Megashear Ranch

2003-02-05T20:05:00.000-08:00

Groundhog Day

It's Ground Hog Day. Well close enough.

First they drag Blix before the Insecurity Counsel and he says he sees the shadow of weapons of mass destruction but he's not sure. He needs more time to be really really sure that he's not sure.

Then Bush gets dragged before the teleprompters, sees the unemployment figures, Down Jones average, housing starts, and falling industrial production. Heroically fights off the urge to wet himself.

Then a confused rodent blinks under bright lights wondering why he's out here when the burrow is nice and warm. And dark. And say didn't this happen last year?

Lastly Colin Powel holds a press conference and says that rats are busy sneeking around in Iraq hiding stuff.

Six more months of War!

Back to the Burrow.

2003-02-04T01:42:00.000-08:00

It's All Fucked Up

The problem with Utopias is that they are perfect. The problem with perfection, is it's static. The problem with being static is that the Universe keeps moving. And the problem with that is no usuable information comes from the future.

Further the boundry of now is chaotic. What that means is you can predict the future, but not exactly. Eventually the future becomes something quite different than what you predicted.

Thus the problem with Utopias. You can only design them to last forever with the information you have now. But you can't see the future and you can't really predict the future from the past very well. Which sucks if you're trying to build a static Utopia. Cause eventually things become unperfect as the universe you thought you were going to have drifts from the universe that you really end up with.

Well actually it's even worse then that. Because the universe is big and chaotic, and our minds are really small, usually what we end up with isn't really a Utopia, it's hell on earth. In fact there is a positive cooralation between how perfect the utopia was supposed to be and how shitty it actually ends up as. It's because only fools think they are smart enough to build a Utopia.

So what to do....

Well if you can't build a staticUtopia, then how about a dynamic one? Well the trouble with that is that a Utopia is 'perfect' and dynamic means that it deviates from perfect. Thus damm it all! it's not perfect Arrrggggghhhhh!

So what to do.... Poink! Well if something eventually fails, then it can't really be perfect can it? Or maybe failure is part of being perfect. Hmm....

So there is this machine at the Ranch. It's an old plotter. And it's in hell. The demons at the ranch are poking at it, trying to get it to plot porn. It's old, everything built out of descete parts, resistors, capasitors, and old transistors in metal cans with GE stamped on them. The Y axis ain't working, but the X axis does. The interesting thing is that if you put your hand on the X-axis motor you can feel it vibrate. Thats the dithering circuit, moving the motor ever so slightly back and forth to keep it from sticking.

It's perfect, even though it's not quite right. Because over the long run it works better, because it'll still work even though the bearings get sticky.

There is a leason here. Perfection in the real world is imperfect, and better chaotic. That is the perfect society is one that is just fucked up enough.

This explains everything, why we die and why the ecconomy of France underperforms. In a utopia we'd still be building plotter like this old dead one. But we're not, we're fucked up. Everything is done half assed if we have an ass at all. Cause we're fucked up.

And only Perfect

2003-02-02T20:57:00.000-08:00

Mine

I would like to take this time to say that, all of the opinions expressed here are mine.
This is my opinion. Not yours, mine!
If you want an opinion, get your own damm opinion and leave mine alone.
Cause this is my opinion!
Not yours!
mine!

2003-01-30T03:24:00.000-08:00

A monkey analysis of Social Science Culture

The culture that developed in the graduate level social science programs in western universities during the post modern period, from the start of the the cold war to the present, is characterized by the expression of deep seated castration anxiety vis hard science and engineering. And is combined with extreme social-sexual isolation.

It is well known that primate males establish social rank by a display where they expose their erect genitals to each other to both display their maleness and to compare size. The most aggressive monkey with the biggest penis is dominant.

Social Studdies culture is effected by an emasculating catastrophy. Because they youngest members of university community they have little social standing. This explains their frequent displays and jockying for social position. Further the cultural disaplines of engineering and physical science by releasing nuclear fire on the world emasculated all other cultural branches in the modern western University. This was especially true of the adolescent social studies culture. Being castrated they have no access to any meaningful sexual outlet.

Thus social science culture was emasculated and now suffers from an ingrained social disconnect. Culturally this evolved into an intellectualized prison culture. All of the dysfunctional elements of an exo-repressed society are present. Thus the graduate studies inmate mirrors his prison counterpart. Whereas the prisoner is subject to physicalogical and psychological sexualized abuse, the grad student is similarly subject to intellectualized sexual abuse. The graduate advisor takes the student to be his intellectual bitch. And debases him intelectually to compensate for his own feelings of sexual sociological anxiety.

