Horrible...

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Ecclesiastes.

Honestly. I'm super-epitomising Britishness right now. It was sunny yesterday, and I mean properly sunny. I mean unseasonably sunny and ridonkulously warm. Well, at least for this time of year, and this country. Apparently today it's meant to hit the low 30's, which is extreme enough for us thank you very much. Unfortunately, in my quest to enjoy yesterday's rays I managed to burn myself. In a delightful V shape across my chest. Stupid open-shirt. I would have been naked had it not been for the fact that I live with 4 other people, and my garden is overlooked by about 30 other people. Much as I would have liked to have a conviction for public indecency (not sure if it counts as public or not), I'd rather not have the shame of that on my record. So, I got burnt. And now I'm too hot. So now I have to moan and lament about the lost days of rain and breeze. Srsly, what happens to the wind in Summer? Is it just like... nah, I'm all blown out. Honestly, way too warm. Stagnant. STAGNANT.

I'm too hot.

Oh, and if I have to read one more truculent piece of 'writing' written by people on my course then I am going to have to remove my own testes. I thought I was elitist (even though my veneer is a joke, consecrated by my inability to be serious), but these people genuinely believe that they have some kind of higher moral authority with which to bargain. You don't. Ironically, the only kind of morality you seem to be employing is turpitude. A paradox indeed. Instead of your insipid pseudohilarious prerogative of naming things with a hint of irony, just call yourselves the Walking Paradoxes. No one will get it, but who cares? We're all morons any way. Before you all get up in arms (hahaha, 'all') and start waxing bullshitical about how I never have anything interesting to say, or how I'm really elitist, or how I think that everyone is a moron, or how I'm awesome, or how I'm no better than them, I beg you please just read the following sentence. I make no claims to being good at this. I have laid no stake. I suck at this. My sentences are grammatically flawed. My structure resembles poorly constructed snakes and ladders board. My thoughts are fragmented and normally ridiculous. My arguments are circular and ugly. My points are pointless. It is in the claim, however, that they make which riles me. "I have been pressured into doing this...", by what, exactly? Some kind of cosmic journalistic presence that I am unaware of? Is that what imbibes your copy with such startling banality? A super-being guiding your every keystroke? How'd I miss this memo? Maybe that's why you think you're so great: you're all religious. See. Stupid argument. The fuck? Any way. Go away, because I'm not better than you, but I mock myself - which makes it OK. Oh, and I might not be any good at metaphor but at least when I occasionally knock one out it doesn't always involve the words 'baby' and 'rape'. Neither of which are particularly funny apart, and aren't in any way amusing when you put them together.

Unless you're raping babies. Then it's good lulz.

Summery song for the day is David Guetta + Akon - Sexy Bitch. Go listen, even though it's kinda old. That doesn't matter. Things get good with age, or so I've heard. Or, at least I hope they do - what with my birthday coming up soon. God I don't want to think about that. Someone who is dear to me said he was gonna get me some glasses, however, and even though he can't afford it I appreciated the offer. Perhaps, when my faculties are more attuned to writing (rather than staving off the advances of a horrible dehydration-headache) I will discuss how I think motive is more important than action (in a lot of cases). I think the whole present-giving reciprocal altruism thing is a good demonstration of it. Even though a lot of people will dismiss my thoughts with an airy flick of their realism-wand, I think there is a time and a place for some mindless optimism. Sometimes we over-think and paradoxically over-look things: this will bring them to the forefront. You will appreciate man, damnit, or you will die trying.

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I promise that if I see another worthless prole citing Ecclesiastes as some kind of ethical or moral guide, I'm going to be forced to get very un-Christian on them. Let me grab my Bible!

Well, the first fourteen... paragraphs (because this implies at least a reasonable grounds for critical interpretation) are nothing but mindless platitudes which could be found in any teenager's diary: "all is vanity" (1:2), "All the rivers run into the sea" (1:7), "and there is no new thing under the sun" (1:9), etc. etc..Then it flips into some kind of narcissistic ridiculousness, "That which is crooked cannot be made straight" (1:15). Somewhat inconvenient given the tendency towards indoctrination and proselytizing, but no matter - we'll gloss over that. Then we move onto a slightly paradoxical phrase, which I have never been certain of how to read it, "For in wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow" (1:18) Now, without hindsight, I would be inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt here -- it is undeniable that with further questing for knowledge, we invariably acquire new ways of being sad. Shame. With hindsight, however, we can see how this is evangelically applied to the doctrine of faith; I mean that insofar as faith is the 'antidote' to evidence and reason. With the exegesis which is evident in the world, the passage might as well read:

"Just listen to what I'm saying, because God is speaking through me (sort of) and you don't need to know everything else. After all, you're probably not smart enough any way. Don't be vain!"

