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Date: Tue, 06 Sep 1994 10:04:38 -0500 (EST)
Subject: $9.99!!!
Sender: Sun King <00bcpalmer>
To: Donkey

So sorry I've lost Doc Foss's new e-mail address. Is there some master list
I'm supposed to be sending these too, because, if so, I wanted to laugh at
it.

Okay, so I forwent the Mason thing, but my wife and I are becoming Quakers,
just like Dick Nixon was. Amen.

To celebrate this, I would like you all to try my wife's and my new product,
Liquid Manna and Liquid Manna Lite.

Looks like she's preggers again. Don't know how that really happens.

sales dude brent in sunny CA.
00bcpalmer



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Date: Wed, 7 Sep 94 13:02:37 MDT
From: WHIPLASH
Subject: The Sand Dunes and My Plans to Leave Town
To: Donkey

>
> Let's Have A Little Gratitude, Goddammit!
>

hey you pulsating mass of genteelness at the bar of
the teat of the milk of human kindness. i went home and got
lit as usual last night and watched tv and tried to figure out
what i'm going to do with myself for the next year. i would
have written, but civil defense sirens cranked up and my block
captain came around and hollered "Blackout! Total Blackout!
Lights *out*, people! That means you too, Holder, and that
damn computer contraption of yours!"

i had just turned the terminal on too. pity.

i just now got in to work. i'm working the 11am - 8:30pm
switch room backups shift tonight. i'll be off friday, but i'll
be in here from 7:30am - 3:30pm on saturday. and it's two hours
behind your time here, but not three as you might be understandably
surmising when i lay upon you the doublet of facts being, one, "i
just now got in to work", and two, "i'm working the 11am - blah blah
blah shift". no, it's not 11am here, it's 12:15pm. I was just really
late. fuck 'em.

Oh, and by the by, the oyster story was great arthur. did that really
happen?

and you're beautiful too, bill. both of you.


NEWS FROM THE PASSING LANE________________________________________

Janice and I just returned from a little two-and-a-half day adventure
into southern central Colorado. We drove down highway 285 to the Great
Sand Dunes National Monument, and shot some good video which you will
all eventually see once I get this video thing designed and built.

Janice and I split about a quart of Southern Comfort on the way down, plus
I had a lot of beer and one of those pills. I ended up arguing with a park
ranger once we got there because he wouldn't let us just sleep in the parking
lot, and then Janice and I had a fight. We had to drive about seven miles
out of the park to a crossroads in the middle of nowhere just to sleep!
We stayed up fighting and walking around in the blackness and listening
to music and I made a fire out of some newspapers I had brought and then
we finally went to sleep.

We slept in until around noon or so when it started to warm up. Maybe it
was only eleven. Anyways, we drove into the park and I spent about five
hours huddled on the ground under blankets shaking, tossing, and moaning
in fear. That finally wore off and we walked out to the dunes, which
rise seven hundred feet above the valley floor.

I didn't drink for the rest of the weekend, and Janice and I got along better
than we have in awhile. She really is a sweet person. In going over the
video I shot for this video thing, I watched myself drunk, and I have to
say that I was shocked and appalled at what a boorish asshole I am when I'm
drunk. Real eye-opener there.

Anyways, we had a terrific time. There was a creek, or rather a sheet
of water centimeters deep, inscribing beautiful fern-like patterns in the
sand. Walking up on it for the first time is a real treat. I got there
first, because Jannie kept lagging behind to take photographs, and I was
on the other side of the hundred-foot wide, 5mm deep "creek" when Jannie
discovered it. Her comments mirrored my own feelings about the scene
we were standing in the middle of: "Wow. Wow. *Wow*."

She then got straight to work at capturing the whole thing in parts with
her trusty pentax.

Deer walked through our campsite early the next morning. We were the only
ones up. There was a fresh print next to our fire ring which seemed too
big to me to be a dog, plus the claw marks were much longer. Maybe I'm
wrong. The rangers and signs did stress that there were many bears in the
area, though. The deer moved off, and we ate breakfast, washed up and
fetched the cats out to the dunes. The cats dealt with it pretty well,
although the kitten, who I have renamed "Clorox", took a quick liquid shit
in my backpack due to stress which we tried vainly to scrub out with sand.

