Okay, I was pretty much going to leave the subject on punishment and retribution alone because I'm moving on with my life, but having really violently minded people blog me and claim to agree with me... I feel the need to clarify my position.
I'm no pacifist. Like at all, but I'm not irrational. I'm not stupid enough to WANT to send soldiers over until I know the benefit of the outcome would outweigh the danger and the damage. (I have a very Machiavelli philosophy. I don't consider it to be the right way or the only way, but I won't/don't feel bad about it) And in this case, it really doesn't look like it will. Afghanistan is a very divided nation from my understanding. most of the nation doesn't even seem to support the ruling faction. There are several rebel groups to support that. And the terrorists don't even have an allegiance to the nation. They're not working for them, they're not working with them. They're just being hid there. Going to war with Afghanistan wouldn't stop the groups, since they can and will just flee the country. We would gain nothing, and the ravage of war would basically only be for sport. That's just a waste. If I thought it'd do any good, I'd be all for it, but that's not the case.
Terrorism is different in that with a lack of allegiances to certain countries, the enemies are more anonymous and can hide. They're not stopped by the threat of war or by economic strikes. The methods of the past just won't work here. And I think this is going to be the warfare of the future. We're going to have to develop different strategies and means of combatting an enemy with no loyalties. We haven't had enough experience yet, but we will.
My earlier post about my urge to support the US government, it wasn't about war or punishing anyone. Just that during such a large period of fear and crisis, we all need to band together so we can rebuild and regain our sense of security. There's going to be a lot of changes in security and we need to be patient. And for this to go smoothly, cooperation, patience and desire to work with WHOEVER is in power to restore the order here is very important. And I do think that some sort of action is necessary and I expressed that. But I didn't say that I thought we should go attack afghanistan.
Most importantly: I find it REALLY offensive that people would blasphemize islamic religions just because the terroristics are islamic. The violent extremists are a VERY small percentage of the members of the religion and to be so blatantly disrespectful is unexcusable. Religious intolerance is NEVER ok. I find such statements disgusting and they will be deleted from my tagboard and comments area ASAP.
Well I had an eventful day. After coming home from brunch, buying a longer ethernet cord for my laptop (25 feet yo!) and expecting to spend the afternoon working, I ran into Jeremy (who lives next door with some other friends of ours) on his way down to the riverwalk and invited me along. I went even though I was in a creative/productive mood (webwise), because I really needed to buy Kelly a birthday present and ended up spending the entire afternoon out. We ate a late lunch and shopped for Kelly, then went to the aquarium (it's next door) and caught an IMAX movie. Then we came home and I called Frances to set up a birthday dinner for Kelly (it's Monday) and went around inviting the girls on my floor. So that'll be fun. Frances hasn't met a lot of the girls in my suite yet, and I really want her to. I know she'll have a blast. I think I'll wait to rope the guys from next door into coming last minute. None of them seem like they're good with advance plans. I also got to be social this evening without leaving the room, which is good, because I wasn't in the mood to get all dolled up. All of the (active) girls in my suite plus Nikki from down stair watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer (the movie) and then Hannibal with Jeremy and Mike. Mike's rented the Hannibal Lector trilogy (apparently there's a prequel out that doesn't have anthony hopkins that he found) and we're doing a movie a night.
You know as much as I've whined about living off of the main campus and in the ugly rooms of Cabra, I'm really starting to appreciate it. The way all the suites on the floor are set up promotes more socializing and I've met a ton of new people. The windows into the living area seem to drag people into the suites, and the door to ours seems to never stay closed to visitors. And I couldn't ask for better people to live around. As I've said before, I get along really well with all 7 of the girls in my suite and spend time with most of them. And there are so many great guys next door. Not all great looking, but always provide a good time and are as funny as hell. Then Nikki and Kelly (both on the floor below us) practically take up residence in our living room. It's really helped me not to miss having Frances and my friends on M.C. as much. And good for times such as these, where slipping into depressive and paranoid thought patterns would be all too easy.
