Yellowjackets killed in house today: 6
Yellowjackets killed in house yesterday: 4
the day before: 3
before that: 4
(etc.)

Estimated Total So far This Summer: 187

Will somebody please email me and indicate when an appropriate time would be to freak out about this infestation? I'd appreciate it. Thanks. Oh yeah, speaking of my domestic woes, the dishwasher blew something electrical the other night and kept us without power for 24 hours. All the food is rotten and the dishwasher is busted. Oh yeah, the guy who came to fix the mold in the bathroom discovered that the water had softened the wall behind the tub. It was about to cave in. Thank goodness for landlords.

I'll be here. Right here. With swatter in hand. Possibly shouting
Come get some you little fuckers. You wanna piece of me?

[you can offer Clay Sails condolensces at eventualsilence@hotmail.com]

Today's History lesson:

blah blah blah slaves blah blah blah dutch blah blah blah

Here is a letter I wrote to Lawrence Summers, President of Harvard:

Mr. Summers,

I hope that the Wall Street Journal was oversimplifying your remarks relating to the waning support for Israel in this country. According to them, you were likening the growing lack of Leftist support to antisemitism. This tactic is counter-productive and prevents meaningful dialogue about the true character of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land.

I am a great supporter of Jews in general -- especially in the United States. Per capita Jews have made contributions to this country greater than any single group. However, I have never felt Jews had a strong claim to Palestine, and cannot sanction continued Israeli denial of Palestinian land and human rights. This does not make me an antisemite.

Hopefully your own comments were more nuanced than the Journal indicated.

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Sincerely,

Clay Sails
eventualsilence@hotmail.com

All this talk about snitching reminds me of Linda Tripp. Anybody remember that fat sow? Somebody should have melted that bitch down and sold her to the Japanese. Check out the background to this web site: http://acav.com/tripp/fans/wwwboard/
or this one:
http://www.gossipcity.com/cyberdame.htm

Ewwww!

(Note: I've been ranting about being sold out by snitches in my previous posts)

What I was going to say before I so rudely interrupted myself with that last blog was that I hope psychos like "Twisted" (called "Death Dreamer" on his/her site) doen't track me down and stick pins through the webs of my toes for having the audacity to leave them messages. I once had an interesting experience leaving an e-message to a stranger.

I used to work as a cataloger for the Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation in L.A. I spent 8 hours a night listening to Holocaust testimonies, getting them ready for public viewing. Once night I was taking a break and surfing the web and I came to a website ranting some sexist bullshit about Hillary Clinton. Granted, it was the guys personal web site, and granted he was a total right-wing nugget (a cracker's cracker), but he left his email address and asked for commentary. I felt compelled to set the historical record straight regarding Vietnam and Hillary (which had some connection in his mind), so I did. I wasn't particularly cruel, but I doubt I was polite. My co-workers were amused. I enlisted their aid. I patted myself on the back for hitting back against the same sort of narrow-minded bullshit that led to the Holocaust.

Two weeks later we started getting bomb threats and psycho messages on the answering machine. We were supposed to be in a "secure" and anonymous location (so anti-Semites wouldn't blow us to smithereens). It turned out to be my friend. Somehow he'd *traced* the motherfucking email (through god knows what method) and was fixin' to come lynch a few of us. There was quite a stir at the Foundation. People freaked out. The F.B.I. was called. And -- here's the saddest part of the story -- I caught wind that my co-workers had ratted me out to the boss (a short, mean, and extremely compentent New York Italian butch dyke, bless her heart). Getting ratted out by one's co-workers is disheartening to say the least. Especially when I was so clearly striking a blow against an ignoramus.

I got called into Kim's office. I got raked over the coals. I had violated email procedures *and* picked a fight with a nutcase who turned out to be both serious *and* able (apparently) to follow up on his threats. I barely escaped with my job. (Things smoothed out: I got promoted a few months later.)

My co-workers were happy for my mouth when I stood up to the head-head honcho -- Steven Spielberg's own agent on the earth and Holocaust-scholar extrordinarre Dr. Michael Berenbaum -- and asked him point blank at a full staff meeting if we were supposed to accept some shitball policy he'd devised to screw us out of promised compensation. They liked my wagging chops well enough then, but a little bit of heat from the Unabomber and the boss-lady and they're all pointing bones at me. Poor me. Still, it diminishes one's faith in folks (except for the freaks, who were amazingly competent in this illustrative tale). I haven't learned anything apparently. I'm still posting like mad to stranger's sites and hoping they can take me with a grain of salt.

