The Immortal Winged Rat

Hello y'all, I know it's been awhile since I posted but I am trying to get back on the band wagon. This entry is going to be a little different from my previous ones, but first, I am just going to update you all with some information. I managed to get an internship with a record label called Banter. I get go to shows, take pictures and create an on going blog about the shows, similar to this one. I haven't started yet but when I do I'll be sure to send all of you the link. Secondly, I was fortunate to attend two phenomenal concerts, one of which destroyed many conceptions I had about how to play music, what is possible to achieve with music, and what is possible in a live setting. Battles put on the best concert I have seen in a couple years, it was absolutely phenomenal, and I think it will take a couple weeks for it to set in and for me to realize just what it did to me.

Now it is time for the actual subject of this blog: Pigeons, and more specifically, their immortal nature.

Have any of you ever actually seen a dead pigeon that hadn't been hit by a car or some other fortunate accident? I sure as hell haven't. Neither has my father, who initially suggested this concept to me a long time ago, and he lived in D.C., a mecca for pigeons for many years. I have been to many cities that are vastly overpopulated with pigeons, like New York and Venice, and still have never seen a dead pigeon. This leads me to two different conclusions. One is that pigeons are cannibals, and the other is that they are immortal. I prefer to believe that they are immortal because it's a lot cooler than being a cannibal.

Now comes the speculative portion of this blog. How did pigeons become immortal in the first place? What does this mean for the human race? The common pigeon, also known as the rock pigeon, seen in almost every city in the world is related closely to the dove, a beautiful, elegant bird. They were introduced to this side of the world from Europe in 1604 through a port in Nova Scotia. They were kept as pets and used, due to their homing ability, as messenger birds. My initial suspicion about how they became immortal is a result of the fact that they were brought over from the old world. Obviously, at some point before their introduction to the west, someone made a deal with the devil, in an attempt to prevent their pet from ever dying. This single immortal domesticated pigeon then escaped domestication and became feral. After interbreeding with its non-immortal counter parts, the immortal trait began to be carried down through the generations. By the time the pigeon was introduced to America, almost all pigeons carried the immortal trait. Now, because a pigeon cannot die, it is free to reproduce for all eternity, which explains why they have managed to over populate all of the great cities of earth. In the four hundred years since their introduction to this side of the world, they have managed to grab a foothold so powerful that we have no chance of ever eradicating the winged rat from our cities.

So now that we have no chance of ever removing them from our lands, how exactly do we keep the population under control? We don't, thats how, and this equals bad times around the bend for the human race. Eventually, say in a century or two, the pigeon population will vastly exceed our own and a race for resources will begin. Due to their winged nature, and their small size, I would say they have the advantage of mobility over us and eventually it will be our downfall. There will not be enough food to go around for all of the citizens, aviary and human, and something will have to change. It will be at this critical moment that we will lose our footing against the winged rat and will succumbed to starvation and an aviary flu capable of wiping all of us sad, non-winged folk off the earth. The apocalypse will not be biblical in nature, it will not be nuclear, nor will it be astronomical. It will not be sudden, but will be slow, painful, sad and dirty, and the meek winged rat shall inherit the earth. Sad days are approaching us my friends, but nothing can be done, because eventually we will be begging THE PIGEON MASTER for mercy.

Good tidings to all of you and my undying love to Dylan, Mark, Tyler, Brad, Susan, Penny, Emily, Savannah, Borg, Tanner, Laura, Maggie, and Kelley. Peace.

The Emoticon

Do you ever have those days when you wake up and everything seems to be operating at half-speed? I know I have been having those days alot recently. It might be because I am used to grey days being lazy days, and it is always grey here. It might be because I don't really have much to do these days. I don't know. I feel extremely melancholy recently, and exceedingly alone. While Andrew is still here, I am now beginning to realize that soon I will be on my own. This is my show, and as Jaxon put it so eloquently last night, my dream, and I should love every moment of it.

Life is one long-ass adventure, full of many beautiful highs, and ugly lows. But I have realized that you must embrace every moment of your life, even the really shitty ones. Think about all the pain you have experienced in your life, physical, emotional, and mental. Would you trade those experiences for anything in the world? I sure as hell wouldn't. Physical pain is an illusion, and emotional and mental pain are experiences you should wallow in from time to time. Everybody should be happy that they can feel anything at all. The gamut of emotions that we can feel are what make us distinctly human, and without them we would be no more advanced than simple animals. Because of this, you should be so very happy you can feel pain, and joy and everything else. You are blessed by the cosmos that you get be human; a thinking, feeling, intelligent being. I mean, look at the bright side, you could be a fish, or worse, an ant. Embrace your pain, love every second of it, and learn from it, because I guarantee you would miss it.