Ah. As many of you might have guessed, no there will not be a september edition of the eternity network. Before I was kind of iffy as to whether or not I'd try to attempt it, but I came to this conclusion as I was eating brunch this morning. I could go ahead and do one, but by the time I put it up, it'd be very late into the month which would only throw me further off my usual schedule. It's not a decision I like, since I haven't, in my 2 years on the net, ever skipped a monthly layout and I'm not keen to start now. But I think it'll be easier for me to resume my normal issuing schedule, if I get back to the way it used to be and there's just no way I can get two monthly layouts in before October 1. *Hopefully* I'll be able to continue present new monthly layouts for es.com this year. It's a tradition I'd be very upset over if I didn't have the time to continue. I was *going* to design and put up a small splash page design this afternoon, but I was detained. ^^ With that said, I gotta go get some sleep. I have to get up for my weekly brunch with Fran in the morning. ^^
I really don't want to go out tonight. I almost feel like I have to, but I'm so not in the mood. I just feel emotionally and spiritually exhausted and in much need of a recharge. I really do love people, not in the huggy sort of way most people persons are, but they do amuse me to no end. But in the end, I'm a very introverted person, and I need a lot of time alone to collect my thoughts and wind down. And here I am, with just about 2 weeks without any real time to myself. I've been working on school work or doing something social every night, and I just feel spiritually and emotional drained. This week hasn't helped any. I mean I love all my friends, and it's great to have 8 people on my floor alone to hang out with. We spend way much time together, and it's sooo much better than last year, but I just need more time by myself than most people. If I don't have at least a night completely by myself, I get really frazzled. So tonight, I'm going to try some meditation, some facial masks, some sappy movies with a guaranteed happy ending (how often do I watch THOSE?), and do the normal things I *used* to do. I'm just not used to being so busy, it's almost nerve-wracking. And with school heating up, and the emotional drama playing on the world stage, I need to take some time out quick. Ahhh and I just told Catherine. I think she's worried about me. She often calculates my quietness as being troubled, which is really sweet. She's really considerate, it's almost surreal in comparison to my previous roommate experience. It just occurred to me that I still haven't "introduced" all of my suitemates and neighbors to you and I've been meaning to... but I'm just not in the mood right now. I'm going to go image hunt, do a downloading spree, drink coke and try to calm my ruffled psyche.
You know, I try to be tolerant of other people and their opinions, but sometimes I just want to trip them as they're walking up the aisle instead. There's different, and then there's blindsighted and stupid. And in times of crisis, most people will not have the patience for blatant stupidity. Like yesterday Kelly was telling me about a girl in her Making Moral Decisions class who thinks that instead of punishing the terrorists involved, we should "talk to them and try to understand their feelings." What a fucking load of bullshit. Sometimes healing the world cannot be done so peacefully. I mean what, are we supposed to understand why we're so terrible and start killing our own politicians to make them happy? I can't even think of a good way to respond to that one, I just feel huge amounts of pressure behind my eyes. Or today Jess forwarded me an email from a girl who went on about how she "feels for the victims" but doesn't support America and went on for paragraphs about it. Get a clue. You don't have to like the government. Fine, but they're our best (and only) bet for solving the situation at the moment. The victims need them, we need them and they need our support at the moment. There are just times when the only mature thing to do is to set aside differences and band together to be able to leap over a huge hurtle. Hate them when it's over. It's a sad thing that a lot of the people in this country can't feel safe anymore, and possibly the only way they're going to feel better about this is for those behind it to be caught and for there to be prosecution for those like them. And to do that we *need* the government. So what if we haven't been totally sympathetic to every cry of pain on the planet? In a perfect world, we could help everyone. But you're living in a fucking dream world if you could think that to be possible. We help more than a lot of countries, and in the end, that's what matters to me. I really hate idealists, and now is just not the time for whiny people yearning for utopia. Support what we got for the moment.
I'm so tired, and I just want to curl up in a ball in a ball on my bed and let the blankets shut out the world for as many hours as I can fit in for the evening. But I know I won't be able to sleep. Everything just seems to jarring and it's impossible not to think. And spending time alone with my thoughts is just really not something I'm in the mood to do at the moment. I keep thinking about my full bottle of Darvoset in the medicine cabinet (no implications that I mean to take any more than the recommended dosage ok? ^^), but I'm not going to do that. I don't want to be that person. You know what else I really want to do? I want to talk to my brother. Not Jake, Paul. I don't even know why, because Lord knows neither of us have been much of a support system for each other since we both have a solitary sort of standpoint on pain (drugs for him and uhhh I'm not sure what I'd call what I do). There's no real reason why, but I just feel an overwhelming urge to talk to him, though I'm almost positive I couldn't get a hold of him if I tried or even if I did, he...wouldn't be in the condition to hold a conversation. I guess he's just one of the most laid back people I know (ok ok, let's not speculate as to WHY) and I just want to hear something like that without hearing some stupid and inane chatter.
