Iskander's Musings

I love my job. . .

2009-08-30T21:22:00.000-07:00

Recently filmed this 10-minute video for my job (www.geoquesttech.com). Thought it was probably time for a blog post, and this was certainly an easy way to do it.

A Quick Sketch

2009-03-15T19:17:00.001-07:00

I'm trying to galvanize my digital process a bit, so I limited myself to 30 minutes, two colors and two drawing layers on this one. I'm actually pretty happy with it despite its roughness, or perhaps even because of it. I don't know why, but I really tend to gravitate toward the unfinished or "sketchy" look in my drawings. It just appeals to me visually. This guy being straight out of my head, I'm kinda curious to hear if anyone can invent a good story for him. Anyone?

Non-Sentient League of Justice, Part 1

2009-02-25T17:34:00.000-08:00

This sketch is a bit quicker than most of the previous postings. I probably have about two hours tied up in this one. It's sort of an impromptu addition to a super-hero league that I invented on an envelope in a class once. I call them: The Non-Sentient League of Justice!!! My boy Henry used to be part of it, but at 10 months old, he's kinda out-grown most of the criteria. Anyway, I give you Timmy the Turbo-Terrapin and his Fearsome Stance of Glory!

Some of my Best Work. . .

2009-01-18T14:36:00.001-08:00

"The Game"

2008-11-20T19:00:00.000-08:00

I recently entered "the DV Challenge" for the second time, which is why I've not posted in a bit. My entry can be viewed below:

Enjoy.

Welcome to the USSA.

2008-11-04T20:50:00.001-08:00

Don't blame me. . . I voted for Eisenhower.

Where on earth does that remote actually go?

2008-10-25T14:34:00.001-07:00

I have my own theory. . .

Still working on the next picture. . .

2008-10-24T21:18:00.001-07:00

Thought I'd post a few thoughts that have been on my mind lately:

What is marriage?

Why is marriage?

A sensible and just society rewards and encourages heterosexual marriage because it recognizes that through the birth and careful rearing of children, the society ensures its future existence. Without this social contract assigning ultimate responsibility for a child to its biological parents, there is a high probability that succeeding generations of citizens will eschew their own accountability and contribute less while demanding more. Homosexual marriage is the biological equivalent of welfare. It contributes no gene, no person to the future, instead demanding the rewards assigned to encourage responsible procreation without even attempting to produce the very reason a society deems such activity worth encouraging.

A sensible and just society recognizes the difference between “separation of church and state” and “separation of GOD and state.” A just society will not subscribe to the fallacy that atheism becomes the modus operandi by default, but will acknowledge both a supreme authority not its own, and the right of its citizenry to follow their own manner of worship. Were this not the case, a government shifts its role from protector and guarantor of individual rights, to the giver of those rights (as the supreme authority, there being no higher), in which case all men are not created equal and there is no such thing as a human right. With recognition of this higher authority, comes recognition of absolute laws: right and wrong that are beyond the authority of the society to negate, change or challenge. Moral law, governing the proper expression of human sexuality is among these absolute laws as has been accepted by every major theology since the dawn of recorded history. While a just society recognizes the right of a citizen to disobey or even to disbelieve, it also acknowledges that consequences will justly occur to those who break these laws and it will never give official sanction to these deviations from moral conduct. When appropriate, a just society will enforce these laws with the power of the state to protect the rest of its citizenry. By crediting ultimate power and authority to God, the society also places itself ultimately at his mercy and in his care. This places accountability upon the society for the upholding of God's higher laws in the interest of preservation and prosperity.

A sensible and just society invests in its future by encouraging its citizenry to excel and to overcome obstacles as individuals and as a community. It recognizes that men and women have fundamental differences and that a child's rearing and perspective are incomplete without a parent of both sexes actively involved in the child's life. The society recognizes that circumstances vary and hardships occur and encourages its citizenry to excel beyond obstacles to this goal. The society does not create obstacles.

And now for something completely different. . .

2008-10-07T22:04:00.000-07:00

Since I've now drawn the most beautiful woman in the world (albeit somewhat abstractly), I figured I'd make a stab at the ugliest. After all, it's October. For this image, I departed from my usual Modus Operandi and went for a traditional-media-look. I found out that Photoshop has an amazingly deep array of brush-sets that can very effectively mimic the look of old-fashioned art implements, so I decided to take the "Soft Pastel" brush for a spin and the result is what you see above. It has its weak points, to be sure, but I'm satisfied with it and ready to abandon it to bloghood. I also tried using fewer layers this time just to galvanize my thinking a bit more with regard to planning ahead with light sources and shadows, etc. And there you have it. Thanks for looking!