It's OK, though, because you don't need to do anything. Fortunately, our erstwhile 'narrator' (the Son of David/King of Jerusalem) is going to do it for you! He plants the trees, makes pools of water (truly, the scope of God's power is infinite: if a man alone can create a pool of water, and tend to an orchard - he must be imbued with some kind of superhuman awesomeness). Oh, but wait. No, sorry, he's not doing anything after all: "I got me servants and maidens" (2:7); so, OK. Let's reassess. Only go looking for knowledge if you're a) Really powerful (preferably a king), b) Superhumanly strong and awesome, and c) In a position to hire slaves. Otherwise leave it to the people who have all of those things. After you've gathered your slaves you can move onto the binary polemic which is espoused by many religious types, "I gat me men singers and women singers, and the delights of the sons of men, as musical instruments" (2:8). I'm more of an aestheticist, to be honest, so I'm not on board with this whole 'God is divine. Listen to this music' argument. But, at least whence you have collected your spoils you can engage in some reckless hedonism, "And whatsoever mine eyes desired I kept not from them" (2:10); although it archaically probably stood for some kind of prudish stuff, in a modern society this is truly wanton behaviour.

But no! It's OK. The King's vanity is misplaced (what with it being vanity and all), "And, behold, all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and there was no profit under the sun" (2:11). Now, if you're anything like me, you're probably thinking 'Who is looking after the kingdom? The king, after all, is busying tending to trees and pools of water and the like! When he gets hoisted by his own petard what will we do!?' Who knows?

Then it gets a bit confusing. He starts thrashing about and saying that basically everything you could possibly do is vanity, and that you should eschew all forms of enjoyment. Then, however, he has an epiphany (miraculous!) and it turns out that you should enjoy what you've done as long as you've come by it by hard work (not sure how this links with the conquests, and general Church appropriation of otherwise well-intentioned government funding, but there you go). Then we praise God or something, "For God giveth to a man that is good in his sight wisdom, and knowledge, and joy: but to the sinner he giveth travail, to gather and to heap up, that he may give to him that is good before God. This also is vanity and vexation of spirit" (2:26). Ah, good job, Old Testament God! Good to see you're not petty or anything.

Chapter 3 is basically just more platitudes talking about seasons and toiling in the fields and whatnot. I have to say, life in Biblical 'times' (the plural necessitated by the fact it's a retrospective biography created by myriad authors) seems like it was just a load of hard work. I suppose it was good they had something to back to at the end of the day: God. Otherwise there might have just been mass-suicides throughout the region. Then we have a swift rehashing of one of the 'commandments', basically intoning how it's bad to be envious of a neighbour (though why God would create a human so fallible as to fall afoul of such a base emotion is beyond me). Fortunately, in Chapter 5 we do have a return to some semblance of humanity. The King admonishes people who don't pay attention to what they're doing and saying, "be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thine heart be hasty to utter any thing before God: for God is in heaven, and thou upon earth: therefore let thy words be few" (5:2). Though, if you're again like me, you probably won't enjoy this kind of superimposed censorship. It is true that we should watch what we say, but not because of some divine providence; but because that is what we should do. Any one needing to derive a life lesson from this chapter missed a few dozen lessons on innate ethics in high school.

Chapter 6 starts with a repetition of Chapter 5's sentiment, "There is an evil which I have seen under the sun" (6:1). All well and good, but it's a pointless chapter. Just talks about how things are only good if we use them. Otherwise it is vanity, as decreed. Chapter 7 I find somewhat more disquieting:

"A good name is better than precious ointment; and the day of death than the day of birth" (7:1).

Dunno about you, but I quite liked being born. Not so looking forward to my own death, what with it being the termination of my life and all. Tiny bit presumptuous to assume we believe in the afterlife; though I suppose if you have slogged through the preceding 754 pages there is a good chance that you do believe. I don't, but there we go. If you're feeling a bit perturbed by my liturgy, by the way, don't worry, because "Sorrow is better than laughter" (7:3). The rest of this chapter has some nice moral messages, I suppose, extolling the goodness of wisdom, penitence, patience, a thirst for knowledge, etc. etc.. The problem comes when the assumption is made that a non-believer is capable of sinning. The overt religious connotations, to me, would preclude an atheist, for instance, from receiving divine retribution. I do not believe, and thus I have not sinned. If they can apply this sort of logic, then I do not see why I cannot. It is fallacious to the point of idiocy, but it is also a precursor to the ontological argument so I'm going to say it any way. We move swiftly (or not so) onto 'observations on wisdom and folly'; concluding that, "Wisdom is better than weapons of war: but one sinner destroyeth much good" (9:18). And therein we have another contradictory instruction: the message is clear, but the implication is muddy. How are we supposed to live, then? Are we to assume that the death of the sinner is good, even though he may or may not have been wise, or are we supposed to abnegate this decision to the Creator? Aren't we meant to be reticent to act against those who don't share our values, or does that only extend to people within our inner circles?

Then in Chapter 10 we have some weird talk about how a prince shouldn't be walking next to a horse with a servant on top of it, and that a man will hurt himself by taking a brick out of something. It seems as though we're just talking about wisdom again. It is good to have wisdom, the King concludes (or so it seems).

I hope for your sake, reader, that you're not young. If you are, you're buggered; "Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth; and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thine heart, and in the sight of thine eyes: but know thou, that for all these things God will bring thee into judgement. Therefore remove sorrow from thy heart, and put away evil from thy flesh: for childhood and youth are vanity" (11:9-10). Sorry, guys. You're even more buggered by the end as well, because it turns out that the only way of really ensuring eternal bliss is to follow the totalitarian rule of God to the letter, and to not err in any way, "Fear God, and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil." Well, who knew?