Well I tried not to keep myself glued to the TV today. It wasn't as hard since I had classes off and on from 8:30 to 3:30, though I did watch TV did my breaks. Then Kelly wanted to go shopping (don't ask. I almost feel bad for going out to a mall) so we went to the mall..... I actually bought a purse. Then I came home and watch the news some more. I don't know why, but I feel both better and worse when I'm watching the news. On one hand, I keep feeling like I'm going to wretch over all of the tragedy and footage, but as strange as it sounds, I feel almost responsible for keeping up with the news. Like I'm helping out or something by following it all the time. I know rationally, that I'm not, but somewhere deep inside I can't pull myself away because it feels like neglect. Like somehow, by watching, I can be out there in heart and spirit with the people buried in the rubble, the mourners and the rescue workers, and that's why I just can't bear to turn away. It's probably silly, but maybe it's not.
Uggggh! Some ass holes have been phoning in bomb threats all over New Orleans in response to yesterday's attack. Yesterday afternoon they called all 4 universities in the city and we had to evacuate all of the school buildings and dorms on the main campus for several hours. It was a pain in the ass since I was over at a friend's on MC at the time, but I just went back to my dorm on the other campus so it was ok. It's still an awful thing to do. They've had to close down all the chemical plants here, in case anything *were* to happen. It's really surreal. I never would have believed the widespread panic, since the US is a huge country in size. We're somewhere between 1500 to 2000 miles from the northeastern cities, but every major building was evacuated. And we have several friends from the UK here (they're visiting my suitemate Sara) who were SUPPOSED to fly home tomorrow, but who knows when they'll start allowing international flights again. And they start school next week O.o
I'm so tired. I was glued from the TV from 9:15 am to 2:30 am yesterday. I missed my 9:30 class to watch TV b/c I had just heard about it (my suitemate Colleen's mother called to make her watch the news because a close family friend of theirs worked on the 65th floor of the WTC), and I didn't have to go to my evening class because they cancelled them due to the bomb threat. I just couldn't peel myself away from the TV and am now paying for it b/c of the lack of sleep (I have an 8:30 class ;_;). I think I considered clobbering Kelly when she switched the station to watch the Brandy Bunch wedding.
I have a lot of international students in my suite so it was sort of a unique experience. Out of 8 girls, 5 of them are on exchange and then we have my favorite Belgian lad next door. The Brits and Dimitri (the Belgian) were pretty concerned, but Dipti (India) kept repeating how this wasn't that big of a deal, that "bombs happen in India all the time" and that "20,000 people were killed in an earthquake in India, there won't be nearly as many here." I really just wanted to smack her. I know lives are lives, but there is a bit of a difference between death by natural disaster and death by human design. Anyway Fr. Knoth (the president of our university) apparently emailed all of the international kids to warn them that they might need to "keep a low profile" just in case there was enough hostility to foreigners due to the incident to make a difference. It's hard to imagine that such a warning would be needed, but looking back at our history, I guess it's not such a far-fetched move. I mean look at how we treated the Japanese americans during WWII. But still, I'd like to think we're a different world now.
Ahhh and did anyone get literally sick after watching clip after clip of the plane crash? It was like the had new footage every 15 minutes. It was so morbid. The worst being the reverse footage of the plane hitting the building. It was definitely the "best" angle and looked unbelievable close up and the sound of the screaming was just terrible. It gave me the chills.
Oh and I've gotten several emails from people (not Americans I'm assuming?) asking if *I* was okay during this event. I do appreciate the concern, but fortunately, am so far away from the eastern seaboard that I was never in harm's way. Thanks though!
Yaaaaay! I *finally* put up the new layout for impolite.org! It doesn't have all of the content updates I would have liked b/v I just haven't had enough straight time to type them all up from my notebook, but I was just sick of having it sit all listless on my hard drive. I'll still be typing all my writing up, it's just not all up at the moment.