We brought the cats back to the truck, and having packed up already, got
on our way. The last twenty or so miles back in to Denver on 285 were
stop and go, apparently because twenty miles up the road there were
orange flags and barrels and signs saying "Give construction workers a
brake", there being, of course, no construction workers out there (seeing
as how it's labor day) so we spent over an hour at a crawl because everyone
on the road neglected the benefits of the reason they could create by
thinking with their brains.

We got to Jannie's, dropped off the cats, went out for a bite to eat,
and collapsed on her mattress, exhausted. The moments leading up to flopping
on the bed were tough because we were so tired, but I never get any
exercise anymore, so after the hiking and packing a driving and all
(especially the hiking--climbing a 500 foot dune at 8300 feet above sea
level!) I was DOG tired, and it felt good to lay down. I haven't been
that tired in a long time. It was a good feeling.

I wish Bill (T) was coming out here tommorrow. (His girlfriend, Kelly
is visiting Janice for a few days). I'm still pissed at myself that I
missed a chance to have you both up here. I'm an idiot.

I give two weeks notice at my job not this Friday, but the next, the 16th.
My last day will be the 30th. What I'll do after that, I don't know.
Looking at my money, I am beginning to realize that I won't really be
able to afford just wandering around the country for months. I have to
go back to Florida to go through our storage shed. I really hate the
heat in the South. I don't know if I can go back to that. Oregon or
Washington don't sound all that great to me. Alaska sounds kind of
interesting. I've also thought of looking for a job way up north, like
Wyoming, Montana, Minnesota, like that, maybe at a university, where
I could work with computers and make *some* money and buy some land,
and see if I can get started on making my dream come true. Land here in
colorado is expensive and the whole place is being overrun with Cali-
fornians that everybody is really uptight about letting there be too
much development, etc. etc. The whole state, while strikingly beautiful,
has a sort of National Park/Ski Resort/Disney World-gone-wrong feel
to it. Maybe I could get some land on the plains, that's not as
expensive. I don't know how to do it, but I want my own land where I
can do my own thing and a job that doesn't make me *completely* disgusted.
Partly disgusted, I could live with. Even mostly disgusted. But not
completely. Maybe I'm just too picky. That's what a number of people
here, who know I am planning to leave, have implied.

Minnesota. Now *there's* an idea. It's not hot, it has lakes to fish
and boat on. It's pretty, I've been there. I need to do some real
thinking. That's my first step in my big plan. Once I quit the job,
spend awhile just thinking about what I'm going to do. Six cats makes it
extra hard. Janice and I have both considered cutting down on the cat
thing. I'll never give up my grey cat, but the rest I could walk away
from. Any of you want a cat?

If I had my own goddamned land, I wouldn't have to worry about how many
fucking cats I had.

I can do this. I know I can do this. There's got to be a way.

Can any of you guys think of a job that pays at lease $7/hour where I
could work outdoors, by myself?

I'll be in touch.

Robert




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Date: Thu, 08 Sep 94 16:11:29 CDT
From: Chet <JMAC>
Subject: Exodus
To: Donks! <donkey-l@SUNSHINE.EDEN.COM>


Waves, water, waves, filthy hominid feet jammed up my nose, sun, waves
and smelly salt water, that's all there is out here in the Straights.
Mi nombre es Chet, soy un burro grande de Havana. I used to live in a big
fancy villa inside El Presidente's compound. I used to entertain hot shots
from across the old Soviet empire, comrades and concubines, I had 'em all.

Must have been crazy to fall in with the retro-revoltionaries from Santiago,
those insane soft capitalist swine. Commandante Uno caught me in the sack
with one of the worst offenders, a shill working for Pepsico. I had to run
for my life and hide amongst the common monkeys.

We've been at sea for 3 days now, no sign of La Guardia Estados, no sign
at all of those beautiful big orange and white cutters, hope is fading fast.
Rumor has it even if we are picked up in time we will be shipped off to
Guantanamo or maybe even Panama. Not me, no not me. My destiny is in Miami,
I will one day be papa de los papas grandes, un burro mas importante, I will
open a chain of fancy stores in air conditioned malls and sell erotic kitchen
ware. I will marry a fine blonde haired burricita linda, I will survive.