The problem, as we see, is that nothing done 'under the Sun' can really have a good outcome. For that matter, it is better to just bow and become blindly subservient to a higher power. Just as a disgusting despotic reign of horror would want you to (though despotism is too light a shade for this colour). So what ethical or moral derivative can we hope to glean from this abysmally depressing foray into humanity? All is worthless and pointless, but that doesn't matter because you should enjoy it any way: it is a gift from God. Or perhaps you should just abdicate any earthly responsibility and merely persevere in your quest for the after-life, and immortality (though this licentious wish, to me, seems the height of profligate behaviour - mortal sin). So, we could derive a nice message from this: enjoy that which is around. Unfortunately, we have to take it as a gift from God; so we are, ultimately, not enjoying anything on Earth, rather we are enjoying God through the conduit that is Earth. A fairly dismal prospect I hazard. The problem is that there isn't really any kind of ethical guideline here, no moral: just obeisance on a global scale. If you want to live your life dominated wholly by a possibility then by all means do, but do not preach it as some kind of codified tale of morality.

It shows that all is base and futile and that we might as well abandon all earthly enjoyment. As far as I am concerned, you cannot get more arrogant, and thus less moral, than that.

The Origin of Species: Proof.

Well, here it is. We've been waiting a couple hundred years, but at long last someone has discovered the proof for the origin of species. Fortunately for you, it happens to be me.

Scenario:

1 Empty house.

1 Person wanting to shave.

1 Hot water pipe.

Thirty seconds into shaving: hot water stops. Someone has come in during the intervening thirty seconds and gone in the shower.

Result: cut face from cold water uselessness.

Proof: If that is possible, then the microscopically tiny slice of chance that necessitated the spark of what was to become human life is put into perspective. One is borderline impossible, the other now probable.

There we have it. Cheques in the post, please.

Blaise, you moron.

Le silence éternal de ces espaces infinis m'effraie.

There is nothing to fear in the nothingness of eternity. All we must remember is that it is more important to live a good life regardless of the immortal consequence. That is Christian, that is morality, that is humanity...

Die Stimme der Venunft ist leise.

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I don't want to be introspective today. I don't want to be profound (and it could be argued, and I would argue, that I never am), nor do I want to shove out some kind of insight. It has been an incredibly long academic year and my brain is tired and apathetic. Instead, I will apply my contumelious hat and discuss some of my favourite myths about masturbation. No idea why, but there we go. It's a comforting thought that even though this will be utterly ridiculous it will probably rank as one of the most interesting things I've discussed this week. Ha. That discussing masturbation myths ranks more highly than other things says a lot about my recent updates (namely that women = sewage).

Masturbating makes you blind.

This one is great. Mainly because it contains an element of truth. An element of truth atrophied and distorted so much that we should stand and appreciate the craven misrepresentation as it is. Whomever we can credit with this announcement deserves a medal. And to be shot. Repeatedly. In the head. By my penis. I'm trying to think of ways in which masturbation could make you go blind. I suppose if you had recently taken to chugging drain-cleaner, and then you spunked in your own mouth... that could make you die. Although one imagines you'd probably be circling the drain before the sexual urge ever came to fruition. One would imagine you'd die pretty quick after downing cleaning fluid, and even if you didn't that it would put you in cataplexy and thus negate the possibility of masturbating. That brings a whole new dimension to the technique of 'the stranger'. Never really understood that, either. Should probably be called, 'The Pubescent', or, 'Doing an Ugly'. Having never been on the receiving end of someone sincerely stating this, I cannot accurately describe which biological imperative they are citing for their 'fact'. Given the limits of my scientific knowledge, I am unable to fathom just how stupid you would have to be to a) Say this, and b) Believe this. There's being ecumenical with the truth, and there's dressing the truth up in so many clothes as to make it unrecognisable. I suppose if you had an allergy to water-based lubricants or something... and then maybe you touch your eye? No, I mean, when is this ever going to happen? That kind of stupidity is akin to the people who need the warnings on the side of irons which say, 'Caution: Hot when on'. Surely, one would hope, it should also include a warning which states, 'Caution: Chilly when left in the fridge'; just in case anyone out there is suffering from cold urticaria. So, yeah, I have no idea why this exists. Probably has a ridiculous religious origin. LIKE EVERYTHING EVER. Or, it could be a stupid connection between puberty and masturbation (decreasing eyesight being a boring by-product of growing up). Any one who falls for that fallacy should be prevented from reproducing. Save yourself, please, you moron.

Masturbating causes hairy palms.

Yeah, jacking off causes hirsuteness. The fuck is this? Ya know what, let's play with words: masturbating causes scary psalms. Read:

My cock is my shepherd; wrong to leave it in want.

Lying down in green pastures, bequeathing to me quiet waters,

It restores my soul.

It guides me in the path of sexploration, whilst I take His name in vain.

As I grunt and moan

Through the valley of the shadow of blindness,

I will fear no climax,

For it is with me;

My rod and my staff,

They comfort me.

