of dictionary.com, it's to be flawless; irreproachable; not liable to sin; or even incapable of sin (sin here referring to its original usage meaning "missing the mark"). To be perfect, on the otherhand, is to have no faults, simpliciter. Both outside and inside factors go into that notion, both things one can control and those one cannot, at least how I'll be using it to differentiate between the two concepts.

Now, as always, I must preface any discussion of human potential with a clear and direct caveat that I do not consider myself to be on par with deities, Plato, Nietzsche, or any of the greats. However, I think there is another distinction to be drawn with individuals such as these, of which I do hold myself to be at least near par; there's a difference between the production of great works of art, truth, and life and that of the motivation or the internal constitution to always strive towards the production of such works.

The difference, then, lies within the causes, not the effects, of our rational will. If I am prevented by fate or luck or disaster, so be it. But if it such great works of truth are prevented from coming to fruition by some cause internal to my own design (even if that be in a deterministic understanding of my "free will", so long as that cause passes through my own reasoning), then I am responsible for not doing more and, hence, the lack of such beauty coming into the physical realm of reality.

I might be charged with holding myself to some supererogatory level of existence; but I'm not saying I can't go see a movie or relax with friends. My life is what is in question, here, not the philosophical products of my career, alone. When the common greats that come to mind -- Plato, Beethoven, Einstein, Goethe -- there is some definitive, well-known contribution to the world. But there are those we know personally who have reached even higher potentials, because they do so with a harmony amongst all aspects of their life. Where Mozart may have been a rake despite his art, the archetypal mother in the neighborhood full of wandering kids who treats each with respect and loving appreciation has contributed her due potential of truth and beauty to the world. All aspects of life, then -- be it intellectual, physical, interpersonal, or otherwise -- could and, in my opinion, should be examined with this aim at impeccability. "An unexamined life..." so they say.

So, SLC knows me well; in a sense, I was back the next day "pursuing immortality." Not in any sense aiming at perfection, but with a constant drive towards impeccability. Do I fail at this aim? Often. I fully embrace my "moments of weakness," but I feel that I accomplish so much more with such a greater depth of experience when this is my aim, not necessarily what I'm able to achieve. Instead of turning a blind eye to sleeping in late when I'm not actually tired or watching sitcoms that I don't even find that entertaining, I think I end up with a more interactive life lived and, if nothing else, better stories to tell on DW. It's more of a constant awareness of my actions and the persistent questioning of my motivation behind them; is this what I really want to be doing right now, or am I doing it merely as a default/easy way to pass the time I've got this go around?

Was that a little over the top? I hope not. Either way, I'd appriciate comments and reactions to that. In the meantime...

Namaste'.

The Middle-Man

"Killing animals to get the nutrients that are contained by plants in the first place is – as in the case of dairy – unnecessary (and thus cruel) as well as terribly inefficient and wasteful."

-Colleen Patrick-Goudreau

What question is first asked when discussing all things vegetarian? The question about the nutrients; not only protein, but the vitamins and minerals, as well. The title of this post is linked to one of the most well-written, non-preachy, purely informative-without-being-overly-technical pieces I've read about veganism (for the best book of similar nature, try Becoming Vegan). The author asks a good question; why is it only when vegetarianism is mentioned that people start questioning nutrient intake? Why not, "Oh, you're an omnivore. That's pretty interesting. How do you get your fiber/antioxidants/complex carbohydrates?"

As I'm sure I've hinted at before, I love animals and all that jazz, and the positive impact on the environment is something I notice, but the real reason I became vegan is for health reasons. This is why the above quote from the article fascinated me so much. Thoreau said it in Walden Pond, something to the effect that all animals lower on the food chain build muscles, bones, a healthy nervous system, etc. by eating nothing but a strict vegetarian diet. Nope, they don't even drink their mothers milk once their digestive system is able to handle solid food. Naturally, then, there's no reason we can't do the same (the things that might be argued to set us apart -- our capacity to reason and have moral worth -- are not dependent on anything found by eating the flesh other animals).

The article talks about a couple interesting points, like how the calcium in milk actually must be artificially placed into the cow's diet, as there's no longer room for them to graze in actual pastures where the green, leafy, calcium rich vegetable matter grows. But if you go straight to the source -- eating green, leafy vegetables -- you get all the benefits of the calcium without 1) the puss from overtaxed udders and 2) the "calcium-leeching animal protein" that accompanies most milk drinkers' daily diets. A second good point made on this issue: imagine, at your age, drinking human breast milk. Even imagine it going through the same pasteurization/processing method used in the dairy industry. Doesn't that still seem odd?