P.S. I'm open to any suggestions readers may have with regard to subjects they'd like to see tackled in my quest for Photoshop Art proficiency.

P.P.S. It just occurred to me that this particular witch bears a slight resemblance to Crispin Glover. Hmmmm. . .

Inspiration

2008-10-05T22:32:00.000-07:00

I'm posting this image since it represents my reason for drawing as well as every other positive action that I take in my life. Yes, it's true: My wife is actually a cartoon character. It was terribly difficult getting a wedding license, or a clergyman who would take me seriously, but there's certainly a way when there's a will. Nah, while this is, in fact a cartoon of my wife, I simply decided that, since no one reads this blog anyway, I'd wax mushy for a minute. Take that cyberspace!

Epiphany

2008-10-02T20:44:00.001-07:00

By virtue of a rather complicated set of circumstances that I will not explain here, I can currently only listen to the radio in Japanese frequencies, which means, here in America, I only get one station and it's Christian Rock, which musical genre I find inexplicably comical. Whilst driving home for lunch today, I stumbled upon the reason for this strange amusement, and I believe I can summarize it with the following gem of profundity:

The funniest thing about Christian Rock is that you get to hear "God is Awesome" repeatedly in the same voice, with the same riffs and the same beats with which other artists are expressing sentiments such as "I want to get your Sister pregnant," or "The following profanities accurately describe my recent breakup."

Probably not what my client wanted.

2008-09-30T21:45:00.001-07:00

This is what happens when you ask your two-year-old daughter "what should daddy draw?" and she says: "A Ladybug!" Don't ask me from what dark recesses of my "id" this Ladybug-of-the-evening sprang, but my poor wife dearly hopes those nether regions are not visited again for some time to come. To be honest, so do I. In conclusion, I hope this resonates with someone, simply because it seems that everyone has that one manky old ant. . .

There are no guns in this picture

2008-09-25T17:16:00.000-07:00

10 Points if you can guess what this is. . .

2008-09-18T22:20:00.001-07:00

I've decided that this blog is going to be the new posting place for my cartoons and portfolio. I'm going to make a valiant stab at uploading a new picture each week, so to start, I give you a freshly-abandoned cartoon.

The Worst Logo Ever

2008-07-24T22:51:00.000-07:00

The most frightening thing about this logo is that the creator is probably still at large, and may even still have a job.

2008-06-16T23:11:00.000-07:00

Apparently (a few) people are suddenly reading this blog. Coincidentally, I also happen to have something to ask of you. The images that accompany this post represent where a great deal of my efforts have been focused of late. This is a photo of my Electric Motor mounted in my soon-to-be electric car. Said car was "ready" for a preliminary test-run about three weeks ago, but I've had something of a fiasco with the motor controller, the end result of which is that two identical controllers are now en route back to their manufacturers having proven themselves to be essentially very expensive door-stops. That said, as soon as my refund processes, I'll be going with a more mainstream brand and getting the thing under way, so I'm pretty excited. Now, for the question: I've always wondered what I wanted to be when I grew up. Sadly, now that its happened, I still don't know. I've thought of going back to school for industrial design. I've thought of trying to be an entrepreneur of some sort or of trying to make the monsters that you see in movies. The writing is on the wall at work that perhaps its time for me to seek a better job. I know there are a bazillion careers out there that I've never even heard of, so I thought I should ask you: the reader(s). In light of the following interests and weaknesses, and knowing what you do about me, what careers would you suggest I look into?

Interests, Skills and Talents

Drawing (Portraiture, anatomy, wildlife, etc.)
Sculpting.
Digital Photography.
Reading.
Writing (Fiction, Grammar, Spelling, editing, etc.)
Design.
Learning.
Variety.
Freedom to innovate.
History.
Mechanics.
Electronics.
Sound Engineering.
Video Editing and Production.
Cinematography.
3D Computer modeling and animation.
Computer Skills.
Mechanical and Electronic Repair (including computers).
Working in groups (outgoing and extroverted).
Public speaking and teaching.
Humor/entertaining.
Creativity & Thinking skills.
Fabrication of unique objects.
Philanthropy.
Leadership.

Dislikes & Weaknesses

Formulaic Mathematics.
Formulaic Chemistry (These two would probably preclude most engineering degrees).
Excessive repetition.
Irate Clients.
Rushing/unreasonable deadlines.
Not having time to do my best or to complete a project.

