dannyman.toldme.com

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Dave Bort has recently put some effort into making some very funny cartoons. I’m not Dave Bort. This means I get plenty of sleep, but I haven’t put enough serious effort into developing my ideas. Still, that doesn’t mean I can’t idly mess around once in a while. I thought I’d borrow from Tom Tomorrow:

It was actually good practice with the GIMP such that by the later frames I was making effective use of moving layers around and whatnot.

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So, Adam clued me into a website called PhotoSIG, which allows you to upload photos to be critiqued. You can only upload so often, which is actually kind of cool, so I started with my picture of the couples kissing goodbye at a Berlin train station.

The web site itself is a pretty darned reasonable time-waster, and time is something I have a surplus of these days.

I’ll post more photos directly into the log sometime soon. I went over to San Francisco yesterday to interview at a newly-opened Cafe-Restaurant-Cocktail lounge across from the newly-opened Asian Art Museum. The interview was weird, as if they had blown me off before I even sat down. Oh well, I got to admire and talk to some good-looking women while I was waiting. Then I went down to the demonstrations to watch the cops run around the place in riot gear. Got some pictures of them arresting people at a sit-in. Some excitement for a Friday evening.

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According to the New York Post:

Even though he wanted more time for inspections, Blix said yesterday that he didn’t know if he could ever be sure that Iraq wasn’t hiding the illegal missiles.

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I just finished watching a movie, so I decide to flip channels and check on the War. The satellite television is tuned to BBC America, and is in the middle of a live audio report from a British reporter who is reporting from the front lines as Marines take in Iraqi Prisoners of War.

The War in question is being broadcast live around the world. It is being waged so far with an eye towards avoiding not only allied casualties, but civilian casualties. At the same time cities around the world are dealing with protesters, who oppose the war because they see it as the precedent of imperialism on the part of the contemporary empire.

The empire regards itself as a fairly benevolent, often isolationist Republic that is being forced into acting in this war on the grounds that since it is the world’s great empire, it is threatened by barbarians who pose a magnified threat because in our time, there are weapons of such fantastic destruction and cruelty that would be used without warning.

I think a good reason to have children, is so that if I live long enough to meet them, my grandchildren ought to blow me away on a consistent basis.

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From an e-mail responding to an Argentine friend who is suddenly extremely upset about the War, typing in all caps and on the cusp of anti-Semitism. I try to explain things from the perspective of an American Citizen:

Changing Iraq’s government is only one reason I support the War. We strengthened Saddam’s hold on power when he fought Iran, we left him in power in 1991, when we shouldn’t have. America is already responsible when he tortures Iraqis, just as we are responsible for Pinochet’s crimes. In removing Saddam, we are trying to right a wrong that is our doing. Just as it is wrong to go to War, and it is wrong to impose our will on other peoples, it is also wrong to strengthen a brutal leader and then ignore the suffering of his people, it is also wrong to leave that leader with weapons that he could sell to terrorists, it is also wrong to believe that “containment” will work when it has apparently only further strengthened the bad guy and increased the suffering of the people, and it is also wrong if you believe that you will have to go to war to wait longer to fight when waiting will only make the situation worse. I see two sets of wrongs to choose from. The lesser of these evils is the “right” answer, in my mind, to a question that has no true answer.

As for the Palestinians, nobody has rationalized a solution to help them out. It is the Israelis who are rightly scared of the Palestinians, and the Palestinians who are rightly angered that nobody in the world will ever help them. We are guilty of Palestinian suffering because of our aid to Israel. The rest of the world, especially the Arab world, is guilty of Palestinian suffering because they will not give the Palestinians refuge. If America proposed a solution to this problem, I might support that as well. But we haven’t, and there are a million other injustices that are not being addressed, so I don’t see what the problems of the Palestinians has to do with America’s entanglements in Iraq. I am neither an Arab nor a Jew: I’m an American who is, as always, trying to figure out if the things my leaders do in my name is right or not.

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Say what you might about the folly of getting in the way of bulldozers, but thanks to the power of the Internet, and international travel, Rachel Corrie provides us with an insight into life in the occupied territories. If you’re going to risk your life and die doing something, the cause of helping the world understand itself is certainly a noble and worthy one.

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Whatever your feelings on the coming war, bear in mind that you can make the best of a bad situation.

You can strike a decisive blow for that which is good and decent about our country and give a pint if you can. With the military deployment, our blood supplies are stretched all the more thin: the Pentagon plans ahead for the fact that we’re going to lose quite a bit of it in the desert sands.

http://www.redcross.org/donate/give/

The nation needs your blood. If they don’t want your blood, for whatever reason, they can probably use your money, or your time. If you click that link at the bottom, www.givelife.org, you can register and search local blood drives online! Yow!

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My second shift tonight was pretty nice. Smaller boat, smaller crew, St. Patrick’s Day celebration! I had a hearty meal of corned beef, potatoes, salad, and carrots up in the pilot house. There was considerable activity at the Port of Oakland, giant container ships attended by beautiful white cranes, pulling containers on and off the waiting ships one after another: zip, zip, zip, zip! I saw one ship with a bunch of Hanjin containers, and I was thinking “Hanjin, Hanjin … Han Chin? Han Chinese?”

I got into a discussion with one of the guests who was also standing at the stern, watching the port. Those ships are from the other side of the Pacific! Those containers are International trade – goods, which employ people. Containers of hope floating across the ocean of a troubled world.

Jessica lost her retail job today. While she was dismissed for performance reasons, I suggested that he may have been looking for a pretext to cut staff without resorting to layoffs, on account of Unemployment Insurance premiums being based on claims made against an employer. I hope she’ll be okay.

It was a laid-back, middle-aged crowd who ate well and drank well and danced only a little. At the end of the night the tips were split four ways among the service staff. $22 in my pocket sure feels good.

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> How is the situation in the US today about the Iraqi issue? Are people
> upset or excited or…?

They’re rebroadcasting his speech on the radio. I don’t like George Bush, but I think it was a very good speech and that often times when he delivered it, his voice sounded like Reagan’s. I don’t like Reagan either, but he had charisma.

Americans are very conflicted. Some tempers are high, but I think that those who oppose the war are coming around to accept its inevitability. I think his speech should help rally those who support him, and soothe those who are on the fence. Those who oppose him can go on fighting, or turn their energies to other activities that should actually bear fruit.

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I got to work on Saturday night. One of three shifts I’ve got with the catering dinner cruises on the bay. Barring some implausibly huge tips, the money will still be less than my month’s “burn rate” but some income is better than no income. Tomorrow I should perhaps call the Unemployment Insurance people and explain that if I don’t get a hearing on my appeal soon, I might never be able to attend such a hearing because my destitution may force me from the area. We’ll see. I’ll also cruise around a few more restaurants.

There were no tips on Saturday, we had a high school dance. It was pretty interesting even if the young’uns don’t tip the bartender for booze they can’t buy. I was the only male on the dining staff. I think that this was the reason that I was selected to jump off the back of the ship when we pulled up to the dock to secure a line. Adventure! Excitement!

Another shift tonight! The management is very chill. “If you want to eat, just make yourself a plate and hide it behind the bar.” The Chicanos in the kitchen relax on the latter leg of the cruise, chatting on cell phones. Our path was out of port in Alameda, a wide loop around Treasure Island, and back under the west span of the Bay Bridge. It was quite wonderful to look up in the sky and cruise under a beautiful, grey, man-made structure.

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