Back to the life is one long-ass adventure topic. We are young, and we have the vast majority of our lives ahead of us (baring fucked up shit happening). Why are we so pressured to have a 9 to 5 by the time we are 23? I don't want to have a 9 to 5 ever, but if I must, I sure as shit don't want it while I am still young, full of awe, and virile. I want to wander the Earth and experience as much as I can. It was liberating to me to finally accept the fact that I don't have to graduate by the time I am 22 if I am not ready to commit myself to something of the sort. You should enjoy your youth, and not let the system stress you out and fuck you over. You have your whole life to work a job you hate and raise a family, so why get to it when you are at your peak? Use your youth to do exactly what you want, not what other people think you should be doing. Fuck those people and don't listen to a thing they say to you, just listen to your heart.

I love you all, Especially Mom and Pop, Thanks for everything guys...

Zack, From Seattle

Balls of Evolution

Good evening to all of you.

The world is quite the overwhelming place at times, and human existence even more so. There is always so much to do, and so much to see and think and learn, that I do not understand how any of us ever manage to find peace of mind, but we do somehow. For me, I find solace in music, beauty, and wonderful people. It is those things that keep my mind from wandering aimlessly down winding roads with no beginning or end. Without all of that, I don't think I would ever think a clear thought, my mind would be a mash-up of discombobulated nonsensical nonsense. Sometimes I feel like my mind is like that anyways, so I can't possibly imagine what it would be like if there was nothing to keep me in check. Everybody needs something in their lives that settles them down. Be it a loved one, sports, nature, music, whatever, everybody needs it. Without it, all of us would be the most amazing assholes you have ever seen.

I was pondering something with Andrew this evening. Why is the world so concerned with itself? I mean, there are vary obvious answers to this question, like because we have to be, because its all we can see, because if we don't something bad will come of us, but what about being concerned with things outside of our world? It would take many many nuclear weapons to stop the 10,000 year ball of modern human evolution from rolling, but only one kilometer wide rock to fall from space. We as a species have accomplished a great number of wonder achievements in a very short time and there appears to be no chance of the advance slowing. It appears to me that it is constantly speeding up, with no end in sight. However, I believe there must be a breaking point somewhere, a point where we officially pushed it too far and fucked something up beyond recognition. Lets call this the FUBAR boundary. We can keep pushing and pushing, but eventually nature will push back.

At this point in our evolution, we are essentially God. We now control everything that happens upon this planet with the exception of weather, which we are working on, geologic forces, (also trying to control those), and anything that comes from space. All life on this planet is now at our whim and we could wipe it off the face of this planet if we so desired to. Does this level of control not disturb you? What the hell happened to real nature? Currently, people are building a particle collider under Switzerland with the goal of creating small black holes in a lab. Uh, so let me get this straight. You want to crete an object with gravity so strong that not even light can escape, and you want to contain it a small metal sphere? And you think that this is a good idea because...? I understand the scientific curiosity behind this, and I fully believe it can be done without destroying the planet, but at the same time I feel as if this might be stretching our reach a bit too far into something we know diddly-squat about. Hey, if it works, give the physicists their Nobel. This is exactly my point behind the FUBAR boundary. Eventually we will push our control over nature too far, and it will squash us. Enjoy the thought that somewhere in Europe, somebody is attempting to create the single most exotic and potentially dangerous planet and star destroying object in the universe. Sleep tight.

- Zack, From Vancouver

E.T. Phone Home

I love the stars. On a clear night, when you can see the band of the Milky Way, you can really make yourself feel insignificant. It is spectacular. On really clear nights, in the mountains of Colorado, you can almost feel the Earth turning under your feet. It's nights like those that make me feel as if I really am here, wandering through space with almost 7 billion of you, on our spaceship. It is quite an amazing experience to look up at the sky and have your stomach drop. It gives you a sense of scale almost. During the day, when you can't see the stars, you focus on yourself, and on the world around you. But at night, the stars make you appreciate the situation everyone of us shares with each other: the situation of being human. We are bound to this planet for infinity, even if we do eventually colonize the cosmos, and multiply into the trillions, Earth will always be the homeland, the motherland if you will.