Thanks for reading (if you did).

2008-06-09T12:14:00.003-07:00

Waiting.
I'm not posting much at the moment because I'm busy being a Dad and making an electric car. Details at 11. . .

2008-03-15T22:21:00.001-07:00

Short Film,
Here's a short film I just shot for a contest called the DV Challenge. Enjoy (If you can).

2008-03-06T21:30:00.000-08:00

I call this "Four Generations."

2008-03-03T20:03:00.000-08:00

Perhaps I need to re-name this blog Iskander's Whinings, 'cause I'm about to post another, rather cynical entry. This time, my target is Yoga. Yes, Yoga. I think this line of thought started yesterday during a viewing of You've Got Mail, where Tom Hanks opines that Starbuck's popularity is actually due to the following trait:

"The whole purpose of places like Starbucks is for people with no decision-making ability whatsoever to make six decisions just to buy one cup of coffee. Short, tall, light, dark, caf, decaf, low-fat, non-fat, etc. So people who don't know what the h*** they're doing or who on earth they are, can, for only $2.95, get not just a cup of coffee but an absolutely defining sense of self."
Which, I think, hits the nail on the proverbial head. Yoga is also up there with this sort of thing. I know that, like television, there are probably a thousand and one legitimate and wonderful reasons to do Yoga, but lets be honest for a minute. One of the defining aesthetics of this stuff is the whole image of someone in their "health clothes," (that's my term for the loose, white tank-tops and weird, thin-fabric trousers that anorexic women wear on the cover of magazines about "your health") doing yoga into the rising or setting sun in some isolated, but ruggedly beautiful place wherein none dwell who have not been there for eons untold: The rocks, the lichens, a family of lizards and probably a Kokopeli man playing his blasted flute. Refer to the included, plagiarized picture for reference. That took about 1.5 seconds of googling "yoga."
Have you ever had a conversation with someone who was out to prove how smart they are? It can be frustrating because the conversation isn't actually about whatever subject-matter you're attempting to cover.
Writing a book could also fall into this category. I wrote a book. It's nothing I'll be expecting a Newberry award for, but I liked it and I'd like to see it published, so I still send it off to publishers and agents. On the rare occasions this happens to come up in conversation, the universal response that I receive is "Oh, I'd like to write a book. It would be about______." For some reason, our society seems to award some sort of credit for completely unfulfilled good intentions.
Having lived in Ireland for a time, I found that a lot of the young people would identify themselves as "Buddhist," but had absolutely no idea what a buddhist believes. I think this arose out of a deep-seated need to be different and unique. Identifying yourself as something so traditionally uncommon in Ireland was certainly much easier than standing out by being an exemplary employee, or by working hard to hone some talent or craft.
In short, it's sometimes easier to have a difference than to be different, it's easier to act smart than to be wise, it's easier to want to write a book than to sit down and write one and it's easier to sit in some forbidden position on a rock than to actually make a stab at becoming a genuine naturalist. I should say that I have no problem, per se, with exercise or yoga, I simply find pretense annoying. I'm probably as guilty as the next man, but living inside of myself makes that difficult to see, so I still feel like whining about it.

2008-01-23T20:22:00.000-08:00

Conspiracy Theories:

Tupac is NOT dead:
It doesn't take a genius to look at the short history of Rock n' Roll and see that death (or the appearance thereof) is probably the best business move one can make. Just ask Elvis, John Lennon, Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain, Janis Joplin, and, about 15 or 20 former members of Lynard Skynard. Tupac has come out with 20 albums and 8 Top 10 singles since his "death" in 1996. Even accounting for re-issues such as "Greatest Hits" albums, etc., that's a pretty hefty backlog of "music." (Those quotation marks are intentional, I know what they mean and I stand by them)

Skull and Bones:
This college fraternity/secret society shows up WAAAAAY too often to be a fluke. At one point, all but one of George W. Bush's cabinet were "bonesmen." (That's his Dad, George H.W. Bush to the left of the clock) Whoa. That's a pretty unlikely coincidence given that there are only 15 bonesmen at Yale at any one time. This is just one of those things that chaps my hide. You can also look up the "Bohemian Grove" if you're into this sort of conspiracy theorization.

