As you have likely observed, I have a long history of getting discouraged and then suddenly becoming optimistic again. I’m not sure why this is. It’s my own opinion that I have a quick bounce. Bounce – or at least my definition, for what it’s worth – is the time between emotionally hitting the ground and springing back up. Even with extremely tragic or outrageously unfair circumstances, I tend to bounce within a few hours. This is why, despite my arguable host of mental problems and questionable sanity from time to time, anti-depressants don’t really seem to be a prescription I need. Anti-psychotics on the other hand? Perhaps.

Not this kind of sign.

Nonetheless and as I’ve mentioned, the last few weeks I have felt kind of panicked. In the simplest of terms, it’s a feeling of “WHAT ARE YOU DOING??? THIS IS YOUR LIFE!!!” and it’s a really lame and anxiety-causing sensation, especially because there’s no clear answer. On certain terms, I could argue with the Voice of Urgency that I’m doing the best I can – I’m working on a new book (thinking and planning more than writing at the moment, but that will come), I’m living my life, I’m thinking deep thoughts, I have clever ideas at least once a week, I’m mostly in a good mood, I use very few aerosol products anymore, and, by and large, I’m not hurting anybody (as far as I know). On the other hand – and recognizing that the Voice of Urgency comes from my head and, thus, is me in some fashion – I completely agree with it. Somehow, in ways I can’t quite pinpoint, I am wasting time and, by extension, my life.

Ouch.

That hurts.

That more than hurts. That f*cking sucks.

And then enter – stage right – the bounce.

Not this kind either. If this kind is even real. I'm not sure. Somehow I doubt it.

I have long had (and recently had reinforced) the feeling that if I just keep pushing and writing and working that I will eventually hit upon the idea and the plot and the “it”, and then the magical, mystical force that makes stuff turn out happily ever after will kick in and things will go my way forevermore. Just as suddenly, all the work I’ve done up to that point will become useful and relevant, if not sought after. I like this idea. I am buoyed by the hope that I have the talent and the tenacity, all I need is the bright idea and a little bit of star alignment.

This is probably why I was overly excited when my two – count ‘em, not just one but two – fortune cookie fortunes the other day were so optimistic. The first read “Don’t give up. The best is yet to come!” Not too shabby. If fortune cookies were guarantees, this beats the hell out of “You find beauty in ordinary things, do not lose this ability” or “Don’t forget, you are always on our minds.” That second one freaked me out. What? Who? Who’s “our”? A collective hive mind or all of your minds individually? And who are you again? And when you’re thinking about me, do you think good things or wish me well or are you have subtle urges to do me bodily harm? In other words, is this a benign threat of some kind? Seriously, who’s “our”?

I'm trying, I'm trying. The signs are harder to recognize - let alone know - than one might presume.

But not the other night. Those predictions were all good. That night I got two fortuitous predictions: “Don’t give up. The best is yet to come!” and “Your dearest wish will come true within the month!” Sweet.

True, there were only a few days eft in the month, and my dearest wish didn’t quite come to obvious fruition during that time, but maybe the seeds were sown? Or maybe they meant 30 days more than the literal month-end? I’m willing to keep an open mind and a hopeful heart. You never know, I suppose.

Meanwhile, if the fortunes weren’t enough, get this: I found a pearl in an oyster I was eating! I did. A Washington state Sunset Beach oyster grown in the Hood Canal. That has to be some kind of  omen of impending amazing luck, right?

Right???

Well, I say so anyway, and in trying to prove it, I came across the following statistics:

• The odds of finding a pearl in an oyster are 10,000 to 1
• Odds of getting a hole in one: 5,000 to 1
• Odds of an American speaking Cherokee: 15,000 to 1
• Odds of being struck by lightning: 576,000 to 1
• Odds of being murdered: 18,000 to 1
• Odds of getting away with murder: 2 to 1
• Odds of being considered possessed by Satan: 7,000 to 1
• Odds of being on plane with a drunken pilot: 117 to 1
• Odds of writing a New York Times best seller: 220 to 1
• Odds of becoming a pro athlete: 22,000 to 1
• Odds of finding a four-leaf clover on first try: 10,000 to 1
• Odds of winning an Academy Award: 11,500 to 1
• Chance that Earth will experience a catastrophic collision with an asteroid in the next 100 years: 1 in 5,000
• Chance of dying in such a collision: 1 in 20,000

I don't think this is real either. If it were, wouldn't they just ask for dollar bills and small bottles of liquor?