A table for competitions is prepared,

in the presence of my enemies, but mostly my friends.

I'll anoint thy head with oil;

'Till my mouth overfloweth.

Surely goodness and love will follow,

All the days of my life,

And I will dwell forever with my rod, my staff; my sword.

FRIGHTENING STUFF, no doubt. There is no justification for this either. It makes no sense whatsoever. What, so... semen is so rich in testosterone and it causes such a hormonal surge of the blighters that it makes you sprout hair where no one has it? By that logic, any one who goes to the gym should have tufty eyes. Cretins.

Masturbating causes the semen to become thin and will lead to infertility.

You know what would be good? If we could flip this one: masturbating causes the semen to become thin and will prevent you from having children -- so go for it! That way, at least, if this were ever proven to be true (which it won't ever be) we could breed the idiocy out of the gene-pool. Yes, masturbating three times a day will mean that you're producing something pretty poor in the evening, but it's not a bloody well. It replenishes itself, what with the testicles and the sacs etc.. Unless you develop some kind of horrendously emasculating disease which ravages your internal organs, your semen will not stop flowing. You should, really, let it escape. I mean, let us take the Christian anti-abortion argument. Every sperm, when inseminated with an egg, has the potential for life. Surely, it would run, that every sperm has the potential for life too? Surely, by releasing them into the world you are giving them a slightly large chance at life than letting them die somewhere in your balls? I mean, you could jizz on a towel, which three seconds later is shoved into someone's vagina: voilà, with three-hundred-thousand other benevolent factors, you have a gestation infestation. If you keep them all pent-up then they will just die and be replaced. That's horrible. That's almost... evolutionary! Preposterous. Preventing your kids from masturbating by instilling a fear of infertility into them is tantamount to child abuse (I would venture that it is child abuse) and it leads to all sorts of inferiority complexes. Let alone not letting them have sex. Everyone loves a virgin, hey! Sexual repression totally works. I mean, just look at the priesthood! I hear celibacy really works in reducing teen-pregnancy rates too! No, wait, none of these things are true. No one loves a sexually repressed virgin who doesn't know how to fuck. No one loves a guy who is scared of sex. The priesthood is infiltrated with a plague of philandering, child-molesting rapists. Celibacy actually increases the chance of teen pregnancy (and statistically only prevents the fucking in the first place temporarily for 18 months). Go wank yourself silly, kids, because you'll still be able to have kids. Unless you're not allowed to masturbate at all, and then the chances are that you will continue the trend of repressed and latent homosexuality which pervades our most hypocritical societies. Post hoc, ergo propter hoc: wank or be gay.

Masturbating causes disease.

You know what causes disease? Misinformation and idiocy. Yes, the former being the main tool in the fight against eliminating disease, and the latter being an actual disease. I am waiting for the day the DSM-IV to classify 'idiocy' as 'a redaction of long-ago needed lunacy; normally found in religious types and people who live near swamps'. The latter being a joke on the former, ya? Masturbating no more causes disease than coughing. Sure it can spread disease. Saying it causes them is like saying boats caused the bubonic plague: the infested rats travelled on them and spread it, so surely it follows thus?

Women don't masturbate.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Masturbating decreases the libido and thus is a useful tool for preventing teen fucking and sexual avariciousness.

1) You're an idiot.

2) You're an idiot.

Nothing like that is ever going to be true. It is so much more likely to increase your libido: you'd never have an outlet. That's like saying, 'leaving the plug in your sink increases the chances that your floor will stay dry'. No, it doesn't: the thing will overflow. What about spontaneous ejaculation? Do we punish that? How many lashes? Castigate the fellow, something happened he had no control over! GOD DAMN HIM. No, wait, good on him :D. Lucky fuck. (I'm pretty sure a potato just exploded in the microwave). True, there is a corollary between masturbating and sexual exploration -- but it is the same fallacy as in the first myth. At a time of high-hormonal imbalance a teenager is more likely to begin to explore their sexuality, and, as a result, is likely to masturbate. And mutually masturbate. Why should we frown upon this? Masturbating is a vital element in the understanding of one's own body. You should lop it off before you stop a kid playing with it. You hypocrite. Any one here who claims to not masturbate - regardless of their age - is either deluded, a liar, or insane.

Just in case a lowly teenager stumbles across this (and to give it some point) and they find themselves on the receiving end of some of this idiocy, I will lay out some things that are true.

--Masturbation is fine and will not damage your health unless you do it 5 times a day 7 days a week. Then you'll get sore and tired.

--Both sexes masturbate.

--There is nothing wrong with it and no one will punish you for it.

--It should not induce guilt.

--People in relationships masturbate.

--People of all ages masturbate.

Most of all, kids: masturbation is incredibly, indescribably, fantastically enjoyable. It's great. Honestly. Go try it. It's wonderful. Any one who hasn't experienced an orgasm hasn't lived.

:D.

Hoorah. Who said things have to be heavy!?

A fighting pacifist.

