“Paying it forward” is fundamentally the most important weapon we have against the oligarchy, and simply refusing to participate in the endless cycle of new technology.

A long time ago, I kind of stumbled into a habit of “paying my hardware forward”. It started because it was simply a pain in the ass to try to sell something on ebay because your first ten offers are scam artists.

So when I upgraded a drawing tablet that I was using, I had a friend of a friend that was looking to try digital drawing and said “Here you go. The only thing I ask is that when you upgrade, or when you’re done with it, give it forward to someone else who could make use of it.”

Later, the same thing happened again with a camera stabilizer. I had bought one that it turned out was too lightweight for my DSLR. So I had to buy a heavier weight one. Meanwhile, a friend’s son was a budding filmmaker just using his cell phone to make stupid movies with his friends and I said “Hey…he’ll like this. The only thing I ask is when HE upgrades, or whatever, he passes it forward to another person”

Even something as simple as a dog ramp I bought for my aging dog. After he passed, it hung around in my shed until a friend of mine’s dog needed an operation and couldn’t do stairs. When her dog recovered she asked if I wanted it back and I said, no…just pass it forward.

I’ve done it with spare monitors. Old laptops that someone has needed for school, etc…

So what started as me just being too impatient to deal with ebay became something that literally makes me feel good knowing that I’m helping someone out, or even better, supporting another person’s artistic passion.

Actually it’s only a warehouse if it comes from the warehouse region of France. Anything else is just a “storage shed”

Full on sobbing? About a month ago, maybe a little less. choking up and tearing up and being unable to speak, just now as I type this.

At the end of February, I had to unexpectedly say goodbye to my girl Ripley (Mastiff/Lab cross). I think a lot of people have a soul dog, and for me, Ripley was that. She very literally saved my life by simply being there during my darkest depressions, and whenever I would have a panic attack, I would bury my face in her fur and breath in, and her scent would somehow pull me out of it. I live now absolutely terrified of what’s going to happen the next time I have an anxiety attack and she’s not around.

About three weeks before, she started limping. Vet said basically that it’s either a sprained muscle or bone cancer. I said, well, let’s start optimistic, get her some painkillers and muscle relaxants to give her leg time to heal if it’s a sprain and then go from there. And for about three weeks, it worked. Went off the meds 10 days later and was seemingly back to normal. So I figure I dodged a bullet.

At the end of February, it starts up again; worse this time. So I make another vet appointment for x-rays, but it wouldn’t be until the end of the week, and because she’s in pain, the vet asks if I can drop her off and she can hang around there so that they can squeeze her in, in between actual appointments that same day. I said yes, not even thinking for a moment that this would be the last time I would see her awake and alert.

I knew that it was possibly bone cancer. I was expecting that. That isn’t what haunts me and makes me cry when I think about it. It’s two things primarily.

1. The absolute sudden nature of it. I get a phone call saying that they’re asking my permission to sedate her for the x-ray because it’s too uncomfortable and painful for her to sit in the machine in the proper position to xray her leg otherwise. And then a second phone call an hour later, not only confirming that it was bone cancer, but that it had already started into her lungs. I had to make a choice. I could either take her home for a day or two to say goodbye in private, but in order to not be in pain she would essentially be so drugged up that she wouldn’t really have an quality of life anyway. Or I could race to the vet and say my goodbye’s right then and there. That unexpectedness hit me like a tonne of bricks, but what really hurt was…

2. I called a friend to drive me to the vet and be there with me while I said goodbye. When we arrived, Ripley was still only just starting to come out of the first sedation that she had been given in order to take the x-ray. I spent almost an hour, just laying on the floor next to her, talking to her and stroking her fur. But I don’t know…and I’ll never truly know for sure; if she knew that I was there for her in her final moments. Did she wake up enough from the first sedative enough to register my presence with her before they gave her the next one in order to start the euthenasia process?

Or did my Ripley go to her rest thinking that she was alone, and her last memory of me was dropping her off at the vet?

My friend insists that she felt Ripley’s breathing speed up when she heard my voice, but she could just be trying to make me feel better. And it’s that unknown that still makes me cry whenever I think of it, even two months later.