In defense, I know a lot of people just like the taste of a juicy prime-rib, a cut of sirloin, or their 2% on their cereal in the mornings. But I'd wager most people have switched milk types at some point in their lives. Have you ever gone from whole to 2%, or 2% to 1%, or skim? It tastes and "feels" odd for a bit, but after awhile, your old preference is suddenly foreign. What you drank for years just doesn't quite taste right. I found the same thing with Silk. I tried the non-flavored, then the vanilla, and I settled on the Light Vanilla. It's not too thick and has a good flavor to it. It took me a bit (a week or two) to settle into where I wasn't consciously thinking, "this tastes different...oh, that's because I'm drinking bean-juice." One day, just like % did for me years ago, it just became a background for my delicious Kashi Cinnamon Harvest cereal. I found the same thing as I gave up beef, poultry and fish. In fact, what's better, I found out how much I love red bell peppers, field greens, honeydew melons, and Royal Gala apples (and, yes, I did try about 12 other kinds of apples before I found those). Things I never ate prior to my switch don't "fill the void" caused by a lack of meat, but simply take preference in taste to what now seems foreign and (forgive me) grotesque to my senses.

Ok, to wrap up this little vegan rant my friends were probably wise to stop reading after the first quote, let me just say this; as mentioned in the article this post is linked to, I agree with the author that we've become overly obsessed with single nutrients. We obsess over calcium or omega-3, or worry about whether we're getting the right amount or the right kind of proteins. But I don't think there's any such thing as a well-balanced diet. I eat what I'm hungry for, and let me tell you, biting into an artichoke heart unexpectedly in the middle of an Italian salad is pure bliss. I stock my fridge and pantry with good, solid, whole foods and build my meals up from there. And I gotta say, I'm now in the best shape of my life (even considering my highschool swimteam days...TDZ has the picture to prove it).

Anyways, I hope this wasn't too much of a bore, and that you didn't take this as a lecture (or stopped reading before you felt that way). Feel free to leave comments, but know that I don't look down upon anyone just because they like the taste of meat. I've tasted both sides of the debate, and I simply prefer my food the way I do. This was simply meant to dispel a couple myths and answer the question most often asked.

"The point here is to demonstrate that far from being deficient in essential nutrients, plant-based diets are actually brimming with them."

The Hanged Man

You are the Hanged Man

Self-sacrifice, Sacrifice, Devotion, Bound.

The Hanged Man is perhaps the most fascinating card in the deck. It reflects the story of Odin who offered himself as a sacrifice in order to gain knowledge. Hanging from the world tree, wounded by a spear, given no bread or mead, he hung for nine days. On the last day, he saw on the ground runes that had fallen from the tree, understood their meaning, and, coming down, scooped them up for his own. All knowledge is to be found in these runes.

The Hanged Man, in similar fashion, is a card about suspension, not life or death. It signifies selflessness, sacrifice and prophecy. You make yourself vulnerable and in doing so, gain illumination. You see the world differently, with almost mystical insights.

[For those who don't know, the title of my posts are always linked to relevant, interesting, or occasionally random-ass sites. So, for instance, this post's title is linked to the online tarot card "personality" quiz. Leave comments with your results!]

As a Languid Torch

Just about a week ago, I took a nasty spill off my mountain bike while, of all things, riding home from working out. It wasn't gruesome, as I managed to tuck and roll just in time. I only had a minor road-rash on my left forearm, but the brunt of my fall ended up directly on the connective tissue between my left clavicle and acromion. Interesting fact; in attempting to find the impressive sounding name 'acromion', aka the shoulder socket bones (and, be honest, you were impressed), I came across the information that a clavicle fracture is the most common breakage in adults, accounting for 1 out of 20 adult bones broken. Hrm...imagine that.

In fact, I have been worrying on and off this past week whether I actually did break something. I got back most of my movement by the third day, but I've still got some shooting pains and a fairly intriguing bump where there shouldn't be one. Considering the persistence of this thing, I actually went to the campus doc's office for a couple x-rays today. Luckily, they didn't see anything broken; just some severely inflamed tendons.