2003-01-28T13:26:00.000-08:00

Alert! Owoooga! Ahwooga! Breep! Breep! Owooga!

We're under attack

Captain! Network connections are slow! Half of our sites are offline!

All Sysadmins to battle stations! Server room! Whats going on down there! There's packets everywhere captain! The servers they can't take it much longer. We're installing patches as fast as we can. But the worm keeps multiplying!

Owoooga! Ahwooga! Breep! Breep! Owooga!

Captain! Korea reports all network connections down, stock market tanking. Dammit! We have to do something or our 401k's are ruined!

2003-01-26T20:32:00.000-08:00

Mexican beer

I had a friend once, he was annoyed by people who thought that the word 'mexican' was a slur. Course he was the guy that went around saying, "I'm not latino, I'm not hispanic, I'm a Mexican because I'm from Mexico!"

So whatz up with the absolute silence about Mexican Beer? People talk about beer as if Mexico didn't exist. Mexico makes good cheap beer! Especially, cheap good beer that you can drink when it's hot out. Sure you can drink American Beer but that stuff sucks ass without the ass. Sure you can drink a micro-brew or some fux European import and die of dehydration in quick order.

To Hell with the cheap American beer, and the premium American Suck Ass brands like miller and coors. Save the good dark stuff for those cool nights at the ranch when you're banging on stuff. Drink Cheap Mexican Beer in the sun. It's good, it's cheap, and it's Beer!

2003-01-26T20:11:00.000-08:00

Stairwell 28

Lovely thing about SF is ocean beach. I've never been there during the day, always at night. Nothing better than standing around a fire, drinking beer as the waves crash in the background. Even more special because there are so few beaches in Kalifornia that you can be at after dark, build fires, and much less drink beer.

Last night I went out with friends and fired pots on Ocean Beach. Sweet! It's the middle of January and we're hanging out around a fire, the night is warm and all down the beach is a line of fires burning in the night. While the pottery was being fired, we spun chains, I learned a new trick, a seemless transition from a left handed spin to a right hand one. First time in maybe six months I've learned something new.

All the cups I made spalled as I was warming them. Heated them too fast I think. The beads and Um... lets just say that the hippy god smiled on us. Something awing about pulled pots glowing orange out of the fire, setting them on the sand and watching as the colors change as they cool. The insides of the pots gowing orange as the outsides cooled. Is Goot! The loss of the cups and the saki pot don't bother me as clay is cheap ass. I'll use them to test glazes next time.

The firing technique I'm using is simple. Build a small fire, set the pots two feet away. Turn every so often so that they heat evenly. Inching them closer and closer till they are right next to the fire. Then start slowly putting coals around them till they are covered. Then push them into the fire and let it rip. After an hour or two pull glowing pots out of the fire and put them on the sand.

2003-01-21T22:46:00.000-08:00

Turing Test

In 1950, Alan Turing asked the question Can a Machine Think and proposed to answer that question via a simple test known to geeks everywhere as the famous Turing Test(tm).

The idea behind the Turing test is that if a guy talking to person and a computer machine via instant messenger can't figure out which of the two is the man and which is the machine, then the machine can be deemed to be intelligent.

The question we at the Ranch ask is, who cares if a machine can think? Our answer: Can it fetch us another Beer? No? What good is it!?

What we really want to know is does the machine have a nice ASS? Is it sexy? Can we fuck it?

We at the RaNcH in honor of Alan 'I'm a depressed gay math geek" Turing, propose our own Test.

The first person to build a computer machine, that by itself, of itself, without any help or prompting, can get itself laid wins. Thatz right, stupped, boinked, fucked silly by a real live person.

You have to admit, this is a hell of a lot more interesting than wondering if a machine can think. In the last fifty years of trying to figure out what inteligence is, all we've been able to figure out is that we're a lot dumber than we thought we were.

The prize is... um... $100 gift certificate from GoodVibes

2003-01-20T11:59:00.000-08:00

Ranchonix Tonight!

Tonight is geek night at RaNCh We drink beer and do nasty things to elektrons. You might ask, what have those Elektrons done to you? Who cares there is more where they came from.

Is also clay. We have fifty pounds of clay for your pleasure. Comrades who want to do clay stuph tonight can do to instead of electonique. Next Saturday the 25th, I fire clay at Stairwell 28, 7:30pm-till done. Any clay do-hickies made tonight can be fired then.