Pope John Paul I, a.k.a. "The Smiling Pope:"
Not to be confused with John Paul II, this Pope "reigned" for a grand total of 33 days in 1978 before his rather sudden and surprising death at the age of 65. Uh huh. Not surprisingly, he was succeeded by a Pope with very opposite political leanings: John Paul II. Catholicism has some fascinating skeletons in its closet which can only occasionally be just glimpsed.

Princess Diana:
I think she died in a traffic accident, not as a result of some grand conspiracy like some would have you believe. Why are we still investigating this?

Oil Prices:
Yes Virginia, there is a monopoly clause.

2008-01-22T22:01:00.000-08:00

Posting for the sake of doing it.

My thoughts tonight are rather stifled by the Sauce (Pace Picante') so don't expect anything too revolutionary (all two of you who check this bi-monthly). I would simply like to pass on a few words of timeless value:

Manifold:
This is a particularly valuable word since it can be used to illustrate your technical prowess when there is none, which can be handy if you're being paid by the hour. I.E.
"Hey, technically-oriented underling, why won't my WordPerfect reboot its passwords when I internet them into my subwoofer?"
To which an acceptable reply might be:
"You're standing on my Manifold."
(If a non-techy begins what they think is a technical question with the word "why," they generally don't actually want to know "why," per se, they simply want to be certain that you know enough regarding their technical problem to confuse them, so it's best to do it quickly and get back to work. The above line works every time.)

Triumvirate:
This word has been valuable several times when a co-worker breaches that age-old office rule: Thou shalt not discuss any element of thy loserhood that might make thy co-workers awkwardly pause whilst trying to think of a plausible word of encouragement. That conversation happens in this fashion:
(Coworker) "Champy, I just don't think girls like me, maybe it's my armpit dreadlocks or my criminal record, do you think I'm handsome?"
(Me, searching desperately) "Yoooooooouuuuuuu. . . haaaaaaaaave. . . veeeeeeeeerrrrrryyyy. . . healthy. . . bicuspids!"
(Coworker, nodding head, countenance brightening slightly) "Thanks man, you're right. Hey, you think I have a chance of going out with the secretary?"
(Me, using my best Korean accent while pointing to Violet Smith's hovel in the corner): "Ummmm. . . Triumvirate."

Twinkie
Possible the best word in the English language. Use this interchangeably with almost any noun or verb as you would "Smurf." The effects are much more satisfying.

2007-11-20T21:24:00.001-08:00

Bad Shipping Karma
I ordered Canon's new XH-A1, High-Definition video camcorder for some projects that I've got coming up, and I have to say that I'm rather disgusted with my continued bad luck with UPS and the companies that ship through them. The camera and its accessories are to be delivered in the form of three separate packages from two different e-tailers. The store that's shipping the camera itself, J&R Music and Computer world, sat on the order for 2 and a half days before shipping it out. If they'd shipped it a few hours earlier, it would have been due to arrive tomorrow, Wednesday. As it is, with the Thanksgiving Holiday, it won't be arriving until next Monday (13 days after my order), assuming, of course it arrives on its scheduled time; which brings me to the third package. This package contains my Pelican case and it shipped out a bit earlier, so it was due to arrive today. Being the control-freak that I am, I watch my tracking numbers rather closely and was thus astonished to see it arrive in Salt Lake City on Monday Morning, in plenty of time to be delivered the next day, only to inexplicably sit there for a day and a half. Now it's on its way to my home town for delivery a day late. Go figure.

I have the world's worst shipping Karma. I recall spending a Christmas in Ireland without a Christmas package that my parents had sent for me. The package arrived a month later after being sent to Iceland. A few Christmases previous, my parents had lovingly ordered some computer parts for me that didn't arrive on time. They finally came a few weeks later minus one part - the video card. This was back when the PCI bus was new, so naturally I had no other video card that would work with the parts. It was two more months before that part came. At least it worked.

Now, before I get too tied up in myself, let me just post this little reminder that I do realize that I'm blessed above pretty much the entire rest of the Earth. I'm lucky to be getting this camera at all, even if it is a little late. I read an article yesterday about the conditions in Somali refugee camps that just made me sick. God bless the USA and if we can stop one more innocent person from being raped, murdered, sold, suppressed or otherwise victimized by deposing of a regime of obvious evil, then I'm all for it. How's that for a meandering post? I do have bad shipping Karma though.

Edit: Apparently I also have bad "Font Karma," (Heh heh, say that five times fast and it comes out as rude puncuation). I just can't seem to get the above text to be the right size. Alas.

2007-11-18T21:48:00.000-08:00

The Hated. . .