[you can send threatening messages to Clay Sails at eventualsilence@hotmail.com or visit his other blog at daysofsilentradio.blogspot.com]

I dig jumping onto stranger's blogs and giving them my comments by email. Just went to a site called "Twisted Thoughts" or something equally unimpressive. The dude (or girl, I couldn't tell) actually *did* have twisted thoughts. They were all messed up and depressed and wishing people would die and hating Algebra. Shit. I've been there. Being depressed used to be an acoutrement. I pierced my ears with depressed and painted it on my shoes. I picked my nose with it and used it as cement for the chip on my shoulder. Thing was, I actually felt depressed in the old days. Life was actually a drag sometimes when I was a kid. Sure, externally it was perfect. Sure I was a product of a loving home. Etc. Now I can't even begin to care, but tell that to the hormones, Jack. Tell that to the noisy sunbeams that used to crash all around and bounce off the hardwood floors when I was alone. Tell that to the "best years of my life", wherever they went. So basically, I understand blogs like "Twisted Thoughts". But everyone has to get over it, so there's no point in indulging it either. Take it as far as it goes and when you realize nobody around you gives a shit about your self pity, find a new schtick. Its what I did, I guess. Hell, I don't remember. It probably wasn't all that self-conscious. I just realized that life was actually good, and wierd and funny just as much as it occasionally sucked. And I used to be damned impressed with myself -- I definitely felt I had to "express" myself and be understood etc. Today I don't give much of a damn. Sure, I'm scribbling on this blog. Sure I hope when I die somebody will dig up my poetry and put a brass statue of me next to Poe or Dickenson out here in Baltimore, chicks draped in black will carve my initials into their soft, white wrists. Sure, I'd be gracious with my fame if somebody "discovered" me before I was too old to take advantage of my success. But whatever. No need to feel self pity if it don't happen. [brightening] Hey, I've still got you, right? My faithful blog. My audience. My very own personal zeros. You're the ones I turn to when my binary stars are all amok. Right? You're here...wherever you are...right? Hello? He1100 10010110110101010010010101010101001011001010101010101010010011001000010100101010100

Quick Update on Issues from Previous Entries:

-- The beer I brewed several weeks ago is *awesome*. Very smooth, dark and malty. And lightly carbonated like I like it. The pliers I dropped in it must not have hurt it and might even have helped.

-- The yellowjacket total in my house has been rising. We're up to forty seven for the past ten days. For a variety of reasons no exterminator has been by yet:

1. I thought I'd solved the problem by plugging up gaps in the screens.
2. Until I know where they're coming from an exterminator would only scratch his ass, coat the inside of the house with dioxin and leave, leaving the yellowjackets behind.
3. Cool weather is coming and they should die off.
4. The building's exterminator is supposed to be by some Tuesday or other.
5. I've kinda gotten used to the sleepy buzz of hornets against the window.

Last year we had a moth infestation. Grubs spilled out of the cupboards and moths fluttered into our food/eyes etc. This year it is yellowjackets. What will it be next year I wonder? And has anybody ever heard of roaches around here? That's all we used to have when I was a kid. Sure, they'd lay big frothy puddles of eggs behind the fridge. Sure they'd scuttle over your feet or flop into your hair. So what? They were fairly good neighbors. What I wouldn't give for a nice, harmless roach infestation about now.

So McGinty has been cracking me up with his blogs. If Panacylum ever grates on your nerves, head over to http://www.drawz.blogspot.com/ and check out Sex McGinty a.k.a. Jimmy Drawz (and many other names besides). Sure, he's an old homie of mine but I wouldn't stake my own precarious rep plugging a loser, however good of a friend he was.

