The True Twlight.

With the amount of Twilight crap that is coming out to better sell the movie, how could I not say something about it? I wanted to  look at the truth of Twlight

So let's take a look at the idea for a moment, shall we? I think a little history is in order.

The notion of vampirism has existed for millennia; cultures such as the Mesopotamians, Hebrews, Ancient Greeks, and Romans had tales of demons and spirits which are considered precursors to modern vampires. However, despite the occurrence of vampire-like creatures in these ancient civilizations, the folklore for the entity we know today as the vampire originates almost exclusively from early-18th-century southeastern Europe, when verbal traditions of many ethnic groups of the region were recorded and published. In most cases, vampires are remnants of evil beings, suicide victims, or witches, but they can also be created by a malevolent spirit possessing a corpse or by being bitten by a vampire. Belief in such legends became so pervasive that in some areas it caused mass hysteria and even public executions of people believed to be vampires.

It is difficult to make a single, definitive description of the folkloric vampire, though there are several elements common to many European legends. Vampires were usually reported as bloated in appearance, and ruddy, purplish, or dark in color; these characteristics were often attributed to the recent drinking of blood. Indeed, blood was often seen seeping from the mouth and nose when one was seen in its shroud or coffin and its left eye was often open. It would be clad in the linen shroud it was buried in, and its teeth, hair, and nails may have grown somewhat, though in general fangs were not a feature.

                                               Good thing too because that looks pretty bad.

The causes of vampiric generation were many and varied in original folklore. In Slavic and Chinese traditions, any corpse that was jumped over by an animal, particularly a dog or a cat, was feared to become one of the undead. A body with a wound that had not been treated with boiling water was also at risk. In Russian folklore, vampires were said to have once been witches or people who had rebelled against the Russian Orthodox Church while they were alive. So in Russia I am going to turn into a vampire when I die. Great.

Many elaborate rituals were used to identify a vampire. One method of finding a vampire's grave involved leading a virgin boy through a graveyard or church grounds on a virgin stallion—the horse would supposedly baulk at the grave in question.Generally a black horse was required, though in Albania it should be white. So that is why those priest had those little boys. They were looking for vampires. Riiiiiight.  Holes appearing in the earth over a grave were taken as a sign of vampirism.

Cultural practices often arose that were intended to prevent a recently deceased loved one from turning into an undead revenant. Burying a corpse upside-down was widespread, as was placing earthly objects
such as scythes or sickles near the grave to satisfy any demons entering the body or to appease the dead so that it would not wish to arise from its coffin. Just like the Ancient Greek practice of placing an obolus in the corpse's mouth to pay the toll to cross the River Styx in the underworld. Some suggest that instead, the coin was intended to ward off any evil spirits from entering the body, and this may have influenced later vampire folklore. This tradition persisted in modern Greek folklore about the vrykolakas, in which a wax cross and piece of pottery with the inscription "Jesus Christ conquers" were placed on the corpse to prevent the body from becoming a vampire.Other methods commonly practiced in Europe included severing the tendons at the knees or placing poppy seeds, millet, or sand on the ground at the grave site of a presumed vampire; this was intended to keep the vampire occupied all night by counting the fallen grains, because apparently vampires have OCD and just HAVE to count, hence The Count from sesame street. 

So where do we get the vampire that we have today? Easy, books. 




While even folkloric vampires of the Balkans and Eastern Europe had a wide range of appearance ranging from nearly human to bloated rotting corpses, it was interpretation of the vampire by the Christian Church and the success of vampire literature, namely John Polidori's 1819 novella The Vampyre that established the archetype of charismatic and sophisticated vampire; it is arguably the most influential vampire work of the early 19th century, inspiring such works as Varney the Vampire and eventually Dracula^, The Vampyre was itself based on Lord Byron's unfinished story "Fragment of a Novel", also known as "The Burial: A Fragment", published in 1819.
However, it is Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula that is remembered as the quintessential vampire novel and which provided the basis of modern vampire fiction. Dracula drew on earlier mythologies of werewolves and similar legendary demons and "was to voice the anxieties of an age", and the "fears of late Victorian patriarchy". The success of this book spawned a distinctive vampire genre, still popular in the 21st century, with books, films, video games, and television shows.