In keeping with the holiday season, I think it's time that I exposed my Scrooge-ish side to everyone. The above image is my primary target of late, a Chicken Soup for the Soul Daily calendar that, more often not, leaves me wondering how some people get published. (Jenny and I fondly refer to it as "Chicken Poop for the Soul.") The calendar uses one page for Saturday and Sunday and always seems to pick a particularly nauseating story for these holdovers. The above is again, illustrative. The writing is generally horrible, there are meaningless tangents in some pieces, and the feel-goodness of them all is dependent on one's assumption that everyone starts broken and needs warm fuzzies to fix them. A formulaic piece could thus be written:

"Jerry and his Mom were starving refugees in war-torn Wherezitstan. One day, Jerry's Mom, who had enjoyed milking cows and splashing her young cousins when they came to visit from neighboring Laurelstanslamibad with the fresh cows milk that they had just taken from Smush, their prize milk cow that never failed to love everyone and liked Sushi and hot-tubbing anytime, died. As Jerry's Mom lay dying, she looked into the clouds and smiled and Jerry knew that even though she wasn't with him now, she had truly loved and the puppies she'd raised by hand would not go to waste. After that, Jerry's life changed and he started doing better in school, or at least he would have if his school hadn't been blown up. This made Jerry's neighbor, old Mr. Bentley, smile."

They would then title this story something like "Puppy love," or who knows what else. I hate that Calendar.

2007-11-12T22:47:00.000-08:00

Alaskan Memories,
A little over a year ago, I found myself in Alaska for two weeks living out of an RV with three other people (including my Father) whilst shooting a television show in the back country. On a rare trip to town, we set about looking for something to eat. On foot, and hungry enough to settle for just about anything, my Dad pointed at the nearest eatery-looking joint and expressed an immediate desire to eat there. Dan-dan the Cameraman, however, inexplicably letting his street-sense prevail over his appetites, suggested that we move on farther up the road to a building that at least had windows. "No," replied my father, "this'll do fine." Upon this rebuff, Dan, also seeking to hasten the close of this dispute, wrenched the door open, revealing a dark, smoky interior with dollar bills glued to the wall and the ceiling, and casting an apparently unwelcome ray of light onto the dripping, bearded face of a grizzled old Alaskan, who had, it seemed, been sleeping face-down in his tall frosty beverage. His lower jaw hung limp and swayed haphazardly in the light breeze blowing through the door. As the Man's foggy eyes struggled in vain to focus on the bright shaft of light suddenly heaved on his unwilling person, Dan simply gestured toward the hairy spectacle and said simply "See Lynn? These are not your people." And threw the door shut again. I've often reflected on this incident and wondered how it must have registered with the probably-sleeping drunk. Without warning, whatever thoughts/dreams were meandering across his mushy mind were interrupted by a shaft of light and four silhouettes, one of which gestured toward him and said simply "See Lynn? These are not your people." Upon which the door slammed and the vision closed. Does he remember it today? Does he know if it was real, or did he just plant his face back down and drown? These are probably questions I will take to my grave.

Here is a picture of this incident not happening, but the guy on the right has the right look about him, minus the smile.

2007-10-21T15:31:00.001-07:00

Another post that just isn't funny.

I'm concerned about Homosexuality today. I imagine a lot of people are. JK Rowling, billionaire author of the Best-Selling Harry Potter Series of Children's books recently announced that Albus Dumbledore is, in fact, "gay." To paraphrase a very wise man, a person is doing themselves a tremendous disservice by choosing their sexual orientation as the defining attribute of their personality. To orient one's entire life around a mere fraction of their being is, in my opinion, not to live at all.

Having said that, I'm glad Mrs. Rowling chose not to make Dumbledore's "orientation" a point of focus in her series. On the other hand, to "out" the character now, AFTER the majority of her book sales have been accomplished, smacks of a "take the money and run" scam. Just try returning that seventh book 3 months after purchase and see what sort of reaction you get, hmmm? It's as if, as I mentioned below, many people cannot fathom that there might be reasons beyond bigotry and/or fanaticism that would drive one to disapprove of the practice of homosexuality. I don't believe the author, based on her remarks at the venue where she made said announcement, feels any remorse at further alienating the extreme right-wing "Christian" zealots who had probably already banned her books from their homes out of a sheer need to hate something and feel righteous about it (and don't give me this rubbish about attracting kids to witchcraft, etc. Kids have been pretending to be "magic" for thousands of years. No one says this about George Lucas's "Force," do they?).