So there you have it: I am almost as likely to win an Academy Award or could be considered possessed by Satan one and a half times before I’d find a matching, misshapen pearl in another oyster, and I’d have better luck hitting TWO holes in one as the same occurring. Thus, I rest my case. I think the math makes it plain: this is a harbinger of imminent good fortune if ever there was.

So bring it on, lucky stars: unload a giant truck of the best and make my dearest dreams come true.

I’m ready already.

For those of you out there who aren’t exactly George Clooney, have no fear. There are women who don’t care all that much about that kind of stuff. And I happen to be one of them. Thus, I assume that extrapolating my opinions and making a blanket statement like that is true. Hopefully, for your sake – if you do happen to be a freaky looking dude – it is.

I have had more than one boyfriend refer to us as “Beauty and the Beast” and although, in my recollection, it was not that severe, I am of the belief that who a person is is a hell of a lot more than the package he/she/I comes in. Admittedly, I take pretty good care of my package, but at the end of the day, I strive to have the sum far outweigh the parts.

True, I have a crush on George Clooney – and it is to a large degree because of his looks. However, it’s mostly because he seems to have a good sense of humor and to be, minus the womanizing, a cool guy. Actually, the womanizing would scare the crap out of me in real life, but I don’t know him and this is not ‘real life’ so it’s a moot point.

I can't quite fathom the logic that says "I would rather wear this ratty thing on my head than be bald."

Anywho, the inspiration for today’s pointless rambling is that I ran across some article criticizing the latest gorgeous girl dating Adam Duritz of the Counting Crows, and despite the fact that he basically looks like a pudgy, middle aged Jewish guy (especially when you factor in the reality that his hair is a piece. He’s bald, which I personally think would be preferable to the horrific Sideshow Bob wig he prefers…) Nevertheless, I totally get it.

No, he ain’t no beauty queen, but since when does that last anyway? We all get older, and if that’s all you had going for you…then good freaking luck, boring unfunny person with nobody to dance with at the nursing home prom.

On the bright side, it’s never too late!

Go read some books and get a hobby and work on developing a personality tout de suite! Maybe something involving cooking or learning to fix broken toilets?

Back to Adam, the other reality is that he is responsible for what is probably my most favorite song of all time, and that goes a long damn way in my way book.

This is (obviously) not an official video, but it’s by far the least offensive out there. Jose, you can tell us if it’s been translated appropriately.

The worst award went to a young woman with a ton of large piercings and pretty much a close up on her face the whole time.

Not so much.

Moving on, in the next corner we have another musician, The Black Crowes’ Chris Robinson. He’s seen better days – and the business end of a bong a few too many hundred thousand times – but he’s still incredibly cool and such an amazing performer. I’ve had the great good luck to see them live three or four times…and each time my crush is intensified. I think it  has something to do with the way he moves.

And of course his voice.

And the fact that they pretty much never chatter, just jam.

I don’t know what he’d look like under that Chewbacca beard – and it probably ain’t pretty – but the kid he had with Kate Hudson is cute enough, so you never know? Actually, if you go back to the early days of the Crowes, you can catch a glimpse of a young, beardless Chris…but the camera never really pans in and focuses, and there was probably a good reason for that.

I’d also like to make a quick note of gratitude that he’s no longer dressing like a fancy pirate. Good move, Chris.

I love this song. The first time I ever heard it was in Liverpool, played for me by a man who said it reminded him of me.

I can’t argue with the talking to angels part (although I think of them more as guides and had said no such thing to him in that regard), and I certainly am not above telling you I’m an orphan even if you’ve already met my mother. It’s all relative…   (No pun intended.)  On the other hand, I’ve never shot up or whatever sad issue the subject of this tune seems to struggle with. Thankfully.

In conclusion, rounding out my trifecta of freaky looking dudes on whom I have crushes, is Dave Attell. Dave used to have this show called “Dave Attell Insomniac” where he would stay up all night (duh) and hang out with people who had night shift jobs and crack jokes and generally be spontaneously hilarious.

I couldn’t find a YouTube clip of the time he hung out in a waste treatment plant in Boston, so you’ll have to settle for some standup, posted below.

And in other news…

Hmmmmm….

Is it me, or do these guys all bear a strange resemblance to one another? Like they’re all cousins or something? Or members of the same synagogue?

I think it’s a coincidence, but just to be sure, I may go ahead and end this now and find a so-so looking blond guy to crush on. Suggestions welcome.

So the following headline caught my eye this morning: The Challenge of Making Real Robot Skin, which in turn led pretty much immediately to a “come again?” moment.

So I went to the article, and it started to come clear…and then more or less tanked straight into WTF land. Why’s that? Well, just so you don’t feel left out, here are a few excerpts to catch you up:

I don't know what this is, but the 1.5mm skin kind of reminds me of cake. Mmmmmm... Cake.