The last ugly sobbing cry was a month after she passed, the crematorium sent me her ashes back, and, unbeknownst to me, they took a nose print of her nose for me. Seeing that nose print broke me all over again. It’ll soon be a tattoo.

Anyway, I’m going to stop now. I’ve run on long enough and I’m on the verge of crying again. Pretty manly for a 50-year old dude, I know… But she was my everything and I miss her terribly every day.

Might be different up here in Canada. But up here you can either ask for a random ticket, or you can fill in a card with the numbers that you want (lucky numbers, etc…)

What are next weeks lottery numbers?

Too many. I collect special interests.

The one that’s lasted the longest are:

Filmmaking (specifically no/low budget filmmaking) with the premise being that regardless of tools, there are things that anyone can do to improve their product without a large budget. (ie. remembering to record tone for later editing. Planning your shoot for the proper time of day. Using reflectors even if you can’t afford lights. Blocking and Business, Shooting enough coverage for later editing, etc…) A large amount of quality in low budget films comes from taking the time to actually plan things out rather than just showing up with a camera and pointing it at volunteer actors.

Things like proper blocking, shot planning, etc… are free. With digital cameras, film isn’t a commodity and there’s nothing stopping you from filming enough angles to give the video editor something to work with rather than just constant two-shots. Editing software itself is free.

Point being, there is no excuse for lazy filmmaking, even if you don’t have access to expensive equipment. Planning trumps equipment 90% of the time.

Okay…rant over.

I mean, when you put it that way, anything can sound bad.

I hope I don’t need the /s tag…

Possibly an unpopular choice, but the remake of Ocean’s 11.

The sequels all got progressively more terrible. But that first one is still super fun to watch. It did a great job of creating a modern rat-pack out of current star power and playing them off each other’s cool factor.

The editing of the film was also great.

It’s one of those films that’s not meant to be high art. But just a fun watch.

ummmm…so what’s with the knife?

“Intimate” is a completely subjective term. Some people, like it or not, don’t consider nudity to be intimate and are therefore more than happy to use it to their advantage. Just because you wouldn’t, doesn’t make you the arbiter or what is or isn’t considered intimate.

So, as you say “Clearly being the more preferable job” is a meaningless statement. A vegan wouldn’t rent out their body to work in a slaughterhouse. A pacifist wouldn’t rent out their body to the military. Just because you wouldn’t rent out your body for people to enjoy on the internet doesn’t make it objectively worse than any other profession. It’s just your perspective.

I’m not saying that there aren’t issues in the porn industry. Of course there are, tonnes of them. But renting out your body to perform manual labour or renting out your body for people to look at on the internet are not as different as you think.

if someone has to grant access to their body, under threat of starvation or homelessness

But that’s employment in a nutshell, though. A welder rents out his body to a company to weld steel beams for 8 hours a day. An accountant rents out their body to sit behind a desk for 8 hours a day and crunch numbers. A salesperson rents out their body to cold-call for 8 hours a day.

No matter what, we’re coerced into giving or body to perform someone else’s labour. The fact that it doesn’t always involve nudity doesn’t change anything vis a vis your bodily autonomy.

The Death Gate Cycle by Margaret Weiss and Tracey Hickman

Princess Bride, of course.

And if you look really close on the right hand side, you can just make out the disturbed ground surrounding the entrance to the underground Chinese base.

Because their penises don’t work anymore and no one ever actually loved them enough to want to touch it without being paid up-front in the first place.

Is this a surprise to anyone? No one is buying Nutella for the health benefits…

8 has always been my favourite. As long as I resist the urge to draw spam. It can get repetively easy if you just draw and cast magic from your enemy, never having to use your own resources.

For most games, it depends on who you’re asking. I, for example, hate multiplayer looter-shooters, so the most overrated game to ME would be Fortnite. It literally hold no attraction for me and the thought of even playing it makes me shudder.

However, the universal answer is really any EA sports title.

It’s literally the same game every…damn…year…

April 1, 1946. Push a very pregnant Mary Anne Trump down a very steep set of stairs.

History podcasts are my catnip at the moment

Mine as well. Regular history for sure (I was an archaeology major after all), but also history mixed with category one, murders. I love a good historical unsolved mystery.