The comments I've read on a few internet forums seem to follow the assumption that Albus Dumbledore is somehow real and made this decision long ago of his own accord. This places Rowling in the position of chronicler rather than inventor. Lets not forget that every-single-thing that "occurred" in these books did so because JK Rowling decided that she would write it that way. This is not history, it's fiction. I think the present tendency for those who suffer from Homosexual feelings to identify their "selves" as a Gay person stems from Hollywood's mantra that life is about personal sexual gratification. Hence, sex is the object of our existence and any deviance (or "individuality") experienced therein must color every aspect of a person. This, I suspect, is why some persons with Homosexual tendencies feel the need to announce their sexual habits to the world through a dress code of sorts and easily identifiable mannerisms. I've even seen a number of posters arguing the supremacy of Homosexuals over "Heterosexual White Males," who seem to be the "new bad guy." We may say we're much more tolerant now that we were in the 60's, but I think we've simply switched targets, and guess what: I'm it.

That said, before you denounce me as a bigoted, let me also assert that I would be every bit as disappointed if Rowling had announced that Dumbledore had simply been a philanderer as a young man, or even that he had had sex out of wedlock and never felt that it was wrong. The bottom line is that there are still people, however silenced they have become, who reject the idea that sex is free, without consequences and/or to be practiced under any old circumstances.

The irony that occurs to me in this stream-of-consciousness rant, is that, as one who believes in an intelligent creator, and as one who opposes the practice and/or legitimization of Homosexuality, my views are opposed to those who tend to argue for many Gay "rights" and/or the idea that Darwin's theory is absolute fact (do not make the assumption here that I do not believe in evolution of any kind, I simply believe that Darwin's model has flaws). I would love to see the two ideologies reconciled: Darwinism and Homosexuality. According to Darwin's model (not according to me), Homosexual's must be "unfit" for survival by virtue of the fact that they cannot biologically produce offspring and will therefore eliminate themselves from the gene pool. We truly live in strange times.

2007-08-12T22:08:00.000-07:00

Normally, I try to keep my postings here a bit on the lighter side, but this bit in the Deseret news today just made my blood boil.

Anti-gay church cheers disaster
By Ben Winslow
Deseret Morning News

The statement comes across a fax machine with all the impact of a kick in the gut: "Thank God for the Utah Mine Disaster."

Members of a Kansas-based church notorious for picketing military funerals to generate publicity for their anti-gay cause have announced plans to picket any memorial services for the six miners trapped inside the Crandall Canyon Mine.

That's assuming they are dead, the Westboro Baptist Church concedes.

A statement by the group pledges to picket in central Utah with a warning: "God Hates Fags!"

"God hates Utah and America for surrendering to the fag agenda, and because of which God is now punishing this evil, sodomite nation with disaster after disaster, including 9/11, Iraq, Katrina, West Virginia Mine Disaster, Virginia Tech Massacre, The Shuttle Disaster, etc., — and now: The Utah Mine Disaster," the Westboro Baptist Church said in a fax to the Deseret Morning News on Saturday night.

The group has protested in Utah before. In June, three protesters showed up to the funeral services of Sgt. Jesse Blamires, a South Jordan man killed while serving in Iraq. They stayed a few blocks away, holding signs with messages such as "Pray for more dead soldiers."

The church claims the deaths have been God's punishment for America tolerating homosexuals.

It's the Westboro Baptist Church's penchant for distasteful demonstrations that has prompted lawmakers in several states, including Utah, to push through legislation forcing protesters at funerals to keep their distance from mourners.

It was originally designed to keep picketers from soldiers' funeral services. The sponsor of Utah's law was shocked to hear it being proposed for the mine tragedy. The group has also recently pledged to picket memorial services for victims of the Minneapolis bridge collapse.

"I thought I'd seen it all," said Rep. Ron Bigelow, R-West Jordan. "Being in politics, you see people use tragedies for their own personal political benefit. It is sad that they do so."

Utah law makes it a class B misdemeanor to demonstrate in a noisy and disruptive manner within 200 feet of a funeral or memorial service within an hour before and after the service.

Emery County Sheriff Lamar Guymon said if the group comes to Huntington, he'll enforce that law to the letter.

"It's absolutely in poor taste," he told the Deseret Morning News. "Number one, we don't have any dead miners at this point."