Ahhh I just found this. I'm so going to join! LOL if I can't start my peach people ring, I'll make up for it by joining ameriBLOGs. =D LOL I love it. Being American is like being white: it's viewed by a lot of the world as something you're NOT supposed to be proud of. Not to say that I have excessive pride about being either, but I'm certainly not ashamed and I don't wish I was born as anything else. I just *really* don't like the fact that I sometimes feel that I'm supposed to feel ashamed for it. I small box don't like that! So fuck that!
And thank you Mel! I feel better now. ::blows kisses:: Love you so much too! Ahhh and I'm so proud of you for fixing your table problem by yourself! You're my prize pupil, you are. LOL
I had SO much fun tonight! I didn't end up going to the lesbian Cafe Brazil, but did wind up in the gay club Oz which I've been dying to see for a year now. It's just a great little club, every bit as good as it's been hyped. Sure, it sucks having to pay an extra $5 cover b/c you're straight and female, but it was worth it. The music was great (at least far better than any of the other clubs on Bourbon) even if only to dance to, since I surely would never play it in my car. The lights and the fog and the strobe were all well choreographed as well. And the populace was, overall, very friendly. The crowd was 90% men, so we got a few "why are you here?" stares, but that's usual. Plus we had a gay pal (Grayham, one of Sara's friends visiting from England) in our midst, so it was excusable. And I made a friend! We went upstairs to watch the floor below for a while and this really good looking guy slid up next to me and gave me a really big kiss on the check and was like, "that's just because you remind me of a girl from my past." Then we talked for about 10 minutes about the normal introductory topics, where we were from (he's from the area), what I was studying in school, was this my first time here.... LOL I told him I loved it because the music was so much better here and he was like, you know why that is right? because it's a gay club. LOL he gasped when I told him I had to pay $10 to get in (he only had to pay $5, because he's gay ^^). He kind of held onto my hand while we talked and it wasn't seedy or weird like a lot of guys when you meet them in bars. It was just sweet and friendly. When he finally had to leave with his friend he leaned over to kiss me and I figured he was aiming for my cheek so I kinda turned my face and he wound up kissing my eye. He started laughing and said that he had been aiming for my lips and that he'd try it again and did (only a peck) and then said he hoped to see me around sometime. His name was Andrew and goddess was he cute. ^^ The club was filled to the brim with eyecandy... shirtless eyecandy at that. LOL lots of guys making out too and dancing in ways that may make even madonna blush. It was interesting. LOL Nikki and I got felt up by some totally tripped out girl too. She kind of broke into our dancing circle, grabbing Nikki and I (we were standing next to each other at the time) as she went and then kinda danced in the middle of us before collapsing on kelly and licking her neck! Kelly pushed her off and then she went off to hump two grinding males. LOL she would have fucked anything or anyone at that point.
So yes, it was a great time. Probably the best night of clubbing I've had in along time (I'm not a huge clubber) and I really hit it off with Grayham. Before we went downtown, we were all at a really boring party so Grayham and I sang songs from Greece and Greece 2 and discussed John Hughes to pass the time. He's just precious. And Sara taught me the basics to salsa! I still suck, but it was fun and she's really good. So yay. =D Anyway, off to bed b/c I have to meet fran for brunch!
ahhh I'm so TIRED. My university needs a nap room. I'm on my break and I just want to curl up with a blanket and catch a few Zzzs but there's no where comfortable to do it from and it's too far back to my room.I think I'm going to ditch kelly at lunch to go home and lie down. I need some vivran too but it's allll at home. LOL I really didn't need to be up until 2 am watching Politically Incorrect (why can't ABC put it on earlier here??), but Donny Wahlburg was on and I couldn't resist the call of the ugliest New Kid try to sound socially conscious.
Hmm so apparently the club/bar I've been invited to this evening is a notorious lesbian hang out. LOL seeing as how the people that invited me are straight, I'm kind of left wondering here. Oh the fun, oh the education.
The 10th version of A Digitized Existence was issue on August 18, 2001. It was designed with Photoshop 6 and PSP6 and coded in Arachnophilia. Fonts used are Rockwell, Shelley Volante BT and Texas Hero. Filters used include Stained Glass, Refractor, Charcoal, Colored Pencil, Mosaic, Negative image and watercolor paper (all PS6 or PSP6). Image credit goes to Getty One!
The Usual Stats // Name: Diana, Di
// Age: 19
// Sign: Scor-pi-o!
// Location: New Orleans, LA