In a recent paper “Towards Humanlike Social Touch for Sociable Robotics,” John Cabibihan and his fellow scientists detailed the reasons for testing and developing realistic skin for social robots.

“Touch is important in social interactions. Social touch are all those instances in which people touch each other, when shaking hands, when giving a pat in the back as a sign of congratulations and even in high-fives. Yet, one should not easily assume that humans will be comfortable with the idea of shaking an artificial hand made from a stiff material. In addition to the appropriate controls for a safe handshake grip and other forms of social touch, humanlike skin softness would be a reasonable requirement for the sociable robots envisioned to directly interact with humans in a social setting. “

Human skin has properties that are not easy to replicate in synthetics. The authors created a skin testing machine to check out some of the current substitutes for human skin in robots – like silicone and polyurethane. Unfortunately, these simplistic skin substitutes were tested and found wanting; at present, there is no accepted substitute for the feeling of real human skin.

There have been a number of different attempts to produce more lifelike skin for robots, as well as skin that would properly feed sensation to the operator of the robot. There is, of course, one ideal solution to creating robot skin that is as human as possible. Recent work done at the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft science institute in Germany has demonstrated that small swatches of actual human skin can be grown in petri dishes in a mass production facility.

It takes a lot of damage before you realize Arnold isn't actually a person, but a killing machine.

Ummm…what?

Who is doing human skin-covered robot development?
And WHY????

Clearly I missed some kind of memo. What the hell kind of robot is this?

I’m okay with Roomba and his stinky cousin, Scooba and anything that comes over to clean my floors or dishes (but no touching the laundry. I love doing laundry. It’s the only chore where I would even consider use of the word ‘love’ in association.), but I’m not so sure how I feel about robots that I can’t tell are robots.

At least even the iRobot robots looked like robots, so once they turned bad you could tell them apart. And WALL-E. Clearly a robot, and fine by me…especially because he never decided to destroy the humans who created him, which is a plus.

As for the explanation on this bad idea, I’m not buying the whole ‘people don’t want to shake hands with a robot’ excuse, either.

I would shake hands with a robot.

I shake hands with my dog (which has, in turn, taught him to flog me when he wants something, and I’m ignoring him, but that’s another story for another day). And if a robot wanted to pat me on the back with a metallic pitchfork hand, I’d be okay with that (so long as it was gentle and not a robot beat down that punctured a lung or whatnot. Punctured lungs are no good.)

My point here is I think there are only two reasons that they would want to put real skin on a robot:

1. To trick us.

2. To make robot prostitutes (or sex slaves or whatever).

See? Nothing but a goddamned robot.

And I don’t like it one little bit. And I suspect the robots wouldn’t like it one little bit. And this is where things go wrong. You create something in order to dominate it and use it as a slave, but you made it too smart so it collaborates with the others of its kind and overthrows you and the next thing you know we’re all hanging out in liquid cocoons and powering The Matrix.

Right????

So can’t we at least learn from our popular culture? Life imitates art and whatnot?

For instance,  in Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (The Phillip K. Dick classic known more commonly as the Harrison Ford movie Blader Runner)? Replicants – or ‘skin jobs’ as they’re not-so-ironically called – that think they’re human beings but later (and not exactly in the interest of their psychological health) find out they’re not.

Daryl Hannah as a 'basic pleasure model.' This gives me an idea for Halloween....

Nobody likes to grow up thinking they’re real and find out they’re not. It’s an identity crisis in the making.

How about Alien? You know, where The Company secretly sends a robot as part of the crew to ensure that a heinous monster will make it back to earth safe and sound? And nobody knew he was a robot until he tried to kill Ripley and then all that white foamy stuff started oozing out of him.

You can’t trust those robots that look like people. You think they’re a regular, reasonable person…but they can be wired as total traitors just like that.

And speaking of treacherous behavior, who can forget The Terminator? Imagine if The Terminator would have at least had the decency to look like a killer robot. Things might have turned out differently for all the other Sarah Conners in the Los Angeles phone book.

In closing, let me go on the record as not liking this petri dish skin human-looking robot stuff. I don’t know what it is, but it ain’t good.

And in the words of Ash, ”I can’t lie to you about your chances, but you have my sympathy”.

Dammit!!!

It IS out of reach! It’s slipping through my very fingers as I type these words.

I’m heartbroken and grief-stricken: How did Summer figure out it’s September!?

Who told her!?!?

I thought I firmly instructed you to say nothing. Nada. Zilch. Zip.

