InvisibastardDotCom

America is in a shortage of true characters. You might be lucky to know one or two. In my life I have been lucky to know one of the great ones, Edie Kerouac Parker. I’ve was fortunate enough through her to get exposure to the brilliant Henri Cru, William Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg, Henry Kingswell and so on. I say this not as some name dropper, only to establish some street cred for my link. The greats are dying off and a generation of sitcom watching bores are filling their ranks. To quote The National, “We’re half awake, in a fake empire.”

Spending time with the brilliant Timothy Moran, he made a point to show me a video of one of his friends. I was blown away by the uniqueness of Edgar Oliver. You have never seen anyone like this, I promise you. The mixture of intelligence, warmth and kindness is rare. The poem he reads is outstanding. The interview, fascinating. Enough of my words, here is the link:

Edgar Oliver Interview and Poetry

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There is no surer path to the poorhouse than running ads on your website. Even with reasonable traffic, I might be lucky to pull in a buck sixty a month. During a good month. Ad to that the fact that a lot of visitors are using adblock with firefox or are reading, not shopping, and you have a recipe for failure. Time spent writing posts or tweaking the site would probably be better spent collecting bottles or standing on the street with a sign in my hands. So it isn’t about the Benjamins. Who knows what it is about.

In that spirit, I’m going to try something new. I have an advertiser,  Absinthesupply, that I have always liked. During my normal three hour wake up routine this morning, I found an interesting article about Absinthe in the New York Times. It has a great history. Picasso drank it, as did Van Gogh (who threw a glass of it at Gauguin). I’m not going to plagiarize the article here. The point is that throughout history cool people drank it. So, if you want to be hip and avant-garde and at the same time fund my ramen noodle diet, read the article, come back and click the link. Or not. Whatever. Don’t blame me if you fail to capitalize on the chances of furthering your love life by looking cool serving Absinthe.

Click here for the link.

One more thing. I cannot drink alcohol, so if you have tried Absinthe, please leave a comment letting me know your experience. Does it live up to the hype?

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This is a tough question. I will take the opportunity of having no readers to publicly spell out my thinking and the flaws involved. I run a couple of websites. They get bogged down in my concept of perfectionism. I do nothing with them for vast amounts of time simply because I feel whatever I do will not meet my expectations. It is better to wait for the day when I magically meet them. Then something will happen!

I originally envisioned this site as a community site. A place where people could post their writing, photos, artwork, whatever and get support from likeminded people. Unfortunately, my choice of Wordpress may not have been the best choice for this platform. I like working with Wordpress though, so my concept of what this site could be has shifted. I’m going to go against conventional wisdom by using a very conventional concept: “It is what it is”.

I commit for the next few months to just throw anything at the wall here, and see if anything sticks. I may gain two loyal readers. I might create a community. I might fail silently and spectacularly, but at least I will have tried. One thing I will do is be very honest in my writing, even if it pains me.

Now go buy some absinthe or coffee!

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I like to know what I am talking about. I have strong opinions and I like to imagine they are based in fact. I trust my gut instincts implicitly, but label them as such in conversation. I have had two embarrassing lapses in the recent past, where I have parroted something I had heard, only to regret it upon further examination.

The first incident was based on the movie “What the #$*! Do We (K)now!?” The K in parenthesis should have been enough to discredit the movie for me, but I was unaware of it until four seconds ago. During one scene in the movie a story is told about how the future “Native Americans” were unable to see Colombus’ ships for some amount of time, because nothing in their experience gave them the ability to grasp it. The ships were invisible because it was beyond their power to comprehend them. I liked that story. I would use it as a metaphor to be slagging on someone. “Her husband is an asshole, but she is like the indians unable to see columbus’ boats!” Finally I was called out on it. The story does not stand up for a second to critical thinking. Plus it just isn’t true. So, I ate my words and moved on.

Then I watched “Zeitgeist” (and learned how to pronounce it!) I was troubled by the 9-11 conspiracy angle. If there were no plane parts left inside the Pentagon, because they had burned up in the fire, how were they able to identify the bodies? I used the phrase “looked like a controlled demolition” here and there in public. I felt ill at ease thinking these things, let alone talking about them. Don’t get me wrong, I see this administration for the bunch of bastards they are and would not put something like the conspiracy theories past them. I just happened upon this page, and felt like the idiot I was. I know better than to take only one source as authoritative (unless it is Sam Harris). I did in this instance, but I made sure to get back to everyone I had spoken with about it and apologized. I still like Zeitgeist, though!

These experiences brought me to this link:

The Critical Thinking Field Guide 

It is my first Link of the Day, and going by the way I add content to my sites, it might be my last.

The stakes are too high in this Idiotocracy to get lazy with my thinking. We live in a time where the Discovery Channel and History Channel devote airtime to UFO sightings and talk about Angels. Lots of Nostradomus junk has been on the air lately. I will remember to think critically about the nonsense I hear.

The ultimate conspiracy theory is that the government is behind the conspiracy theories. They produce them to create a feeling of doubt and helplessness in us. That one I like! I can’t promote it, though, after reading how to think critically.

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I use a variety of platforms for my websites, mainly Wordpress, Drupal and Movable Type. I think they all are excellent, my favorite is Wordpress (which this site runs on). The benefit of Wordpress, besides the ease of use and the fact it is open source, is the amount of plug-ins that work very well. There are so many that it is both a blessing and a curse. If you need something, odds are that it exists. But! A lot of times if you aren’t looking for specific functionality it can be like finding a needle in a haystack made out of heroin needles.

I was pleasantly surprised to find this aptly titled post:

Wordpress and WP Plugins used on this site.

It is…wait for it…a list of plugins used on that website. What I like is the list is made of of plug-ins that made the cut and are used. There is no speculation about how good it is. The ones that didn’t work well didn’t make the list. The plug-ins are nicely listed in a table that links to the plug-in itself, gives you the verion, a description, a comment and a category. This is going to be a big help to me. I already have read about a few plug-ins that will be useful that I was unaware of. The list will continue to be updated, which is very nice.

So there you have it, my second link of the day in as many weeks! Look for more content very soon, I have stuff to tell you about. Like how awesome my webhost is or how there is an amazing songwriter in New York City not getting her due! More soon, bastards!

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