Message over.

2003-01-18T16:26:00.000-08:00

It's all working up to something

Well in a desparate attempt to not clean out my van, I'm here typing. I just finished making a small saki bottle and I'm quiet pleased. Most of my friends are off at the Anti-War Rally in San Francisco. Me, I thought we should have killed Saddam twenty years ago. Course no one listened and here we are. Cause that isn't that same as saying that the anti-war protests are a bad idea.

From the news the aircraft carrier groups have all be ordered to the gulf. Should be there in a few weeks. It's Baghdad or bust. Well actually there is no or about it. The troops are going in one way or another. Hopefully its with Saddam running off without a shot. Last time he was all gung ho for a fight. Course last time it wasn't him that was looking at dying. Who knows.

Friends of mine have been wondering why we're so hot after Hussains ass. I'll give three reasons.

There has been a large number of people in the admin who thought that it was a mistake to not kill Saddam in 91. And not to go after him in 98 when he kicked out the weapons inspectors.

And then there is oil, or more who controls it. Before this whole mess started Uncle Sam thought that about 50% of the world oil suppy was in the hands of unfriendlies. Now with the Saudis appearing not to friendly, it's more like 80%. *cough* *hack*.

The current admin is engaging in strategy of draining the swamps. They might be confused about what a swamp looks like but here we are. Iraq is a swamp and the hawks in the admin are keen to drain it.

Combine the three together and what do you have? An armada sailing for iraq as we speak.

One thought I just had was that the needs for a large number of troops for the iraqi campaign, might explain why the US relied so heavly on locals in the Afghan war and commited so few troops there afterwards. Because they didn't want the army busy in Afghanistan when it became time to attack Iraq.

2003-01-17T02:23:00.000-08:00

Spring is Sprong!

Well it's about time that I give my impression of the new year and while I'm at it, the last two. Lord knows if I don't do it now I'll never get around to it.

2001 was the year of disbelief as the crack fueled ecconomy crashed hard. One might say that the word crack is hyperbol. But I'm pretty sure that a lot of that dot come money went right up peoples noses. Then at the end there was a certain unpleasentness in New York.

2002 was the cracked out year. Everyone depressed without jobs, worried about jobs, worried about the state of the world, etc. Reminds me of a cartoon I saw from the 1973 book of the year of the "Bad Year" blimp with a small frightened man peeking out at the world down below.

2003... Well all I can say is that I've been invited, caught wind of, and otherwise heard of three sex related parties in as many dayz. This on top of the usual stuff going on in the city of perverts.

And then there is fearless leaders grand plan for a full immersion porn party at ThE MeGaSheaR RaNCh. I think this bodes well for the coming year! Sure the ecconomy sucks, politics sucks, and it's become obvious that we're in the midst of World War III, but we're used to it and well, we're horny and looking for a good time.

Note the link to GoodVibrations under SEX.

2003-01-16T12:58:00.000-08:00

Car Rant

My car makes a couple of different warning sounds to alert me that I'm about to do something stupid. When I start my car without my seat belt on, a warning buzzer sounds. Trey annoying. Less annoying is when I open the car door with my head lights on" The car sounds a fast excited chime.

What is odd then is the times that the car doesn't sound warning.

When the Fuel level drops below a gallon one would think it would be nice if the car sounded a momentary chime to let you know. But nope, no importamenta.

Check Engine Light? Low Oil Pressure? Engine Overheating? Nope nada. You'd think...

Whatz Up wif dat?

2003-01-16T00:43:00.000-08:00

When I hear the Word Culture I reach for my Flame Thrower

About twenty years ago I started mentioning to my friends that culture wasn't about skin color or wearing funny hatz. Culture is what you do and why you do it and that what you wear isn't really that important in saying who you are.

For instance, putting on your pants in the morning and going to your day job is a cultural thing. Getting a low interest mortgage from a federally insured Savings and Loan is a cultural thing. Ditto buying things on short-term credit. The way people deal with property rights, law, and business are cultural constructs and are very important and they have everything to do with culture

I've also said that these things are actually more important culturally than the language you speak and the types of clothes that you wear.

There is this idea that one culture is as good as another, which is true if you think of culture as funny hatz, wooden shoes and the like. Not true if you think that culture is about what people do day to day. If you think of culture this way then cultures can have vast power. And it explains why when two cultures meet one often goes under.

People don't like this idea at all.