                                         Vlad the Impaler aka Count Dracula aka not a nice guy 

 Although vampiric entities have been recorded in many cultures, and may go back to "prehistoric times", the term vampire was not popularized until the early 18th century, after an influx of vampire superstition into Western Europe from areas where vampire legends were frequent, such as the Balkans and Eastern Europe, although local variants were also known by different names, such as vrykolakas in Greece and strigoi in Romania. This increased level of vampire superstition in Europe led to mass hysteria and in some cases resulted in corpses actually being staked and people being accused of vampirism. The sad thing is that it still happens now. In 2002 -2003 there were allegations of vampire attacks in the African country of Malawi with mobs stoning one individual to death and attacking at least four others, including Governor Eric Chiwaya, based on the belief that the government was colluding with vampires.

Still no worries kids, we have top people on the case. In 2006, a physics professor at the University of Central Florida wrote a paper arguing that it is mathematically impossible for vampires to exist, based on geometric progression. According to the paper, if the first vampire had appeared on 1 January 1600, and it fed once a month (which is less often than what is depicted in films and folklore), and every victim turned into a vampire, then within two and a half years the entire human population of the time would have become vampires. The paper made no attempt to address the credibility of the assumption that every vampire victim would turn into a vampire but I am not a vampire and there are vegetarians out there so they can't be either.

How do you protect yourself? Easy.

Garlic is the usual suspect but if you are out I got you covered, a branch of wild rose and hawthorn plant are said to harm vampires, and in Europe, sprinkling mustard seeds on the roof of a house was said to keep them away. There is the obvious  sacred items, like a crucifix, rosary, or holy water and vampires  are said to be unable to walk on consecrated ground, or cross running water for some reason.Although not traditional, mirrors have been used to ward off vampires when placed, facing outwards, on a door (in some cultures, vampires do not have a reflection and sometimes do not cast a shadow, perhaps as a manifestation of the vampire's lack of a soul). This attribute, although not universal (the Greek vrykolakas/tympanios was capable of both reflection and shadow), was used in Dracula and has remained popular in movies and books. Some traditions also hold that a vampire cannot enter a house unless invited by the owner, although after the first invitation they can come and go as they please. Though folkloric vampires were believed to be more active at night, they were not generally considered vulnerable to sunlight.

                                                     This is hawthorn for those in need

And here is my favorite part of all. You see kids, since the term vampire is actually a recent development. Before what we think of as vampires were several different demons or spirits, even gods. They all consumed the flesh or blood to steal one's spirit. There were all sorts of different flavors and looks, but they all did the same thing, they ate people. When Christian came around is when things started getting a bit more unified. When everyone started converting the idea became more solid. The vampire was viewed as "a dead person who retained a semblance of life and could leave its grave-much in the same way that Jesus had risen after his death and burial and appeared before his followers." In the Middle Ages, the Christian Church reinterpreted vampires from their previous folk existence into minions of Satan, and used an allegory to communicate a doctrine to Christians: "Just as a vampire takes a sinner's very spirit into itself by drinking his blood, so also can a righteous Christian by drinking Christ's blood take the divine spirit into himself. So Jesus was a vampire.

Still, it is odd that every culture out there has a version of a vampire.  So who knows, maybe there are vampires out there and they are just better about not drinking blood from people, or they just frequent blood banks. There are a lot of theories but it is interesting. Why are vampires so stuck in the human psyche that we can't seem to get them out and we will kill people under the suspicion that they just might be one.

So in truth, Twlight is completely off, just like everything else. We do not really seem to know what vampires are after all.

The Fire Rises

A fine frenzy you are now dear
All those ideals
you failed to adhere
and there is no court of appeals 

 You swore it was me
that was the bane
and if I was absentee
 your greatness you'd regain

You sang our swan song
as you slandered my name

I was the one who was wrong
and you the one of great claim

How proud you were
so sure to succeed
yet you bowed
at your first lone deed

The fire claimed all
And were I rose
You did nothing but fall

with all of your woes

And I rise
so very high
burning into the night skies
without you I fly

I lent a hand
as you lay in ash
but I was banned
in your abash

So do not blame my hand
when it was yours
that lost your promised land
in your fire wars

The fire rises
and so does the  bird
there no surprises
in the theater of the absurd

Diamonds aren't forever. Knowledge is.

I am quite the nerd. I follow under the ideals of Sherlock. Your mind has a limited amount of space, so what you put into it better be worth it. Thus, I end up reading books and watching shows that just promote learning of some kind. There are a few exceptions but for the most part I follow that rule. So after 3 weeks of being in the middle of the sea and only armed with books I bring you more odd and interesting facts to show you what a odd and diverse world we live in.