These are the people who create the excuses others use to shun and deride religion in general. These are the people who allow proponents of homosexuality to assume anyone with a legitimate moral objection to the practice of alternate lifestyles look like they belong to a group of complete nut-cases. Plus, in what way has Utah surrendered to any "agenda?" This is one of those moments when I must simply shake my head in absolute incredulity that there are even people this toasted walking our planet. Consider me amazed, no, dumbfounded, no flabbergasted, no, just consider me absolutely beyond the scope of any adjective in the English language.

2007-08-04T22:13:00.000-07:00

Lets be honest here. . .

Woe unto you scribes, pharisees, cheerleaders! For ye shut out mine pass at the top of the key! Behold, I would have scored upon thee had not thine lineman tackled mine runningback. Thou shalt neither score thyself, nor thy team-mate after thee!

2007-07-30T00:03:00.001-07:00

Morality in the entertainment industry.

Call me old-fashioned, but I find that I simply cannot enjoy movies that treat the chastity of the female lead as something trivial. Case in point: She's the Man is a movie that roughly follows Shakespeare's 12th Knight in a teen-girly-pop-princess sort of way. Toward the end of the movie, when asked to prove her gender before a crowded soccer stadium full of people, the protagonist (female) simply flips up her top without the slightest hesitation or embarrassment (Camera angle too high to see anything). That single moment absolutely ruined that movie for me (not that I was terribly enthralled in the first place, but afterward I was angry). Second example: Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (That's number three, if you're counting). Elisabeth Swann is required to completely disrobe in order to prove that she's unarmed. There are countless other examples, but these should suffice for the time being to illustrate my point that Hollywood seems determined to convince the world that it simply doesn't matter if a woman is raped, defiled, exposed, passed around, or who-knows-what-else as long as she doesn't die. Interestingly, there are certain taboos that seem to be far worse in Hollywood's reckoning than depriving a woman of her virtue. Racism for instance, is almost always a "capital offense" in a movie (I.E. racist characters are always villains and thus, more often than not, die)*. However, adultery/fornication and even outright promiscuousness seems to be considered admirable behavior for a protagonist even down to defiling multiple "partners" (I prefer to call them victims) take James Bond, for example. I was recently disgusted by a movie trailer that played before Transformers for a movie called Good Luck Chuck. The movie depicts a man who thinks he's cursed in that any woman with whom he is sexually active is bestowed with the "good luck" of getting married soon thereafter. He is thus set-upon by a slew of women who want to find their future spouse and get married. He goes on to "test" the "curse" by seducing a woman whom he deems unlikely to ever get married. This advertisement and the very idea of this film are absolutely distasteful on so many levels! The simple fact that no consideration at all is given to the morality of "sleeping around" is simply sickening. I believe that movies such as this are simply promotions of evil and a cancer upon our society and I would go so far as to say that I hope I never find in conversation that anyone of my acquaintance has seen it, as any respect I may have once held for that person will immediately drop. Do I sound angry? I am. I am nauseated by Hollywood's determination to undermine the solidarity of the family and its place in society. Why this horrific agenda exists in the first place, I could not pretend to understand, but I hope and pray that it stops.

*I am fully aware, by the way, that there must be exceptions to this "rule." However, I am not personally acquainted with any of them and I believe that the torrential current of Hollywood movies is pitted well against any exceptions that may exist.

2007-07-25T14:51:00.000-07:00

Electricity, a fiery mistress. . .

Since my wife has brought me down into the depths of humility by being an infinitely better blogger than her husband (rowenasrantings.blogspot.com), I've decided that I'd better update this wee board with a posting about. . . you guessed it! My electric car (actually, you probably didn't guess it). You see, electric motors generally have an absolutely massive amount of low-end torque, which makes some sort of speed control more than nice, but absolutely mandatory for survival of the acceleration process.

To this end, I've previously "borrowed" an old, plastic cutting board from my mother to which I affixed bolts and an arm with a fulcrum, all attached to different wires. This contraption was used to add two 6 volt batteries at a time to a series which then gave my motor 12, 24, 36 and finally, 48 volts. Whalah! Speed control! Not too easy to use as it turned out, but it functioned. To make a long story short, I nearly blew myself up when I attempted an alternative system made of relays, so I'm now awaiting a shipment of 200 volt, 75 amp MOSFETS from digikey. Hopefully, I'll be able to make a proper pulse-width-modulated controller that can handle a 72 volt system without having to completely break the bank, alas.