His blog about asses especially kills me. Why? Because I myself am an ass man (unbeknownst to him) and I need psychological help even if he doesn't. I need a psychologist to help me get some ass. If she's hot enough, she can throw her professional ethics out the window -- I won't tell -- and give me a big, bent-kneed helping of the kind of therapy I can USE. Hee hee. But I'm a married man and even if my wife knows I'm a pervert, she'd poke a fingernail through my eye if she ever reads this post. But I must continue for the sake of disclosure, for I am a man of principle:

The thing that's different between where McGinty works and where I work is this: he is in Sherman Oaks -- my own home town for awhile -- and one of a small constellation of uburban cities that comprise the world's biggest porn industry ($7billion per annum). Hence, however odius it may be to pretend to be excited by such facts, there is a higher concentration of scantily-clad, thong-spliced ass in his neck of the woods than mine and I'll admit it -- I'm jealous about it. In that city all you have to do is *pretend* to be a producer, maybe wave a business card around a bit at a club, and you'll have more booty than Rosie O'Donnel's girlfriend on GHB. Of course, I could take the moral high ground and make a crack about the lightness of the attic in some of those gals, but that would be cheeky.

All that aside, I have to say that D.C. might have a corner on the hot intern market. I work on Capitol Hill and the vast quantity of young, fresh-faced help these congressmen get is unbelievable. And I'm also at American University these days, which I swear has hotter undergrads than any university in California I ever saw, especially the University of Redlands (my alma matter).

Aww don't mind me -- I'm just being an old letch. I'm sure McGinty had a point to all his drooling, but I lost mine. Oh yeah -- the university. So this school is just unbelievably endowed with young flesh and it is a crime against biology that the requirements of professionalism and matrimony impell me to pretend I'm not interested. Fortunately for the Puritans among you I work in the history department, and that brings me back to my jealousy: I may get 2 hours a week as a "teaching assistant" to a group of 25+ co-eds, but the rest of the time I'm locked away in a little grey cubicle in the Arts & Sciences department, talking through polyeurothane panels to chicks who haven't seen sunlight in three terms except as reflected from the bottom of a Pringles can (and perhaps one too many at that).

I'm going to forsake reading this book I'm supposed to be reading as I write and wander -- dazed -- across the quad, scoping out potential students to assist while taking in the fresh, sweet smell of young, gusty...

...Fall.

I've been incredibly busy and feel guilty about it, like I'm lazy or something. Well, I am lazy, but I'm too busy to be truly lazy and I feel guilty about that, too. I feel like I'm misrepresenting the source of my laxity.

My current plans in no particular order are:

1. Start a political party called the "Radical Moderates" which would espouse that the left get out of the quagmire of identity politics and get tough like it used to be (gets its guns and puts them in the closet and re-remembers that the government is not the solution to every problem). Ideally I would start the party and use it to cooly stare down the muzzle of Bush's Newer World Order ("Step aside, Yank, there's a new cowboy in Dodge...") It would be some sort of semi-populist, partly-libertarian, anti-fascist, anti-socialistic, pro-environmentalist Jeffersonian movement. It would flick the religious right off their golden thrones and...and...well it would be neat.

2. Write a novel on one of a variety of subjects.

3. Play more video games.

4. Smoke more dope and play more music.

5. Learn to paint.

6. Create a web site that is more interesting than self-indulgent, and less time-consuming than playing video games.

7. Start a religion with myself as the prophet. Prop my homeboy Unbreakable up as the martyr and collect mad donations.

8. Finish grad school.

Alright, its 2:10 a.m. on September 14 and I'm uneasy, but not for the reason you might think, or that I might have suggested. Since its technically Saturday I suppose my prediction that Al Qaida would strike today is a bit rediculous, unless they strike a baseball game or shumshing. No, I'm uneasy because of what happened last night.
But first, a primer:

For the past two weeks -- hell, all summer long, but especially for the past two weeks -- we've been getting yellowjackets in the house. I assume y'all know what yellowjackets are. I assume you've all had a picnic spoiled by angry stripped yellow hornets spilling out of the mud and stinging like mad for no apparent reason other than they have to live in mud and crash picnics for a bite to eat. Well, these little fuckers have been slipping in from god knows where every so often. Oddly, they tend to collect against the windows even though the windows are closed, though we've found them crawling on the carpet, and on the couch, and buzzing in our lampshades. Even more oddly, they are usually in a wierd stupor of some sort that causes them to lie on the sills gasping and spasoming until death overtakes them. It is horrible to see them dying everywhere, but we're glad that only a very few are perfectly active. So this has been going on routinely for a few weeks with two or three getting in per day. With each passing day our uneasiness increases (every step we take in bare feet must be careful, every lunge for a light switch in the dark comes with the expectation of putting a hand on a hornet etc.)

Last night I came home from school at 11:20 p.m. to find carnage in the house. They were everywhere; dead, alive, half-alive. They were scattered across the kitchen floor like spilled cereal and resting on our pillows and clinging to the curtains and trapped against the window panes, and bashing themselves angrily against the doors to get out.