I am donkey, hear me bray.

Chet
Somewhere in the Florida Straights



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Date: Sat, 10 Sep 94 13:34:02 CDT
From: "Pope, The" <JMAC>
Subject: 'dis an 'dat
To: donks! <donkey-l@SUNSHINE.EDEN.COM>


Blessings to you all, especially the heathen donkeys. Let's just get one
damn thing straight, okay? I AM NOT NO CHICKEN. I really wanted to keep
my papal promise and go visit those fine Bosnian folks in Sarajevo ahhhh
but ahh something came up. Yeah, that's it, some last minute god business
ahh just came up so I decided to go see the thugs in Croatia instead.
Shucks.

Around 10 last night the pope line rings and my very good friend and long
time ahh companion Nuncio Doug says some cat name of Spivey's on the blower
and wants some holy intervention or some such shit. Took a long pull on my
JD and moseyed over to the pope phone. "Dig baby, THE POPE here. Who wants
my ear?" Cat with a tremendous set of meatballs kinda rumble/speaks real
low, like at around 60 cycles, "Pope. Name's Spivey, used to run bills and
buds outtta Milano. Crazy Tunisian shot me in the head, it's like this
old sod, I'm just about dead. Before I go toes up .. just wanted to know
if you had any tricks that might save my immortal soul."

"Well Spivey son I really can't say since soul saving is not my main stock
in trade. This Vatican gig is for the most part a scam, cooked up by some
bankers in old Rotterdam. God and the devil and good versus bad, the
philosophy of niceness and prayers of salvation, all that crap is for
suckers. As for the fate of your everlasting soul, I really don't care if
it rots in a hole. Ciao, baby."

Cardinal Slide's on the stoop sp I'll wrap this up quick, there's money to
launder and kickbacks to pay. Remember dear donkeys there is no life after
death, the point of this world is to screw your fellow man.

Doug! My solid gold jade encrusted house slippers, please.

John Paul II
Vatican City



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Date: Tue, 13 Sep 94 16:01:03 CDT
From: Bob Hughes <JMAC>
Subject: Voodoo in Hell
To: donks! <donkey-l@SUNSHINE.EDEN.COM>


Went to work last night and these minor demonic types from over around
the 7th Circle of Pity are hooting and hollering about all these messages
coming through from Haiti. After taking my usual place behind the main bar
I slide over to these clowns and ask what's up.

"Dig my man, this one here's from Generalisimo Ramos, the top dog himself."
With that, a furry little scuzzball name of Mort hands me what appears to be
a clear plastic cube. "I don't get it, what's this piece of crap got to do
with anything?" My boss, a big ugly biker who goes by Camille, reaches over
my shoulder and appropriates the cube. "Gotta s'cuse little Bobby, boy's so
green he still thinks if he's real good he'll be goin' home one day." Laughs
echo around the room at my expense.

Camille put the cube on the bar then he put his massive face right up close
to it and simply said, "SPEAK." The sound of plaintive wailing immediately
filled the bar, then a great baritone voice started chanting, "OMOS, OMOS
OMOS, OMOS ... " Mort and his fellow scuzzballs broke into hysterical laughter
at this point while Camille and half the bar took up the chant, formed
a conga line and sorta snake danced around the place.

"I hate to seem like the proverbial rube here old Mort, but what the fuck is
going on?" Camille had mysteriously re-appeared behind my left shoulder and
and had clamped his furry paw down ontop of my head. "Tell him, man. Tell
young Robert here the great cosmic joke, tell him the fate of any and all
human prayers."

"Ain't no secret little Bobby, we all thought you knew that down on our
circle we collect refuse. Garbage and trash of humans in need, the cosmic
debris of sentients in pain, prayers dear Bobby, that's what we collect.
We bag 'em and sort 'em and use 'em for fuel. The funniest ones we save and
sell to the highest bidder."