To those that prefer diamonds I have bad news for you. Even though they say that diamonds are forever it is not so. For those of you who skipped chemistry class, diamonds are made through heat and pressure of carbon. The carbon atoms form a pyramid  like structure. Graphite, the stuff in your pencil instead of lead, has a layered planar structure. This makes Graphite more chemically stable than diamonds. In chemistry everything wants to be stable so over time diamonds turn into graphite. Now before you run to your dresser to check your earrings, calm down. The process does take quite a while and your earrings will not turn into graphite any time soon. A few more facts on diamonds and then we shall move on.

Diamonds are extremely good conductors of heat so they best way to see if your diamonds are real(natural) is to see how well said jewels conduct heat. That is seriously the test that most scientist/suspicious jewelers  use to find out. Also diamonds are no longer the hardest substance known to man. In 2005 scientist at Bayreuth university in Germany created a new material by compressing pure carbon under extreme heat. Its called a hyperdiamond. It doesn't have diamonds looks though. It looks more like asphalt or the stones at the bottom of a fish tank. Following the hardness test, which pretty much is if it leaves a scratch then it is harder, it leaves scratches on diamonds.

Moving on, the loudest thing in the ocean is not the biggest. Its not even medium sized. The loudest thing in the ocean is actually shrimp. In fact they are so loud they can white out sonar from a sub so nothing can be heard around the shrimp besides them. This is what happens. The shrimp get into a large group and they start to snap their claws. Its not the snapping that makes the noise though. On the shrimps claws their is a groove on one side and a bump on the other so when they snap their claws water shoots out at 62 miles and hour. This creates bubbles that when they slow down and pressure takes over they pop and create the noise as well as heat and sometimes light. The noise registers at 246 decibels in water and in air that is 160  decibels. At jet taking off is 140 dB. They use this noise to stun predators and find mates. Besides giving OS' a headache the noise can be heard through the hall of the sub and it can dent propellers along with the heat.

Polar bears are NOT left handed nor do they cover their nose to hide, but they do enjoy toothpaste. Apparently they are concerned about oral hygiene because polar bears have been known to trash camps all to steal toothpaste. I guess they can not hide as well if they have yellow teeth Roaming polar bears have become such a problem that the town of Chruchill in Canada has a polar bear prison.They hold their inmates until autumn or spring, the season that polar bears hunt in, and then they are released. This could be quite a few months. They can hold up to 23 polar bears at one time. Still, they do not have to feed them, since polar bears only eat in those season. I hope that they learned their lesson though. Toothpaste is our right as humans. Still makes me wonder what a polar bear jumpsuit would be. I guess the easiest thing would be just to shave lines on them since their skin is black. Also, all polar bears are Capricorns, being born in late December or early January. So this means I am a polar bear. Ha.

For those champagne drinkers out there, its not carbon dioxide that makes champagne bubble. It is not the grooves on the glass that makes it bubble either. What makes champagne bubble is actually the dirt in the glass. Without the dirt and dust in the glass the carbon dioxide has nothing to bond to that creates the bubbles. So in theory, in a perfectly clean glass champagne will not bubble, only one with questionable sanitation with create the bubble that connoisseurs to desperately crave. Legally, now only sparkling wine created in the champagne region can be called champagne. Before 2006 any created in the US could have the same name. This is takes to a treaty with the European countries that states that only champagne from that region can be called as such. The US signed no such treaty and the treaty that they did sign that stated such, the treaty of Versailles that ended WW1, stated that it was only European countries. In 2006 the US accepted that ban so any sparkling wine made after 2006 can not be called champagne.

The guillotine was not invented in France. It was actually invented in Halifax Yorkshire and was pretty much beams of wood and an axe that came down with a rope attached to a pulley system. How the guillotine got to France was due to the Dr Joesph Ignace Guillotine. He hated public executions and thought that it was completely unfair that the poor should be hanged which was messy and could fail to work thus causing more suffering and the rich were beheaded. He suggested that things should be equal and that was what made the french take the idea and run with it. They gave the device a new name and sadly a new face. Also, despite what your histroy teach may have told you, the good Dr was not beheaded. He died from infection. The last person killed by the guillotine was killed in 1977. It was officially abolished in 1981.

For the moment that is what I will leave you with.

Giraffe in the jungle.

So if you go to a party store that sells supplies for kids parties you will not have to look very hard until you see a Jungle Party theme kit. Though I have yet to got to a kids party that actually used that theme, they are always there. Always. There is always a banner that says something like"Jungle Fever" of something equally cliche. In that theme there are various animals, a tiger, an elephant, monkeys, a croc, a lion, and a giraffe. We all except this without question.