After a mad, frantic killing spree in which I admit I only barely kept my cool, there were no less than twenty-five dead yellowjackets. Where they came from I do not know, but I suspect they have a nest in the air ducts. After the frenzy, I spent several hours methodically pushing a mirror taped to a broom into the dark spaces of the apartment, feeling like the dumb handymen in so many horror movies (you know, the Fat Guy) who goes blithely exactly where he should especially not go and winds up chopped up or devoured except in my case I was imagining poking my little mirror straight into a dangling strip of yellowjackets in some crevace of the house and having my eyelids and lips and ears pierced by stingers, either that or the Mama Yellowjacket with a seven and a half feet wingspan would be waiting, her mandibles clicking with glee as I approached...

Needless to say, I slept very little last night and since it is 2:28 a.m. now, I probably won't be sleeping much tonight.

Here's a funny-ish site dedicated to religion:

http://www.positiveatheism.org/tocwebx.htm
http://www.churchofsatan.com/home.html

This stuff is too funny. The sarcastic stuff is funny. The serious stuff is funny. What a gas. The Church of Satan claims its "the real thing" and other satanist groups are posers. Bwahaha.

Here are the bylaws of one church of satan sect, the Church of Loki:

1. I am a member of the Legion of Loki, a Grotto of the Church of Satan. I take pride in being a member of the Infernal Empire, and as such, will ensure that at all times, my conduct -- both public and private -- reflects favorable upon these organizations and the movement they support.

2. As a Satanist, I view myself as the highest embodiment of human existence. Therefore, I will make the effort required to responsibly ensure the physical, emotional, and economic health of myself and those dear to me, realizing that Satanism begins at home.

3. As a Legionnaire, I am a member of a team. Therefore, I will seek opportunities to assist in furthering the Legion's goals. Because I know others are depending on me, I will not accept a task I am not certain I can complete, and will strive to my utmost to complete those tasks I do accept. I will take pride in being known as an able and dependable team member, knowing, in turn, that there are others upon whom I can depend. Should I be incapable of completing a task I have accepted, I will immediately inform the team so that another may complete my mission.

4. As a member of the ultimate Underground Movement, I will respect and protect the secrets of the Legion, and the privacy and anonymity of my fellow Legionnaires. I will not discuss the private ceremonies and activities, or membership of the Legion with non-members. I will take all reasonable precautions in safeguarding confidential material entrusted to me. I will refer to comrades by their pseudonym, if they so wish, and not insist on knowing their mundane name. I will not reveal the names (even the pseudonyms), or other personal information about other members to any non-member without the express permission and knowledge of the member(s) involved. Ever.

5. I demonstrate the respect I have for myself by the respect I show for others -- members and nonmembers, Satanists and non-Satanists, alike. I will, at all times, deal honorably with my fellow Legionnaires. I will speak plainly and truthfully to them as a sign of respect, yet I will attempt to weigh the potential results of my words before I utter them. I will not create or carry gossip and innuendo, as this is a cancer to group harmony and effectiveness. I will always remember that as a Soldier of Satan, I can respect and work well with an individual toward a common goal without ever having to like them personally.

6. If I openly reveal my affiliation with the Infernal Empire, I will strive at all times to be an example of our highest ideals. I will be prepared to effectively discuss Satanism and the Church of Satan with those who are sincerely interested, and to politely (if possible) but effectively disengage from those who merely wish to mock, "debate", or preach. I will make no public statements on behalf of the Legion of Loki without the knowledge and permission of the Grotto Master, Legion of Loki. I will accept the Grotto Master's guidance and instruction in this matter.

7. If I must conceal my Satanic allegiance, I will use whatever influence I may have to reasonably assist other Satanists and to help bring about a more Satanic world. Wherever practical, I will play "Devil's Advocate" and try to open others' minds so that they may see events from a Satanic point of view. I will strive to be the very best at what I do; my superior performance will rally the support of the wise and deprive the "righteous" of ammunition and so blunt their assaults. I will yet be the ideal Satanist in deed, if not in name.

The part that kills me is the stuff in bylaw 5 about having respect for members and non members alike. What a bunch of pussies. Either go all the way or just go away. Either way, shut the fuck up about it and don't pretend to be legit and respectable.