The colonization of space brings up interesting moral quandaries for the human race. What do we do if we discover extraterrestrial life on a distant planet? Do we go and investigate, or do we quietly watch from a distance? What if an alien race finds us, and who is to say they haven't already? In my opinion, it is our prerogative to search the cosmos for habitable planets for scientific purposes only. I do not believe we have the right to impose our problems on a planet other than our own. I do not think that if we fuck this planet up too much that we should just colonize another, it won't solve anything. Some people believe that we can just spread throughout the cosmos without any respect for other planets or civilizations, but how would we feel if aliens landed on our planet and didn't respect our sovereignty? We would go ballistic and start an interstellar war, thats how. I think making contact with an alien race would benefit all of mankind if it didn't result in our oblivion. There is a book written by a Colonel who claims he was part of the Roswell cover-up. He states that a lot of our technology, such as integrated circuits and lasers, was derived from alien technology recovered from Roswell. If we had friendly relations with an alien species, we would be able to advance much quicker by trading information with them. This raises the question of how do we establish contact with an alien species without alarming them and sealing our fate? One day, we shall be an interstellar species, exploring the cosmos in the vain of Star Trek, and maybe even being a member of a larger galactic republic.

Of course, all of this is hundreds if not thousands of years into the future. I, personally, have little faith in humans being able to keep our selves from self destruction for that long, and no one living today will witness it, but it is possible. For this to happen, we have to get over ourselves, and all the petty bullshit. To advance we must abolish poverty, war, and inequality. You and I will never have the pleasure of being able to witness a world such as this, but maybe our children's children's children will. If we hope to have a beautiful, safe world for our future generations, we have to focus now.

Much love and goodnight

- Zack

112 Miles In 6 Hours

So, I had the notion that it would be possible to drive from SF all the way to Portland in about 12 hours. Whoops. As it turns out, this is impossible. The Sus-Monger and I left SF about ten in the morning and decided to drive north up the Pacific Coast Highway (PCH). It is spectacularly beautiful, and windy, and filled with a million tourists scared to death to drive on the damn thing. After driving for six hours, paying $3.35 a gallon for gas, and only managing to drive 112 miles north, we decided it was time for a new plan if we had any chance of reaching our destination. We decided to drive east to the 101 by way of an even crazier-ass road than the PCH. At one point we had to stop to let the brakes cool off before total failure and certain death. After about another six hours driving north and reaching the Red Woods in the dead middle of the night, we realized that California is absolutley massive. After crossing into Oregon sometime after midnight, we started to make better time. And then we realized that Oregon is massive too.

At about 2:30 in the morning, we ran out of gas. Well almost anyways. Oregon tries to discourage overnight car travel by limiting your gassing options. And by limiting I mean making it state law that an attendent must pump your gas, and then closing all the gas stations at 8 PM. We pulled into a gas station in Reedsport, OR and discovered that we were fucked. With only fumes in our tank, and no idea what to do, we decided to ask some locals if they knew where to find a 24 hour gas station. It turns out that the closest gas staion was 25 miles back the way we came. We decided that we would either spend the night in the car in Reedsport, or we would attempt to make it to Coos Bay, and either succeed, or fail and the spend the night in the car either way. Well to make a long story short, we pulled into the gas station in Coos Bay just as the car decided to die.

We finally made it to Portland at about 6 in the morning, found a parking lot and passed out for about four hours. We made it to Mt. St. Helens and drove around the park for three hours without ever seeing the damn mountain due to the weather. At about 8:30 we finally made it to Laura's house in Bellingham. What I originally thought would take us 12 to 16 hours, took us 24. Worst....Road Trippers......Ever... This is our homebase for now while I begin the exhaustive process of locating a new domicile. This is now my only goal, and I need to accomplish it shortly so I can remove all my shit from the car before it falls apart.

It is really strange having made it to my final destination (at least close enough). I am extremely nervous, but extremely excited at the same time. I can't help but think about the fact that I am not going to see any of you until christmas, and hoping that I didn't fuck up a good thing. Only time will tell and I will be here until it is no longer what I want. I miss all of you to death, and December seems like a really long way off. At least I get to share my thoughts with you still. I was having a creative down point when I wrote this blog, and that is why it is not as philosophical as the other ones, but when I think of something else good to bitch about, you'll get to read it. Until then, which will hopefully be tomorrow, enjoy your days, and know that I am thinking about you. I leave you with this....

The Long and (Very) Winding Road

Blog # 3

Hello again. To all of you living vicariously through me here is another installment for you. After leaving Tahoe, we drove down to San Francisco. San Francisco is huge, by far the biggest city we will visit on this trip. I usually really like big cities. I have spent time in LA, London, Paris, Rome, and New York. With the exception of LA, which I hate, I have loved all of them and not wanted to leave. All of these cities are massive and offer so many different things to pleasure your five senses. San Francisco is no different, it has all of those things in spades. So, why then do I not like SF very much? I think the overall vibe is one of stress amid a heavy clash of classes. There are so many sad, dispirited, fucked up people in SF, and weaving in between them so many rich, sane, happy people. Even New York doesn’t feel as if its coming apart at the seams like SF does. I felt stressed and rushed, and never really felt all that safe for the two days we were there. There were a lot of aspects of SF that I loved, such as all the ethnic neighborhoods, great bars, the park, and free festivals in the middle of the park. But most of these can be found in any great city you go to. I met some really nice people in SF, but for the most part I felt as if the people were either extremely fake or extremely self-centered. I think a lot of this is the effect large cities have on people.