I'm not actually a pacifist, by the way, as it has no pragmatic implications whatsoever. As so aptly pointed out by someone or other (probably Harris), if the world had adopted Ghandi's idea that the Jews should kill themselves before they could be killed, well... we'd all be dead. Pacifism is by far and a way the stupidest ideology prevalent in more liberal people at the moment, because of how nonsensically it would have to be applied to the most divergent of situations. It's an absolute where context is necessary. That's not what I want to talk about, however, and in fact I don't really want to talk about anything. I'm too fucking tired.

I'll just ramble about that awful fight you have to have when you're tired. You know, the one where you're clawing at the edges of consciousness, struggling to stay awake? The one where your eyelids are creeping inexorably closer to the hoods. The one where you physically don't think you can stay awake. That one is great. Not sure why, however, because it's stupid. You're just sitting there and your body is going, 'yeah, no, can't do this I'm afraid', and it makes no sense. It normally happens on days where you have no good reason to be tired. Take today, for instance: I slept for a good 9 hours last night (as befitting of someone of my age) and didn't get up until around 10.30 this morning. Since then I've just sort of ambled about. I would say running errands, but it would be a misnomer. There has been no running. At one point I think I stopped moving. It might be the sun, I guess. It has been unseasonably warm today (then again, 'unseasonably' implies warm: none of our 'falls' are warm). Not sure what I'm talking about, really. I think I'm just rambling. So there was that, and this was now. I was out in the garden reading God Is Not Great, and the slow and steady drift towards slumber ensnared me. Cernuous of head and horizontal of body (I can contort into some wonderfully lazy positions). I looked like the illusionist's trick whereby a person is prostrated between two chairs, and when they are both removed their body is still reticulated at the ridiculous angle - despite anyone's best attempts to curve them back into normality. That was me. On the chairs. With my legs in that awful position on the table. Ya know, the one that gives you pins and needles in like 8 seconds? What's up with the phrase 'pins and needles', any way? In no way does getting an inoculation, for example, feel like sitting in the lotus position. Nor does pricking your finger feel like sitting on your hand. Neither are particularly painful, but the are two distinct sensations.

Silly world.

Babies are born through a sewage canal.

That is my logical deduction from the following:

This city smells of sewage.

My road smells of vagina.

Vaginas thus smell of sewage.

Babies are thus born in and through a sewage canal.

You cannot dispute my logic there, however hard you may wish to try. I defy anyone to rebut that ratiocination, and if you can I don't care, because I promise you this city smells of sewage and vagina. And I have smelt both, up close and personal. Ever had a malfunctioning septic tank? Ever begrudgingly administered cunnilingus? I've had the first, and done the second. Trust me, it was against my will. No, it wasn't, that's a horrible thing to implicate my ex-partners in. It was reciprocated unwillingly simply because the whole concept made me want to vomit (which would not be conducive to sexual relations for most people), it wasn't that I didn't want to, in essence, but that doing it made me want to die. And not in a joyful Shakespearian way. As for the septic tank, that's just a boring story which involves a garden. No, more experiential evidence comes from walking past open sewage drains, on a daily basis. As pointed out yesterday, this place has a shit sewage system (if you'll excuse me...) Effluence it is not, though you would think defined by what it is... alas, no, there is no drainage here. Miasmic, perhaps. Any way, so, yes, I have encountered both. Although that implies that I once came across a stray vagina and, against my natural predilection, decided to attempt to consume it. I can promise you I have never had that experience.

As for the conclusion, well, that follows simply: I have never been present at a live birthing. I have seen things on TV, sure, and on sex-ed videos (though why we need to know about rupturing, prolapse, etc., I am unsure), but we all know what fancy prestidigitation these televisual types are capable of. No one sees Jurassic Park and concludes that dinosaurs exist, living on some far-off island. Call me sceptical but I just don't think that babies can be born in any other way. I mean, have you seen how they come out looking? Thing looks less like a human and more like a roundish blob, the kind of which you can only find in the psychologists' diagnostic etchings, "What do you see?", "A greyish blob?", "Correct, now what do you see?", "A greyish blob?", "Not... so correct..." Precisely. They could be covered in anything. Ah, but your screams nourish me so: "What about midwives, surely they could testify to the ridiculousness of your theory?"

Well, that would be making a tremendous Kierkegaardian leap. Let it run so:

Midwife.

Derived, probably, from 'mid' and 'wif', meaning "with woman", or "woman who plunges deep to grab the baby."

Women know nothing.

Midwifery + testimony = fallible and stupid.

Any one who trusts the words of a woman is an idiot. Want further proof other than my random proclamation? Let us follow from my original point: women beguile men into licking their lady parts, and men henceforth are repulsed by the very thought of them: they are the seductive sirens, alluring and deceptive. We, as sailors, should fight hard to resist their enticement, lest we be dashed on the rocks, and/or ensnared in the perpetual burning bush of woe. If they are capable of such misleading suggestions, 'you'll love it', then surely we can safely discount anything else they might have to say about anything? So, when a midwife comes up to me in the street, as they so often do, and says, 'But I have seen it with my own eyes: there is no sewage', I will not be averse to hitting them sharply around the fizzog. One should never lie to a gentleman, should they? We must condition and correct where we find misinformation and delusion. It is our purpose, as men, to do so. I feel I have dealt sufficiently with that poorly formed argument.