Doesn't matter. Cause it's true.

What does this mean for the future? Starting a hundred and fifty years with the advent of rail and ships, the walls between cultures started to come down. With cheap air travel, the walls are down world wide.

All the cultures in the world are now cow-mingling. Moo! International Travel is Up. More people than ever know second languages. Commerce is a serious world wide international affair. People of different faiths are talking more and more with each other. With the internet, one can read foreign news papers, blogs and correspond people all over the world.

The biggies, interracial and interfaith marriage are up.

And the people who are afraid that their cultures are sinking under the waves of history are freaking out big time. Well actually they are afraid of losing the power that their cultures give them.

What you see now is this vast change underway in the way that people conduct their lives. America gets blamed a lot for spreading it's culture around and destroying other cultures. But that is really a blame game. What really happened is that America was the place where the transformation to western culture was completed first. For an interesting read about Americanism and the world.

Over

2003-01-15T17:28:00.000-08:00

Dorkbots

Tonight is dorkbots at the ThE RanCh in Beautiful Bayview. Bunch of geeks presenting talks on Robotics, Culture Jamming, and Post Industrial Sex Toys.

2003-01-13T21:35:00.000-08:00

We have Demands you Capitalist Pigs

We have demands you capitalist running pigsdogs. Yes it is true we are working on devices of mass obnoxication. It is our sovereign right to do so even through we told you that we wouldn't. You gave us money and food. We do not care. Your government is daughter of prostitute. But we are men of great honor. Especially fearless leader! He has kindly take time to make list of new demands.

Demands are is this

Super carnitas burrito from Taqueria San Jose. Yummy.
Your ASS! Thatz right you capitalist pigdog. Drop your pants!
More Beer You heard us more beer! Best be cold.
One pair of Black Pajamas. XXX size with Bunny logo. Last pair worn need replace.
Super Mario Brothers Nintendo cartridge to replace broken one.
One Case Tanqueray Gin. And dozen limes.
28 million barrels of diesel fuel.
Dry Cleaning You do us laundry No starch like last time. Or we been really mad!
Wide Screen Plasma TV. No LCD! DVD player and DirectTV like Bush have
You move Buffy to 1pm your time. Come on way too late what you thinking!
Send mistress flowers and release her mother from labor camp #5. Or maybe #17? 'secretary you figure out'
Naked Girl Movie! On DVD. No VHS. Old ones get fuzzy. Fearless leader no Like Fuzzy. Also no like big hairy guy.
1kilo Ducs de Gascogne Brand Pâté and box crackers.

If you give into demands we give you nothing. That right! But you able tell your sheep dog people that you do something about us. We not afraid! You spinless chicken weasels.

Remember no starch!

2003-01-10T02:40:00.000-08:00

something with accordians, maybe

One of the wonderful things about SF is that it's a drinking town. Unlike my home town of San Hoser, bars are fun places to be and every neighborhood has a few that are at least a short stagger away. You can basically find any kinda of bar you like. Even something with accordians. . .

Mad Max, who holds the lease the Megashear Ranch has this to say about accordian enabled bars.

That combo would lead me to the ODEON, althought the good beer is more expensive than $2... they do have cheap Papst ( or however you spell it ), somewhat frequent nudity and top of the line accordian players ( no shit, Mark Growden plays there all the time )

The HUSTLER CLUB has $2 Tuesdays, everything but top shelf booze is two bucks. Not a bad deal, although the chicks don't get naked. They will come over, sit on your lap and make you stink all night from cheap perfume. You leave smelling like a cheap hooker, thats just all right, everyone should smell like a cheap hooker from time to time.

The CROWBAR on Broadway in Northbeach has cheap booze, no live music, and frequenty hot chicks with tatoos who'll kick your ass if you attempt to deface there shoot'em up video game while drinking too much on your birthday. You leave with a big dent in your head. As long as you don't fuck with the video games, this is a very nice bar.

SKIPS, in Bernal Heights, has live music, booze is pretty cheap, and you don't want to see the chicks naked in this place, believe me, you just don't wanna see then naked. Go there and see for yourself, you'll understand, you just don't wanna see these chicks naked.

The ATTIC at 24th & Mission has resonably priced booze, no live music, and you have to keep your cloths on. There only saving grace is the excelent mexican resturants nearby and they allow you to bring food into the bar. The bathroom is very small, you can lock the door and turn off the lights; this is important, if you don't know why, stop reading this.

