Meaningless non-rant for little or no purpose at all.

[tyrannosaurus vex]

There is a profound truth about life that only you know. You've seen it inscribed on the walls of every room you've ever been in; etched into the faces of all the wretched souls you come across, as they squirm uncomfortably in the glaring sunlight of the horrible truth -- even if they don't know it -- seeking in vain to hide their attempts to escape.

Everything reinforces this truth. The way the wind bends the trees, the way the tide swallows the beaches, the way the moon hangs in a quiet Summer sky, haplessly, like it's beginning to think the string that holds it there is never going to snap, and it'll never have the pleasure of reuniting violently with the Earth.

You are deeply, intrinsically aware of the common thread that weaves its way around and between every thing you know. If you could successfully articulate it, if you could convey what you know to anyone else, you could create a bond between you and your audience so strong that nothing could possibly sever it.

But it eludes communication. Words are dull and clumsy, ultimately useless for describing your truth. Even ideas lack the resolution to zero in on it, because the more time you spend thinking about what you know, the less sure of it you become. The truth is like a message scribbled in an alien language on a fragile slip of paper, rolled up, locked up in a bottle, and tossed into the sea forever.

You are the bottle, the carrier. Inside you is an insight so powerful that it could instantaneously transform the world, if anyone were to ever read it. The sea is life: tumultuous, unpredictable, and able to whisk you to and fro at its will. But it cannot touch the message.

At the end of your journey, when you wash up in some distant shore, who will be there to find what you have carried there? Whoever it is, and whatever the message means to them, they probably won't be another bottle like you. Because bottles can't read.

[Cramulus]

I feel you loud and clear, man

[Jenne]

[Doktor Howl]

I liked it, but two things:

1.  Individuals don't have truth.  They have opinions and beliefs.  Truth is external.

2.  Words work just fine.  Nothing clumsy about them at all, just as there is nothing clumsy about a hammer.  If you whack your thumb - or piss your wife off with an ill-advised comment - don't blame the tools.

[Fujikoma]

I liked it. Didn't seem meaningless to me.

There's some old saying about each answered question leading to ten more questions, but, not sure of the actual quote, or where it comes from.

According to Zen Buddhism, Doktor Howl, at least if I interpret what I read correctly (which is unlikely), there is a point at which words fail. I will now be leaving the topic of Zen, as I know jack shit about it, and am not qualified to speak on the matter any further.

Words are abstractions, they hold meaning, but they are symbols of sorts, poor substitutes for the reality of any experience, no matter how well used they may be. There are some thoughts that cannot be conveyed in words, only action, emotion, these can be described, but they can never really cross the gulf and reach the intended target with the full force of the experience itself.

[Doktor Howl]

According to Zen Buddhism, Doktor Howl, at least if I interpret what I read correctly (which is unlikely), there is a point at which words fail.

1.  Zen Buddhists are, and have always been, utterly full of shit.  They're a bunch of deranged hippies who think that asking koans will make up for the fact that they've totally wasted their lives.  Their Western adherents are even worse, and should be beaten right out of their Birkenstocks.

2.  There may be a point at which words fail.  It's probably during an event that is so awful that common experiences DON'T apply, such as the monstrous shit I just took.  For real, it was like someone turned the toilet bowl into a planter, and just filled it right up.  That someone, of course, would be me, but that ain't dirt.  I have left it as is, to test our theory on words failing (You didn't think I used my office bathroom, did you?).

[Fujikoma]

I've seen a similar shit once, working at McDonalds, many years ago... I was sent to unclog the toilet in the men's restroom...

I opened the door and the wave of stench hit me, I immediately felt ill. From the doorway, I spied it, PILED UP HIGHER THAN THE SEAT, and it was almost a glowing, radioactive orange. Fearing the tentacles that might at any moment reach out from the depths of that foul basin, and gagging the whole way, I returned the sacred plunging instrument to my supervisor, who, better skilled with the wards and sigils needed to protect oneself from such a sinister evil, and less sensitive to its toxic aura, proceeded to send the beast back into it's infernal abode.

[Doktor Howl]

I've seen a similar shit once, working at McDonalds, many years ago... I was sent to unclog the toilet in the men's restroom...

I opened the door and the wave of stench hit me, I immediately felt ill. From the doorway, I spied it, PILED UP HIGHER THAN THE SEAT, and it was almost a glowing, radioactive orange. Fearing the tentacles that might at any moment reach out from the depths of that foul basin, and gagging the whole way, I returned the sacred plunging instrument to my supervisor, who, better skilled with the wards and sigils needed to protect oneself from such a sinister evil, and less sensitive to its toxic aura, proceeded to send the beast back into it's infernal abode.

So, Monday.

After vindaloo.

[Freeky]

I've seen a similar shit once, working at McDonalds, many years ago... I was sent to unclog the toilet in the men's restroom...

I opened the door and the wave of stench hit me, I immediately felt ill. From the doorway, I spied it, PILED UP HIGHER THAN THE SEAT, and it was almost a glowing, radioactive orange. Fearing the tentacles that might at any moment reach out from the depths of that foul basin, and gagging the whole way, I returned the sacred plunging instrument to my supervisor, who, better skilled with the wards and sigils needed to protect oneself from such a sinister evil, and less sensitive to its toxic aura, proceeded to send the beast back into it's infernal abode.

So, Monday.

After vindaloo.

I should make vindaloo again...

[Reginald Ret]

Fujikoma,
i like you.

[Doktor Howl]

I've seen a similar shit once, working at McDonalds, many years ago... I was sent to unclog the toilet in the men's restroom...

I opened the door and the wave of stench hit me, I immediately felt ill. From the doorway, I spied it, PILED UP HIGHER THAN THE SEAT, and it was almost a glowing, radioactive orange. Fearing the tentacles that might at any moment reach out from the depths of that foul basin, and gagging the whole way, I returned the sacred plunging instrument to my supervisor, who, better skilled with the wards and sigils needed to protect oneself from such a sinister evil, and less sensitive to its toxic aura, proceeded to send the beast back into it's infernal abode.

So, Monday.

After vindaloo.

I should make vindaloo again...

YES.

Keep that up, and I may have to change my mind on this bigamy thing.

[Freeky]

I've seen a similar shit once, working at McDonalds, many years ago... I was sent to unclog the toilet in the men's restroom...

I opened the door and the wave of stench hit me, I immediately felt ill. From the doorway, I spied it, PILED UP HIGHER THAN THE SEAT, and it was almost a glowing, radioactive orange. Fearing the tentacles that might at any moment reach out from the depths of that foul basin, and gagging the whole way, I returned the sacred plunging instrument to my supervisor, who, better skilled with the wards and sigils needed to protect oneself from such a sinister evil, and less sensitive to its toxic aura, proceeded to send the beast back into it's infernal abode.

So, Monday.

After vindaloo.

I should make vindaloo again...

YES.

Keep that up, and I may have to change my mind on this bigamy thing.

[Fujikoma]

Thanks, Regret, and I now see that you were trying to help me out when you posted that link in that other topic, sorry to be such a paranoid spaz.

Another way in which words fail... Have you ever played the telephone game? Being on the ass end of the receiving spectrum for any verbal message (or written message, having been translated or otherwise butchered over time) pretty much guarantees ruination of the original message.

Vindaloo sounds delicious.

[Doktor Howl]

Vindaloo sounds delicious.

How?  We never described it.  We just said the name.

[Fujikoma]

I looked it up on wikipedia... I'd heard it mentioned many times on "Red Dwarf", but until I read what it actually was I had no idea how much I wanted to try some.