So, let me bring around my next line: have you ever fucking seen a baby? They're covered in all kinds of bodily fluid. And where does bodily fluid go? Yes, that's right, down the drain - into the sewer. Irrefutable, I would venture, but I will continue just for the sake of completion. Think of all the things that babies are covered in: vaginal discharge, menstrual fluid, embryonic fluid, excrement, urine, womb-juice. Where else do you find all of these things? The toilet, that's where. Who hasn't wandered into the bathroom one morning and found a congealing puddle of freshly produced womb-juice? No one, I tell you. And I know that for certain. Don't ask me how, or you will break the spell. Just think of this as the birthing ontological equivalent. But valid. Instead of insipid. The mind boggles, presumably, that we haven't stumbled upon this conclusion so far. For continuity: babies come out of the vagina crying. Wouldn't you be crying if you had fallen through a drain, or if you had been living for 9 months in a small bucket full of excrement, or if you slipped and fell into a septic tank? Yes, yes I think you would. Or if you wouldn't then you are implicated in this conspiracy: yes, you, you are embroiled in this feminist tapestry of conceit. Shocking, I know.

For inculcated naysayers (driven to their recalcitrant position by leftist propaganda of the suffragettes and the like), I offer another demonstration. It is relatively simple, if crude, so as to not confuse you any further. There is a distinct and reasonable parallel to be drawn between a crap that won't flush, and a baby that won't crown. Think logistics here, people: a cervix, roughly 3cm wide, and a U-bend, roughly the same when relative to the anus or something. You work out the dimensions for yourself, I dare you (though beware of any puddles). Everyone has happened upon a malformed piece of excrement that obstinately digs its nails in whenever you try to flush it (anthropomorphic phantasmagoria aside, I'm actually feeling a little queasy at my own analogy); likewise, we have all seen and heard that babies have to claw their way out. The cervix was not made to split open for the passage of a head. It simply makes no sense. If it was, the easiest way to impregnate someone would be to ejaculate in your own mouth and then shove it up into the fallopian tubes, spitting on the nearest egg you come across (diving equipment mail order business patent pending). Hopefully there's only one egg, mind, lest you inseminate an army of sewage-covered-pea-sized-humanoids. So, there is the corollary: a toilet that won't empty its contents, and a baby desperately seeking freedom. Undeniably accurate, I fancy.

For a penultimate thought we must turn our attention elsewhere on the female. And, just for a bit of light relief, you can think of this section as being my Sermon On the Mound. Saddened as I am by our departure from vaginas, we must move upwards. Fortune favours the brave, however, as we stumble upon the tumultuous fantabulousness of the mammalian breast. Intelligent design proponents need look no further; though, evidently, their contradictory sexual repression would probably prevent them from happening on this miracle. Whence we arrive, we will find a stark binary: beauty and disgust. What happens when the baby arrives? They start leaking. What kind of sick designer would have decided that: what kind of deity would prevent their young from fucking, whilst simultaneously making their very young suckle at the teat of their mother? This is an Oedipal nightmare, surely: promoting incest in a community precluded from sexual liberation? Counter-intuitive, no? Any way, I am stretching far from my original intention. As our foray into the depths showed us: there are deep currents of intention present here - ones beyond our comprehension. My mirror is necessary, again, here. Milk, being the dairy equivalent of pear, has a shelf-life of roughly 1tp. And when it spoils, it ruins the world: the olfactory horror is of apocryphal proportions. Truly, to prove evolution, we need to look no further than our nose's reaction to the smell of off-dairy. If that is not a physical defence mechanism I do not know what is. So, milk is the devil's child, and yet it seeps from a lady? Connection? Indubitably, as our friend Holmes would conclude (although I seem to recall that this is actually a myth - I wouldn't know, not having read any Conan Doyle (much to the alarm of any non-English-literature students who assume that studying it entails reading everything in the world ever. Something I will talk about one day)). Where would you tip your spoilage? Down the sink, one assumes, or perhaps just let it solidify and throw it in the bin. Not sure why you'd take this approach, but it's a free country - thankfully; imagine a world where we weren't allowed to choose between enduring rancidity or relieving ourselves of it! The horror! Unimaginable. Let the biology continue: what would cause milk to go off? Heat. What produces heat? The body. Have you ever felt a breast? They should be called furnaces (though the delightful parody of Hell's flames must be appreciated nonetheless). The devil incarnate, evidently. So, why are we content to let our children drink this, when we would throw it away? Well, there is trickery afoot:

_{"For sewage thou art, and unto sewage shalt thou return."}

_{Blindingly obvious when it's pointed out, isn't it? Allegory abounded in the long-long-ago, and here is a puerile example. So, we feed our offspring sewage because it is from whence they came. Therein we find the mystery explained conclusively. Truly, it astonishes me that it took so long to reach this epiphany. Dawkins' mountain, I suppose. A long trek through ignorance, clearing to a moment of monumental understanding. So, feeding sewage to sewage aside, we have one last issue to address. Fait accompli, you could say. Or checkmate.}