Cities are a strange thing. They are incredibly artificial, yet more human than anything else on this planet. To me, a great city is the embodiment of all things human. They show off our greatest strengths, and our darkest secrets. Everything around you is human created or human its self. Even the “nature” around you is created and controlled by humans. Having grown up in the mountains, a huge city unlike the kind we have in Colorado, is essentially an alien planet. A city has a profound impact on it’s inhabitants lives, just like living in the country does, but I feel that this impact is usually negative.

City life is fast, constant and aggressive. Because of this, the mentality of the people changes from laid back to go get shit done mode. Because a city never sleeps, neither do its inhabitants in a sense. You might go to sleep, but the constant noise of the city subconsciously, or consciously too, repeatedly reminds you where you are, and exactly what you should be doing tomorrow. The body never really gets to shut off, check out, and relax. After an extended period of never being able to fully shut off, your mentality and health begin to be affected poorly. This leads to what I call bullshit blind; not being able to see through the bullshit of the city and your life to the real stuff behind it. Bullshit blind screws you up real good. Your stress level skyrockets, your mood drops in to despair and depression, and you begin to focus on the only thing you can see: YOUR JOB. I know I write about this sort of thing a lot, but my greatest fear is becoming the opposite if what I preach, so its kinda important to me. To me, your job should never ever be your life. You can have a job that you love and be absorbed and challenged by it, which is more than anyone can ask for. It can be a large, important part of your life, but it should never be your everything. It should support the rest of your life without encroaching upon it. When your job is everything, you are a shadow drifting through the voids in your life, and you miss out on everything.

I think you should love your job, but never love it as much as everything else in your life. People need perspective, and need to keep what is really important, like your loved ones and passions in front of your eyes. Love everything you do in your life, just make sure you know what is truly important.

- Zack, October 7th

Keep Lake Tahoe Blue

Lake Tahoe is absolutely gorgeous. I am sure many of you have seen the stickers that say, "keep Lake Tahoe blue." And, I am sure that, like me, you were kinda confused about what that meant. Well now I fully get it. Lake Tahoe is insanely blue. Its blue almost like a tropical lagoon. Its amazing, and today I was lucky enough to spend the whole day wandering its vast banks. Being around water and trees was extremely therapeutic after spending two days driving through the desert and plains was starting to stress me out. We drove the enire way around this behemouth and went swimming in a frigid bay. Its amazing to be around such a beautiful piece of nature. I felt so relaxed and happy standing on the beach looking at the bluest water on earth. It is truly an honor to be on this beautiful planet and I hope I get to see all of it. We are so lucky that we get to inhabit the Earth, a jewel amongst stones in our solar system. Think about it. We could've had the misfortune of inhabitating Mars, or Pluto. One a monochromatic wasteland prone to highwinds and planetary dust storms. The other a small, dark, frigid snowball. I know life seems unlikely on either of those places, but anything is possible. Consider yourself blessed by the cosmos that you are here.

Why do humans seem to be so shortsighted. Nearly every person on Earth is capable of appreciating our home world. The fact is that so many of us are rediculously absorbed by the everyday bull shit, jobs, relationships, and money, that we forget about the things that matter the most, and we forget how fucking lucky we are to be here. Instead of trying to think about the greater good, we think about what is good for us individually, at this moment. No thought to what the long term effects of what we do will have upon our lives, or to how our actions affect the world around us. This is a serious problem. This is the root cause of all of the major problems of the world. Closed mindedness runs a close second. Global warming, nuclear proliferation, wars are all a result of not realizing we have to work together, and we have to think about the future. It takes every single member of a population doing their part to achieve anything of this scale. If everybody carpooled or used public transportation, there would be a huge drop in the amount of gasses pumped into the atmosphere. It would make a huge difference. But that sort of selflessness, and personal sacrifice for the greater good, is unachievable in this lifetime. We must teach our children well. We have gone on with our carelessness long enough.

Its depressing to think that by the time I have children, there will be many places on Earth that are no longer beautiful. We are an intielligent, resourceful species, and I hope that, when faced with our own destruction that we would rise up to face the challenge with honor and integrity. But until our time comes, let us enjoy this beautiful jewel, and let us protect it. Earth is our spaceship on this interstellar journey the sun is taking us on, and we need her more than anything else. Enjoy your world because it is truly the most beautiful you will ever see.

Zack

Reno, NV
9:27 PM October 3, 2007