The problem is, where a tiger, Asian elephants, some crocodiles, and Indian lines can roam into jungles, there is something wrong. Giraffes do not live in jungles. Yet there are ALWAYS there. Every jungle theme EVER. Why? They would hit EVERY branch. They couldn't survive. So why? Why?

It seems fitting for how things are now. At the moment where I live is filled with BS high school drama. I hide in my rack but even still it finds me. These queens of drama want to circle me with lies and rumors until all truth is displaced and I die with their lies filling my chest. I am the giraffe surrounded by screaming monkeys.

I work down in the galley, at the moment, far from my real job. Its temporary but it last for 4 months. Its to the point where I no longer want to eat. Its horrible. It really is. I have seen food dropped on the floor and then served, I a aware that the beverage machines carry 2 year old syrup. I know that hygiene isn't that pressing, and no one cares. Again I am the giraffe, and there are so many other little things going on that I almost feel that I should start looking for spots and horns.

Soon, but not soon enough I will find my way back to the savannah were I belong. I have plans to get an apartment and possible a dog. I have been dreaming of both for so long now it just doesn't seem real. I found a place that online looks PERFECT.  I want it. I want it so bad. What is holding me back is a possible money issue. Still here is hoping for my savannah.

To those who would think otherwise:

 To those who do not know me, this will be quite boring. With luck the next post I will have found something interesting to write about once more. Please pardon me for stating something that needs to be said to the few that know my face.

Deep down I am not a good person. I do well to hide this fact, I even try, but I am not fooled. Call me arrogant, I have done so myself, but I am smarter than many. I know this. I try to hide it in a vain attempt to seem normal. Abnormal people get too much unwanted attention. That and I wouldn't dare let people I am close to see just how cold I really am. I wear a small amount of coldness to ward off the stupid and ever chipper. Once the person in question has passed those two qualifications than they are a friend. That is all. Just a friend. There are few that are closer, and even they have not seen my quite like this. At most they have seen me quiet. I pretend I am normal and in some way or another they all believe it. Sometimes I even believe that I am normal, not for very long though. Eventually something calls to my intelligence and I am reminded just how useless people can be, so stupid, and annoying.

I vent my intelligence into different formats, to better hide it. Why else would I learn all the presidents of the US? Of course there is the ever present sarcasm that I use. I vent and hide and it gets me through. I focus some of it through the very people I hide it from. They can be interesting at times, and they were my first obsession, but now that I have the key to most puzzles that they present, they seem boring and uninteresting, predictable at best. I dare not draw too much attention, but I dare not loose an ounce of my intelligence and potential. It is the siren call of intelligence that I am not immune to. It is then I am at my worse. I am cruel and uncaring. In short I am an ass and I know it, and I DO NOT CARE.

No one has seen me this way. I hide in isolation and if that is deemed impossible for the moment, then I don my mask and dance in the masquerade that is normalcy, all the while, waiting for the moment when I can strike off and examine what has caught my attention. Each call becomes a new obsession for me. Thankfully they are far between, everything else I handle on a normal level and all seems well. Its the puzzle that I must solve, the rush I love and hate, for it is addicting, and I must solve it. I hardly care what gets in my way, or what I must say or do to do so.

My intelligence is especially in people, social interactions, and what lies behind the day to day. I can read people, quite easily. My childhood was good for something after all I guess. I know what to say, how to act, how to stand, to act like I am just like them. Its second nature now. There is a simple pleasure in not thinking, just like them. Its how I made it through bootcamp. I turned my intelligence away and my social skills. It made it a lot easier. I was able to avoid a lot of the drama and frustration. The RDC were making decisions for me anyway, so why bother with thinking about how stupid it all was. It would do me no good, so why? Why make more than 3 friends? I was never going to see these people ever again and more than 3 was asking to bring how their pointless drama. Be-friend the people who mattered and screw everyone else. Simple.

The result was when I returned I was all the dumber. There was no avoiding it. Survival or insanity? Simple. I did my best to regain what I had lost, and now that I have been away from boot for almost a year I finally feel I have gotten most of it back. We all have our darkness and mine seems tied with my brightest light.

I have not reached my potential, my mental "growth" was stunted with the need to survive. That is how I am so cold to begin with. If I didn't learn that trick I would be dead now. I came close a few times before I just shut my emotions up. Children are not meant to be raised like that.

And with that I could have been so much worse. I could have quite easily become a sociopath. The true heights of my intelligence and what I could and couldn't be or have become I can only guess at. There is a lot I imagine I could be, but no proof and without said proof there is no point.  