_{Have you ever listened to a woman? They speak utter, utter rubbish. And, no, the irony is not lost on me. I don't think I've ever had a conversation with a lady that hasn't at least pounded the borders of derivative nonsense into nothingness. Not to cast an entire sex into degradation, but the generalization seems both apt and true. Endless hours spent castigating each other for being shallow, for being bitchy; years just lamenting your very existence, how you're so useless at everything, and inconsiderate, and lazy, and blah, blah, blah. Well, think nothing of it any more, as I will explain it now. If we can cast our minds back to rudimentary biology, we will probably remember the XY sex-determination lesson. Remember: men are XY, and women are XX? Think of it this way: X represents dirge, and Y represents triumph. X being extraneous, and Y being yes, I have succeeded. Women, God bless them, do not have the chromosomal equilibrium to transcend their ephemeral origins. Men can detach from their sewagey past, and woman cannot. It explains why they talk such garbage. See, the words are not lost on me: further proof. Why do these words exist? Precisely. Etymology is nothing compared to this lecture. We need it not when we 'hold these truths to be self-evident'. Which we do, because they are. Seems self-evident, doesn't it? They are truths, after all, not untruths... Further testimonial for my cause, I think you'll agree. It is a never ending circle, which feminists will attempt to square. We are born of sewage, through sewage, and end as sewage - but some, the lucky half, can escape; thanks to a genetic advantage. The only question left, for more intelligent folk than I, is 'What came first? The lady or the sewage?'}

_{In the immortal words of Luna Lovegood: "A circle has no beginning."}

Say what you wanna say.

So be it:

Stop wearing your pants like that.

I am not one of these people who hates the 'trend' of 'sagging' (whereby the jeans do not sit on the hips, instead sagging to a different place on the buttocks, see?) In fact, because of my predilection for the willy-bum action I am actually all in favour of this. I wholeheartedly (and groinly) approve of this trend (and yes, stop saying "it's not a trend". Trend doesn't mean "fashion", and "fashion" doesn't mean "good fashion". I wish we could stop getting bamboozled by these really rather simple ideas). TOO MUCH PARENTHESIS. Any way, no, I like it. It's great. The more ass on show the better. There is a line, however, and it is clearly demarcated by what evolution has given us. Actually, thinking about it, there are several lines.

i) No one wants to see your actual ass. I don't wanna see it 'cause chances are it's really unpleasant: hairy, malodorous, and misshapen. The 'crack', by the by, is not in the least bit attractive. To anyone. Ever. Except people who are into CBT, and we can quite easily discount these people as pathologically insane. Incidents, those pictures make me want to die inside. Shudder. No, the sag is meant to show off your underwear, because you're a brand whore, and it's meant to be suggestive, accentuating the possibilities of what lies beneath the voluptuous folds of dexterously woven nylon, cotton, or even silk. It is meant to be a tacit gesture; coquettish and tauntingly promising. Letting it hang too low, however, is none of these things. You are to suggestion as religion is to truth: woeful.

ii) Stop being fat. Honestly, stop being fat. Really closely linked to the one above, but stop it. I don't like it and it makes me want to up-chuck my guts just to get away. That bottomless crevice is a slip-'n'-slide of doom: skating towards Hades as inexorably as man is drawn to Earth.

iii) Very closely related to i): wear nicer underwear. That's like... the whole point of this prurient exercise. You're ruining what should be a wonderful spectacle with your cheaply imported, saggy boxers. You should at least be confining your choice to boxer-briefs, 'cause, frankly, the whole billowing pants look makes you look like you're trying to birth a malformed child out of your anus. Maybe you are. Maybe the whole world is trying to do just that. Maybe I am in the wrong (I'm not: my body is a piece of crap on the whole, but I've got a delicious ass). If you're going to do this properly, which you are if I get my way, then you need to be wearing one of the two: fun, tight underwear, or decent brand, tight underwear. CK, D&G, Armani. It's not hard. Or something fun from Topman. Not just... beleaguered check patterns.

Sick and tired of seeing it. I want to see some nice ass, so please God stop doing this badly. To be honest, we can probably just prevent this ever happening again by imposing the following rule:

YOU CAN ONLY DO IT IF YOU'RE HOT.

And yeah, I'll be the judge of that.

Stop wearing trackies/joggers/billowy trousers if you have a tiny penis.

I don't care what you're packing down there, honestly: it's one of the least important things to me in the world. Just above tact and grace. If, however, you are unfortunate - which is fine, it really is how you use it - then stop parading around like that! You look absolutely ridiculous.

Stop wearing trackies/joggers/billowy trousers if you have a big penis.

As above, you still look ridiculous.

Stop wearing trackies/joggers/billowy trousers if you have a penis at all.

This is easier this way: I just don't want to see your little man shaking in step with you. It's repulsive. Wear proper underwear, for the love of all that is holy. And my eyes are Holy. Or at least they used to be. Sigh.

Stop walking around with your top off: It's 13 degrees.