The WILD SIDE WEST, in Bernal Heights, has reasonably priced booze, but no live music. This dyke bar is The Best bar in Bernal. I once saw two chicks get into a fight over a pool game and tear each others shirt off. They both had really nice titties; this doesn't happen often enough.

AMERA at 16th and Velencia isn't really a bar, but has top notch belly dancers and mid eastern music. The food is great and the show kicks ass. The mideastern musicians are old and very skilled. The belly dancers are young, have hot tattoos, and are very skilled. Ever have a 'stiffy' with your lamb kibabs?

ANY bar in The Mission with a neon gimlet glass sign will have cheap booze, unlikely to have lives music, and if you wait until everyone is good and drunk around 1am, someone will take there shirt off - I will probably be some dayworker who smells bad, but you never know. If someone doesn't take there shirt off, there will either be a fight or you will slip in vomit on the sidewalk while leaving the bar. These bars are best visited earlier in the evening.

2003-01-09T15:26:00.000-08:00

Working on that Html Stuff

Been working all day on dat html stuff. Reminds me Wordperfect 5.0 Funny that I never wrote a line of it during the dot com thingy. Funny I still receive a pay check twice a month.

Speaking of rotten apples

2003-01-08T20:23:00.000-08:00

Daily Rant

Well now here is a word that I haven't heard for a long time, the word draft. Seems some foolz want to introduce a bill to reinstate the draft. I feel a facial tick coming on already.

"Reps. Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) and John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), both armed services veterans, said this week they would ask the House to consider legislation to reinstitute the draft" and "If indeed the president believes war is necessary in terms of our national welfare, then he has to believe that sacrifices need to be made, and those sacrifices need to be shared," Rangel said. "We have to kick up a notch the sense of patriotism and the sense of obligation."

Well ain't that just great. And a couple of democrazies too. Who are these putzs anyways and why are they breathing my air! God hates me. Everytime I hear the term patriotism and the sense of obligation(tm) I get all nervous and sweaty.

You'll have to excuse me, I grew up in the shadow of the Vietnam War. If you're under 35, imagine that first ten years of your life was spent in a world where your government drafts innocent young men (thats you!) and sends them off to be shot at in a stupid insane foreign war. All because putz's like Dingle and Conyer don't have the guts to admit they're wrong. For this there are 50,000 young men aren't around any more.

Conyers said in a statement that "once the conscription process for service in the military becomes universal and mandatory for all those who meet the criteria . . . it removes the long-held stigma that people of color and persons from low-income backgrounds are disproportionately killed and injured while serving as ground troops on the front line."

BFD. I'll agree that the above is true. But it's also true that no one put a gun to their heads and forced them to enlist unlike what happens under the draft.

Under a draft you still have the less educated types getting shot at and the better educated types processing letters that say "dear Mr and Mrs so and so it is my regret to inform..." The only difference that you have under the draft, is some poor disadvantaged type getting shot at because Reps Rangel and Conyers want to make a statement about national responsibility.

One thing that annoys the snot out of me is people who are disingenuously stupid. That is they say something stupid expecting me to believe it. Thatz doubly insulting. First cause they're lying to me and second because they think I'm stupid as well. This is really common in politics. On one hand you have a public that doesn't want to face the truth and politicians on the other who are all to happy to tell them the lies that they want to hear and me getting all steamed up in the middle

Course they aren't alone in this whole lying about this war on Iraqi and this or that mess. The Bush Admin is lying through it's teeth too cause they are are also afraid to say the real truth. In a word we're doomed.

The reasons that people didn't want to kill Saddam in 91 are still good reasons to kill him today. People didn't want him killed in 91 because it'd upset the middle-east apple cart and the rotten apples therein. Which is admittedly a bad thing if you're one of those rotten apples or relying on them to contain communism and Islamic Fascism.

Well now we're not so sure we like certain people in the region. The real reason the admin wants to kill Saddam is that it'd give us direct control of Iraqis oil fields. Then they'll be able to put a hell of a lot more pressure on the House of Saud.

Now I'm starting to sound like Henry Kissinger.

*cough spit*

Now there are those that oppose a war saying that Iraq is a sovereign country and that the Iraqi's have the right to self-determination. Bhah! Humbug! Since when is Saddam a sovereign country? And when did the Iraqi's ever get to exercise their right of self-determination? We the British and others helped him to power and kept him there. We, and the British, and the Saudis saved his ass after he stuppidly attacked Iran in 82 and again after made a grab for the Kuwaiti oil fields and '91.