2006-04-22T10:04:00.000-07:00

Open-Xchange Server

I've been playing with various Open-Source Groupware solutions lately, trying to convince my office that we need to start using groupware. By far the most impressive product I've used has been Open-Xchange Server. It's completely free, but you can also purchase a proprietary Connector for Microsoft Outlook. (Seats are $20.00 each) While the product is impressive, it's a ROYAL PAIN IN THE CABOOSE to install and set up. It's definitely not for a Linux newcomer, which I am. That said, after much trial and error, I've managed to set up two working boxes on SUSE Linux 10.0 (Open-Source Edition) using the instructions at http://linuxrc.org and following them verbatim (in a few cases, I had to download older editions of the software I was installing just to ensure compatibility). However, while my installation is, for the most part, working, I haven't managed to get the e-mail component working, or the Outlook Connector (at least not completely) and for some reason, the Global Address Book is readable, but not writeable. A lot of people have complained about these last two errors, but I haven't been able to find a working solution. Frustrating. Therein, I think, lies the weakness in Open-Source. Setup instructions are often (not always) cryptic, incomplete, or simply outdated and/or wrong. Whatever the problem is, it's definitely reproduceable by following the SUSE 10 instructions at linuxrc.org. Anyway, I'll continue to poke and prod at these boxes and eventually, I may come to a solution. I'll let you know.

2006-04-15T17:15:00.000-07:00

On home ownership.
When you buy your own home. A home warranty is a good idea. I can attest that if you don't get one, by three months into your life in your new abode, you'll have paid out-of-pocket or gone into debt replacing everything anyway. In such a situation, one's head is often filled with dark visions of the home's previous occupants rubbing their hands together in vicious delight and cackling as they, with a screwdriver, poke minute holes in the base of the water heater and fill the heating ducts with dead kittens. I have spent a good portion of the last week doing battle with my home. This has just been one skirmish in a much larger-scale two-year war. Until I owned a house, I did not know that it was possible to have a fist fight with a pecan tree. Further, I'd never have guessed that in such a conflict, I would almost certainly lose. The good news is, my swamp cooler is no longer leaking all over the roof, and I now have a rain gutter on the south side of my house, the process of installing which tested the furthest reaches of my vocabulary. This rain-gutter is brown to complement my brand-new roof over my brand new carpet, which matches my brand-new dishwasher (and water heater). It protects the window well around which I just poured a load of cement from filling up with water from above (the concrete is to keep water from running in from the sides. . . tricky water). I think that will cure the leaking basement, but only the next major rainstorm will tell. It's times like this when one is really grateful for his or her spouse. What a trooper my wife is. She was helping all day and, unlike her husband, never uttered a word of complaint. Now, if anyone has a decent method of extracting dead mammals from heating ducts. . .

2006-04-15T17:05:00.000-07:00

On publishing one's work.
By the veritable mound of (rejection) letters that I've been piling up on the bookshelf in my dining room, it's becoming rather apparent to me that getting a book published is not for the faint of heart. I've been sending query letters to literary agents since late November and I've been rejected by almost every one. Inside that almost, there are a surprising number of "return to sender's" by virtue of the address no longer being valid. Being a literary agent must be a tough business. However, inside that even smaller group of non-rejections is my one "interested" reply. I received that one exactly one month ago when they requested my first 100 pages. People who have published always talk about the amount of rejection through which one is forced to wade before that successful letter is finally received. Well, as I anxiously await further word from my one "interested" agent, I can add my voice to their voices in saying that it's true. Either that or my query letter is just no good.

2006-04-14T21:58:00.000-07:00

As I am entirely new to the world of blogging, I think it's probably best to introduce myself, my reason for blogging, and an estimation of the subjects on which I'll be blogging. To you, who may (rather unexpectedly) read these ramblings, I'll be known as Iskander, or Alexandrus, or Alexander. I'm from a very rural setting, but through a string of unique events I've become somewhat acquainted with a few aspects of city life, from which I've thankfully been able to make my escape. I have a hard leaning toward run-on sentences that I probably won't be attempting to cure. I am male, married, expecting a child (girl), and quite interested in all things creative and technological. I'll probably be posting:

Odd invention ideas.
Occasional hardware or software reviews.
Thoughts about the future and direction of the Open-source movement.
Puzzlements, rants and struggles with Linux and Windows.
My experiences in trying to get my first novel published.
My trials with home ownership and repair.
My complete happiness and wedded bliss that I enjoy with my wife and (future) daughter.
An intermittent socio-political tangent.
And other such solvents.
If you enjoy reading any of them, I'll be surprised, but pleased. Mostly, this blog is an outlet to express what bottles up inside now and then. G'nite.