I'm not sure if it is a British institution or what, but we can probably assume that it is, given that our other institutions range from, 'being rude to people for no reason', 'being unnecessarily aggressive', 'loutishness', 'pre-teen drinking and pregnancy', and 'living off the state'; but, walking around topless seems to be the first thing we want to do as soon as the sun says hello from his 8-month slumber closest to us (incidentally, and just because it fascinates me, the sun is actually closest to us in winter. Not sure if this line of argument is likely to dissuade people from going topless in Summer, but it's worth a shot). I don't care if you want to do it when it's actually warm, but the sun doesn't necessarily mean it is. You look absolutely fucking ridiculous prowling around with your pasty flesh, and I guarantee you that you are one of two types of person: horrendously over-built, or fleshy jelly. Why does no one attractive do this? Why are the most sensuous things reserved for the ugliest people? Stop being so ugly, damnit!

Stop asking me for money.

What do I look like, a fucking charity? I wish I was a fucking charity. That is a cause I would happily support. Just because you've fucked up your life doesn't mean you deserve anything from me. You're not making any effort. People who have hit hard times and then are doing their best to get back on the life-train get as much as I can give. You, you stupid, fucking pikey, you can fuck off, "Can I get 50p, mate? Well, a couple of quid would be great, or a fiver." And what are you going to do for me? Give me a Big Issue? No? Just stand there gawking at me, assuming that the fear generated by your ugly teeth will be enough to cast me into obedience? You're wrong, I'm afraid. Get out my face.

PLEASE, PLACE WHERE I LIVE, STOP SMELLING LIKE SEWAGE.

What is up with that? How can an entire city smell like sewage, all the time? It almost defies belief that someone could have constructed so poor a sewage system. Not sure if the pipes are made of wool, or if the drains are shallower than vaginas, or if the treatment facilities are actually nuclear reactors, or if the people who work to keep these things operational are actually vapid morons of the highest order... but something is awry. Based on where I live I think we can safely deduce that it is all of those except the nuclear one. No one in this city has the brain power to run a nuclear reactor (and that's not really doing any one a disservice; they must be inordinately complex). Hardly anyone in this city has enough brain power to walk in a straight line, let alone get their atoms in a twist. So, yeah, my olfactory-centre is offended. GRAVELY OFFENDED. To be honest, I'd rather this place smelt like a grave. Nothing like the scent of decaying corpse to remind you that you're alive. All the smell of sewage does is remind you that you're not a piece of shit. Which, let's face it, you probably are.

Ice pick headaches are ridic.

The history of humanity is a history of bloodshed, of desecration and destruction on the grandest scale imaginable; it is a history marked by genocide and war, by holocaust and nuclear bombing; by torture, complicity, and religion. Mankind is the greatest threat to mankind, because it's so insensible and stupid. People who still propagate intelligent design should heed the following thoughts, however: stop butchering the language, please, 'intelligent' in relation to 'religious' is patently insane, and stop flying in the face of irrefutable evidence to the contrary. You can defy evolution, natural selection, the origin of species, biology, cosmology, astrology, mysticism, relativism, physics, anthropology, archaeology, and everything else which shows your beliefs to be indicative of genuine mental disability; you cannot, however, persist in your belief when things like ice pick headaches exist. If you've never experienced one then you can count yourself lucky. Eponymous insofar as it feels like you're being stabbed repeatedly in the temporal lobe with an ice-pick. Fucking painful, and fleeting. Gtfo. "My vision, she is swimming." No, she's not, and she's not a she. Any way, they're horrible.

All of these things annoy me. And I would have continued if I hadn't been annoying myself. I also need the toilet. Maybe I'll just go in the street, it's not like it's going to make much difference. Then the tramps can lick it, or something, because clearly my life-blood is what is sustaining their population. Honestly, you want to prove natural selection is a myth: come here and have a look around. Unreal.

And the title of this post refers to a great song. Please click here if you want seductive sensory stimulation. Honestly, absolutely divine. I recommend everyone goes out and buys the whole album, because it's divine. Wow, I am all for proving God's existence at the moment, eh? I will be posting something about religion quite soon, as well, but not until my exams are over. I want it to be my magnum opus; debunking "the whole rotten edifice - the whole profiteering, woman-fearing, guilt-gorging, truth-hating, child-raping institution". Obviously, I won't manage it, but I want it to be deliciously vitriolic and accurate, so it will take some time to collate my thoughts. I also have more reading to do. As for some recommendations there, I suggest Christopher Hitchens' delightfully acerbic God Is Not Great. If you have any misgivings about it then I will point you to the closing lines of the opening chapter:

"It will never die out, or at least not until we get over our fear of death, and of the dark, and of the unknown, and of each other. For this reason, I would not prohibit it [religion] even if I thought I could... But will the religious grant me the same indulgence? ... And as it happens, I will continue to do so without insisting the on the polite reciprocal condition-which is that they in turn leave me alone. But this, religion is ultimately incapable of doing. As I write these words, and as you read them, people of faith are in their different ways planning your and my destruction, and the destruction of all the hard-won human attainments that I have touched upon. Religion poisons everything."

♥.

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Got another mark back: 70 (2 marks deducted for unalphabetised bibliography). So this year runs at:

69 + 70 = 70 (1st).

62 + 78 + 97 = 75 (1st).

70 + 72 = 71 (1st).

70 (50%) + ? = (1st so far).

Love me or hate me, I don't care :D!