Course there are also those that say they just want peace not war. I heard this a lot after 911. Mean while the gang bangers in Bayview are driving around with American Flags flying from their Big American Cars. Many people want peace. A little peace of Poland! A little bit of France. A little bit of Turkey per chance.

You want peace? I tell you how to achive peace! What the world really needs is less hypocritical patriotism and sense of obligation(tm)of the type espoused by Dingle and Conyers.

And more dirt bikes, tight pants and short skirts on young people.

And beer don't forget beer! Also clubs with good dance music and lots of dark private corners where young men and women can mack in.

And just who are the main enemies of dance clubs, beer short skirts, and dark private corners where young men and women can mack on each other? The House of Saud + various Islamic Fascists. Who are we really at war with, House of Saud + various Islamic Fascists.

There are those who are pessimistic. I'm not, Europe, Russia, Asia and the America's have already taken over by the forces of cheap beer, short skirts, tight pants and dance music. All that is left is the middle east and half of that is already ours! Bwahahaha!

Will will win! Because you can't fight dance music, tight pants, short skirts, and beer without seriously pissing people off till they hate your very guts. Eventually everything starts to fall appart till one day...

QEFD

2003-01-08T19:18:00.000-08:00

Vegas

Well here it is the end of a work day, planning world domination and I haven't done jack. Well I think I did convince the girl to go to Vegas. She's a sneaky one and is planning her arrival so that my work and her don't overlap. So she's going to show up after the CES show and we'll go off to camp in the desert afterwards.

I think a couple of million people go to Vegas every year and almost none of them venture outside city limits. Good thing if you ask me. I once complained about LA to an 80year old man who lived there all his life. He got to watch his beloved world over taken by shopping malls and tract homes.

He said, that if LA didn't exist you'd have to put all those people somewhere. Good point. Think of places like LA and Las Vegas as national sacrifice areas. All those people are going to go somewhere for vacation. Good thing that they like to hang out someplace you don’t.

Speaking of disliking Vegas. It seem that all the things that I dislike, crowds of fat bottomed poorly dressed tourists from the mid-west, drunk frat boys, hotel security, and old people obsessively plunking quarters into shot machines while smoking and drinking are the very things that some of my friends like. At least they don't have me working in a booth. Can't imagine that sort of hell on earth.

2003-01-08T12:57:00.000-08:00

ecconomic Indicators

At work today, working on world domination. This morning the major ecconomic indicator was down. While the number of cars in my parking lot is holding steady, the fee has been reduced from $9 to $7!

Further indication of the contracting SF ecconomy as it recovers from the dot com boom. Two years ago the econnomy was on crack, now it's crunch time. Jobs are scarce and many friends have been unemployed for quite a long time.

2003-01-08T00:37:00.000-08:00

Zero Hour

Well it's half past zero at the Ranch. The Ranch being an old dusty tin clad, fire trap of a wherehouz built of old growth redwood. Located in Beautiful Bayview. All is quiet save the pitter patter of little feet. Little Rat feet making their rounds. It not always quiet here at the Ranch. Last night some damm fool in a Lexus took the cops on a wild ride through bayview and onto the freeway before crashing into a guard rail. Spring and summer nights bring the sound of gunshots from off over at the projects. And cops racing around down the street like angry bee's.

I like it here. Squeek.

In San Francisco it used to be cool to live in a warehouz. Cool! Heh! Yeah when you're some wide eyed dot com yuppie who thinks that drafty substandard housing in a bad part of town is a step up from college dorm life. Course the the dot com yuppies are long gone, once the money ran out they left town in mass. Well not all of them are gone. I'm still here and so are a bunch of my friends.

A year ago I saw a young twenty something dot com girrl with red hair, walking down the street totally cracked out at 11am on a Tuesday morning. Nobody left here but us freeks, geeks, homosexuals, perverts and hard working South Americans. And the Rats who came with the miners a 150 years ago and never left.

The Ranch is where I have my studio. I don't live here. My tools and misc crap do. 300 sqft of tinkering space. There are twenty of us here off and on. My latest project is working with clay. I've been making little pinch pots and firing them in camp fires. First attempt went well the next attempt is drying in the corner. My friends think I've gone mad. Mostly cause what I usually do is more fucko. The month of December was spent recovering from a trip to the far east, coming down with mono, and hours spent online researching primative pottery techniques. I do a lot of camping trips to out of the way places. Firing pots in a camp fire while drinking beer seems like a good gig so I'm working on it.