But there's a bigger problem. I think I've been using this lack-of-a-left-arm thing as an excused to make myself feel better about not doing anything with my days. AS (what's your middle name?) has been calling me trying to get me back to the gym. True, I can't lift weights or really do any upper-body stuff so far, but I haven't even been keeping up with my running. And this is a week off (ok, I did go once) after being at the gym 6 days a week so far this summer. Even more, I don't think I'm living up to Shaw's ideal, brightly burning torch, as I quoted in my last post.

Bouncing at night is great, as 1) I'm already going to be awake and 2) it leaves my days completely free for productivity. But while I've been getting up at 7 or 8, eating breakfast, reading my comic strips (and the news), I end up going back to bed for another couple hours for a lack of anything better to do. Which is a lie. I have so much I could be doing - interesting books I could be reading, some furniture refinishing projects in their final stages, even a couple e-mails to friends which are overdue. The problem is that, at 9 or 10 in the morning, all of that can be done later in the day. But after having gone back to bed, I wake up again with the same mentality: There's always tomorrow, or next week, or after I move up to Madison. But that leaves each day in-between a complete waste of breath. And we've only got so many (though I've decided I'm going to live to 117, just so you know).

The point of this post is to publicly let forth my barbaric yawp from the rooftops of the world: Tomorrow, no more wasted breaths. I'm going to get up and be ready to do whatever doesn't directly cause my shoulder to scream (really, it screams...scared the shit out of the girl on the elliptical next to me the other day) at the gym first thing in the morning. Then, after a shower and shave (the lack of which is a great indicator of how much I haven't been doing anything with my time) I'm going to actually do something with my day. I'll let you know how it goes, but the overall point is to do one thing, each day, directly promoting each of my ideals. I know, it sounds lofty. But, for example, my ideal for my first action upon waking up is to look good naked (in the words of Lester Burnham). I'll let you know how that's going, too.

To Be Thoroughly Used Up

“This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being a force of nature instead of being a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work, the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no 'brief candle' to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.”

— George Bernard Shaw

Ashes and Snow

The most beautiful film you've ever seen...

Perhaps the waves are telling us
'Remember your dreams. Remember your dreams. Remember your dreams.'

Nepal or Bust

Those of you who’ve known me for a good long while probably remember my love of Nepal. Not the current political disruptions, but the peasant villages, mountains, and orchard paths. For a long time, I wanted to spend a couple months from the Fall after my senior year there. The plan was to buy a ticket there, a ticket back, and have 200 bucks in my pocket for the trip. And it could be done. But, due to the circumstances of where I was at and what I needed to do to keep moving forward academically, there was simply no way to not postpone that trip.

And I do say postpone, because the intent to make that trip hasn’t passed. I haven’t thought about it in awhile, but just recently I’ve been realizing that, quite literally, everything in my life is turning out beautifully. I’m moving up to a scenic, progressive, intellectual city; I’m starting work on my doctorate in Philosophy at a school with an amazing reputation which is only continuing to move up the charts; my coursework, advisor, and TA assignment all fell perfectly into place; and, to be frank, outside of all that my heads in the right place, again. So why not make this trip?

It is something I’ve not been telling myself I need to do but have been feeling deep down that I need to do. JMD, when I was out at his cabin in Colorado, asked me why I needed to go halfway around the world when I could achieve the same level of isolation within 14 hour drive. There’s nothing mystical or special about Nepal – it’s just the place that’s calling to me. What’ll I do there? Nothing…and everything. I plan to not plan a thing, outside the aforementioned ticket there and ticket home. And given the recent resurgence of my bike riding, I see no reason why I can’t pack up my bike (and more than a few spare tubes) and send that with me. Add to that some hiking gear, a tent and pad, and the tools to cook some rice, and I’m set. Travel some, hike some, converse some, but spend a good deal about a day's ride from a village for necessities, but far enough away to be completely alone. Completely alone. Maybe I’ll take turns between sitting under a Bodhi tree and letting out a battle roar (in honor of NRZ). Whatever it is, I feel it’s important that I do this.

Naturally, I won’t be able to this coming Fall. As I mentioned in passing, I’ve got a great schedule lined up for the coming term. Add to that getting settled into Madison, acquiring a second job bartending, and finding the intriguing and eccentric med-school student to share my life with, I’ll have a pretty full plate. But after a year in the program, I might see about taking a semester off for Fall ’08. Get someone to sub-lease my apartment for the term having acquired all my inoculations, passports, and languages-learned in the semester leading up to it, and then just go. **Blink** and gone from the world of the known for a couple months. How’s that sound?

Namaste’.