Traitors!!! All of you!!!

This is maybe a LITTLE more sun than I need. But only a little.

Okay, okay. Sorry about that. I’ve composed myself. Seriously though, who does that woman think she is? It’s only September 7th, for crying out loud.

Why did she already start passing the baton to Fall? And when I tried so hard to fool her: Hiding the fallen pine needles and random leaves in my pants. Sleeping with the windows open and nearly freezing to death. Braving some highly unpleasant and distinctly northerly winds (was that snow???) in a bikini.  And, who can forget, slathering on SPF 50 even though there was zero trace of Summer’s warm, happy sun?

And all this pretending and posturing and outright lying and for WHAT?

Another freaking winter, that’s what.

(Dear Hawaii: Save a place for me at the table.)

Meanwhile, it’s ironic that I’m quoting The Boys of Summer, because I have always hated Don Henley’s The Boys of Summer. I think it has something to do with the melody, and definitely there’s a long-standing beef with the synthesized noise of seagulls.

Seriously, who would want to listen to seagulls if you don’t have to?

It’s not even like they’re localized to the sea anymore. Seagulls are as equal-opportunity as pigeons.

Don’t believe me? Name any American lake, and listen for the hideous squawk.

Lake Michigan? Seagulls.

Lake Mead? Seagulls.

The Great Salt Lake? Seagulls.

A large puddle at your average Wal-Mart? Seagulls.

Speaking of which, I got crapped on by a seagull yesterday, and I am so not making that up. I wish I was, but it’s the 100% USDA-certified truth.

What’s white and brown and warm all over? My crotch and upper thigh area. (Sorry. Is that horribly vulgar? I now realize it is – which wasn’t my intent at the time – but now that it’s written I find it a wee bit funny, and I’m kind of inclined to leave it.)

So back to the non-vile point, it was not a small amount of crap either – a solid two tablespoons/half a shot worth. Admittedly, I was sitting on the beach and there’s a certain amount of risk inherent. At the same time, it seemed like there was more than enough unoccupied sand to use for target practice, in lieu of my privates.

Jerk seagulls.

I’ve heard people say that if a bird poops on you, it’s good luck. If you ask me, that’s rationalization in its purest form.

Some random lame thing happened to you?

That’s a sign that some random good thing is going to happen to you!!!

As if.

Moreover, as further proof to my pudding, nothing particularly good happened to me yesterday in light of my bird crap shower.

Oh well.

At least I’ve still got the disenfranchised Boys of Summer (who are these boys, really? Punk teens? Guidos? Old men with metal detectors [given the name in jest]?) to keep me company through the short, cold days and dark nights ahead…

And normally I don’t go there, largely because I have no interest in senseless arguments or other blowback, and I completely respect everyone’s right to have differing opinions (but don’t so much want you to try to change mine), and so – simply stated - I just really don’t want to fight about it.

Can't get enough of those tired and poor...

Nonetheless, this health care thing has finally gotten to me. I have to say something.

And I hardly know where to start I’m so appalled.

See, this morning while making some scrambled eggs and french toast (I know. I’m so domesticated.) I put on Comedy Central and watched some of Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert’s shows and inadvertantly learned that people are showing up to these town hall health care debates with semi-automatic weapons.

SEMI-AUTOMATIC WEAPONS

Apparently they’ve gotten confused and think their first amendment rights require them to execute their second amendment rights, and I guess in their minds showing up to have a rational and intelligent discourse about differing opinions requires bullets.

But I digress.

When I see this stuff I can’t wrap my brain around it. I really can’t. And I can’t honestly believe that people think making sure that everyone has acess to an equal level of care is socialism. And I can’t understand how you would actually believe that ANYONE in this country wants ‘death panels’ and thinks it’s okay to kill babies with Down’s Syndrome. (Trust me. If that happens, I will be the first one in line waving a torch.) And when they make it about religion or Christianity or Hinduism or Confucianism or anything other than what it really is about – health care for all – I get confused.

Here's where we keep the fine print.

Moreover, if this is about taxes, I can’t fathom why if you have more than me, you wouldn’t be willing to throw a little extra in the pot to cover me - because I would certainly do it for you.

So here comes the (probably offensive to some, and apologies if so) theory: America was founded by a bunch of religious zealots who left their own country so that they could do whatever extreme weirdness got them banished or shunned or otherwise forced them out of their homeland and then those same folks risked their lives on a boat for several horrific months in the hopes of surviving long enough to get here. And then most of them didn’t survive the first winter, anyway. So you figure only the toughest of the nut bags were left to procreate, and that’s saying something.

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