So its September 11. I know I should wax eloquently about my unique perspective blah blah. (Shaking fists and speaking in faux Kennedy Voice: Why you! I'll give you some hot wax. Come over here. Bring me a q-tip and a Bunson burner)
Instead I will leave the truly profound stuff to the professionals and make this prediction, perhaps going out on a bit of a limb:

Al Qaida will not attack today.

Think about it. It makes no sense. What is the essence of terror? What is the one thing we have all been afraid of throughout all of humanity? Come on. We went through a "Quake at the Sight of the Godhead" phase, then a "Quake at the Sight of The King" phase, then "Quake at the Sight of the Mushroom Cloud" phase, etc. (I'm skipping a few I'm sure). We got over those things, mainly. But what one thing are we always, no matter what culture we're from, afraid of?

Answer: The unknown.

Al Qaida will gain much more power by not being predictable. If we do not know when they will strike we will be afraid all of the time. The power to seem like they have control by attacking freely on an important anneversary will be of some marginal benefit, for awhile anyway, but we will become used to it. We will learn our enemies as they have learned us. We can get used to it. We can face it and fight it.

How can we eliminate terror when we do not know when or where it will come from?
Rest easy today, I say. If I was Bin Laden, I would sit tight and count to three. Three days. September 14.
I will be uneasy on September 14.

[you can reach Clay Sails at eventualsilence@hotmail.com]

James,

I hope I wasn't too bleak about blogs in my earlier message. Point is, I don't really know what power they have in the short term, but I have seen a few that have turned into true cult of personalities. (one I used to read is jaycine.com) The internet is not some new Shibboleth: it will never have true standards or gatekeepers. Its stars will rise and fall only with "eyeballs" flicking by (or not). In my own mind, we are all still on the cusp of the e-revolution in art. E-Piddle.com may not have made a zillion bucks in the end, but the wierd wired world is still making connections and learning to find its voice irrespective of the market (which will follow us like a pack of pock-faced whores). Thats where people like us come in. We contribute our little pieces, prostheletize the power of the medium, admit that it won't save the world (just as we admit that pop culture, high art, or politics won't either) and get on with saving the world. Or at least our little piece of it.

Visit James "Jimmy" Drawz at http://www.drawz.blogspot.com/

[email me, Clay Sails, at eventualsilence@hotmail.com]

So I just read some posts buy a guy at Santa Cruz (http://www.king-mob.com/blog/index.html) and, although he was a good writer and entertaining and all, I couldn't help but wonder what "ontological anarchism" was that he was so into, or why Veganism, Marxist-Leninism and a bunch of other stuff was so passe all of a sudden. Are we just reaching out to anything different to seem different so we get noticed? Do people really believe we know what the hell we're talking about when we use words like "ontological"-anything? "Ontology", as far as I know (consulting the back of a cereal box here) is philosophy that relates to the nature of being. (Now you say, "doesn't all philosophy"? And I say, "What's the sound of one hand clapping?") So "Ontological Anarchism" must be "Anarchism that Is". Of course, I could look it up on the altar-of-all-answers (Google) and save all of this embarrassing and all-too-revealing speculation, but I refuse. I'm an Ontological Nihilist and I enjoy destroying my own credibility and rebuilding it piece by piece only to destroy it again.

Well, the beer has fermented and is now "aging" in the sun of my back porch. We'll see how it tastes.

In the meantime, after contemplating (though not watching) the new DVD release of "Dahmer" I think I established a new and possibly universal corrolary to the old "you are what you eat" axiom:

You are what eats you.

This of course brings up a whole host of legal questions, such as: after Dahmer ate somebody and was convicted of the crime, were the "victims" of his crime also implicated, rightly or wrongly, by the judgement? In a sense, only the last person he ate is entirely innocent because the previous victims became Dahmer. Y'follow me? Of course, if he only ate part of a victim, then would only part of the victim be guilty? (i.e a nipple or the chewy bit between the thumb and forefinger) Who ever heard of a nipple being guilty of a crime? My axiom has all sorts of hidden dilemas for future generations of legal scholars to sort through. Still, I have no time to pursue these issues for I am currently up to my eyebrows in pathbreaking research for my next (if first) bestselling monograph: The Definitive History of Iceburg Lettuce.

[If anybody has input to contribute upon these or other comparably weighty matters, do not hesistate to send it to Clay Sails at eventualsilence@hotmail.com]