And here I am on the side of angels as it were. Good intentions and an understanding of right and wrong do not make a good person. If needed be I'd shake hands with the devil, most likely for a good reason. It is because I understand one thing, I will never be pure, or innocent, or good, so why stain the hands of someone who is when my hands are already stained with sins. In a way that makes me good, if that is the way that you wish to see it, but I know better.I am no hero, I am no angel, I am no concerned citizen. At best I am demon with morals.

Odd facts and musings

There is an old Romani legend about watermelons that kill. Apparently if you leave a watermelon alone long enough it turns into a vampire. It still looks like a fruit but now it thirst for blood. In the night it causes all kinds of chaos, as they roll themselves and attack. They even growl. Its thought that they couldn't do too much harm to people since apparently they have no teeth so they weren't out right feared.Yet they still do attack and drink blood. It isn't sure if this was told as a fairytale nightmare, in the sames sense as the boogeyman, something adults laugh at but children are unsure of, or it was actually believed. The legend comes form that fact that an aged watermelon develops red spots on the skin or "blood". This only shows up right after the transformation, or right before. Apparently  its tied in with the lore that if you leave any inanimate objects out on the full moon it will become a vampire. Pumpkins and Watermelons are the most common, and it apparently takes 10 days for it to happen.

Still the next time you cut open a watermelon and you see that sweet pink inside, you have to wonder if it was always pink to begin with, or did you just kill a monster? Was your melon a killer and you are now drinking what you think is watermelon juice but is actually AB+ from some poor, blood drained farmer. Who knows, maybe the farmers are feeding the melons blood to begin with. Mmmm, delicious. Would that make
watermelon eaters cannibals, and if you feed watermelon to someone in need of blood would that help?

I guess its no worse than eating jello which is made of boil animal bones, tendons, and skins. Seriously. Anything with gelatin is most likely made of that. Gummy anything folks. I say this as I eat gummy worms. Yumm! Marshmallows get their names from marsh mallows, a plant found in swamps, and were made from the sap of said plant. The plant even has pink flowers. Today most marshmallows are made from corn syurp, starch, sugar, water, and gelatin.That is right, gelatin. Its everywhere. We probably have never had real marshmallows. What a rip off. Egyptians used the real deal to cure sore throats.

Marsh mallows. Yum!

My favorite fact, after watermelons of course. is that Tequila is perfect for making diamonds. It has the perfect amount of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. If you just heat up eighty proof to 1,400 degrees it makes a thin diamond film. Its too thin to make jewels, but it still is pretty cool. You are drinking liquid diamonds, and getting smashed. On the note of liqueur, in 2001 Belgium started a program that served beer with children's  lunches instead of sugary drinks like soda. The kids could choose between lager and bitter. The kids liked it. It was only 2.5 proof though. The beer club ran with it and said "Beer is for the whole family!" Indeed. Why wait to start an alcohol problem? I can just see those little tikes, slurring and staggering their way through their elementary days. Hey, they won't remember them anyway. But now, for some reason, they get the shakes during the summer, and they are WAY to excited for school to start.

tequila diamonds

yay! Drunk children!

Death by chocolate really can be. Chocolate is poisonous, though it takes a few pounds to kill you. The toxic part is the alkaloid thebromine, which  is mostly in bakers chocolate and dark chocolate. Chocolate is very toxic to dogs and they love chocolate, just like we do. I had a dog that was really bad about stealing chocolate. If there was any in the house she would find and eat it. The problem was she was way to smart. She once found a box of eight chocolate donuts and she ate them all, and then hid the box under the bed so we wouldn't find it.  For a dog it starts off with bad stomach ache and if they eat to much they die. The bigger the dog, the more it takes, which is why my Greyhound didn't die on the spot, or even get that sick from eating the donuts. She lived to eat a lot more chocolate until age caught up with her. Cats have the same problem but the thing is, cats have no interest in Chocolate. They do not perceive sweetness at all.  That is probably why cats are so mean and dogs are so sweet.

And for those that do not take the platypus serious know that the male of that species is poisonous. Its got a spur on the back of each hind leg that is 15 mm long. No worries. It isn't fatal, just very painful. Also, though it is a mamal, mother platypuses (one of the two correct plural  forms, the other being platypus) do not nurse their young. Well, not the way that we think of nursing. They excrete milk through pores through their abs. No nipples at all.

So raise your glasses of liquid diamonds in a toast to killer fruit and gummy bones. To the marshmallows that we will never eat and drunk elementary school kids. Here is to chocolate dogs and the dangerous platypus. Here is to what makes life interesting.  I hope I have brightened your day, and at least you realize how interesting our little world can be, if we look.