"What prayers? You mean those directed to demons? Is that who Omos is, an
old voodoo god?" This brought a fresh burst of laughter from throughout the
bar and Camille kicked me in the ass so hard I thought he must have broken
his foot. "Shut up and listen before I sell you to Mort and his crew." A
particularly pustulant creature knwon as Leather, Mort's oldest comrade
shot me a wink so lurid I wanted to puke.

"No, no, dear Robert not just the prayers to our kind but EVERY prayer ever
uttered or thought ends up in the great pile of sewage and slime it is our
duty and honor to uphold and maintain." With that, Mort started pulling out
cube after cube after cube, lining them up on the bar like he was going to
do one of those domino tricks. His band of cretins slowly moved away from
him with the most profound look of wonder and awe you could imagine.

Mort, looking extravagantly pleased with himself moved to the end of the bar
and into the face of cube number one, softly commanded "Speak."

"Dear god in heaven most holy please help my son Bobby."

While the all too familiar voice was still croaking from the cube Mort
started moving down the line. "Speak." "He's a good son, really." "Speak."
"Jesus help my brother Bob." "Speak." "Lord if you let him get off the dope
I promise he'll straighten up." "Speak." "God help Robert." "Speak." "Take
me instead sweet lord, just help our Bob."

"I've got at least ten years of these Bobby, seems you were a real class
'A' top of the line shitheel in your time. How many times did you break
their hearts, man? Your family sent out enough prayers about you to fill
a good sized warehouse."

Camille took this as his cue to put me in a head lock so tight I couldn't
even dream of breaking free. He hauled me out to the front of the bar and
stopped in front of the very last cube Mort had set upon the bar. "Say it,
Bob. You know the magic word." Somehow the place had filled to capacity
during Mort's little show and every sorry piece of degeneracy in that tacky
smelly little room started chanting, "SAY IT SAY IT SAY IT SAY IT..."

Camille eased his death grip on my larynx just enough to allow a minute
amount of air to pass down my throat and I managed to squeak, "Speak."

"Don't let me die god, don't let me die. I'm sorry for all of the horrible
shit I've down in my life but fuck man I'm only 26. Let me live sweet jesus,
and I'll set it all to rights. Don't let me die like a pig, man, please just
don't let me die rolling in this stinking dirt, I'm sorry. Please don't let
me die. Don't Let me die don't let me die dontletmediedontletmediediediedie."

As soon as the pathetic voice from the cube stopped whining Camille let me
go from his sweaty grip. "There's glasses to wash in the back, Bobby, and
be sure to swab out the head."

Just another night in hell.

Bob Hughes
Pullin' Time in Hades



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Date: Fri, 16 Sep 94 15:29:18 CDT
From: Jerome <JMAC>
Subject: Cows in Hell
To: donks? <donkey-l@SUNSHINE.IO.COM>


So it's like this, when I woke up this morning I realized right away that
I was not feeling very well. After the usual cobweb shaking from my mental
hidey holes I realized that I did not look at all well either. Then, when my
reason grew just a bit sharper, I realized that I should not really be able
to see myself lying in bed. "Oh shit," that was the sum total of my oration
at the most critical juncture of my existence. Plain fact of the matter was
that I had, as the old saying goes, actually woken up dead.

It seems as soon as I came to awareness of my new state of being the damn
phone started ringing. Since the dude in bed wasn't in any condition to
move, let alone get up and answer the thing, I made for the annoying
contraption determined to silence it but I decided at the last moment to
pick up the receiver and see if the dead could actually speak.

"Yeah, hello?" After a moment or two of clicks and static this really loud
announcement started playing, "Hello! Welcome to hell, if you are recently
deceased of natural causes press 1, if you are a suicide press 2, if you
are a major pop/rock star press 3 for accidental overdose, 4 for suicide
or 5 if you were slaughtered on the highway. Hello! This is Hell-Call, your
24 hour infernal message and communications service."

Right. Voice mail in hell, some joke. I took the bait and pressed 1. "You
have selected (buzzclickbuzz) recent demise by falling bovine. Please
press 6 for further instructions." Falling what? Okay I'm dead so what's
the difference how I croaked? I pressed 6. "You are assigned to area 2,
level 16, room 175 in the Outer Ring of Cruelty. A trained counselor will
be along shortly to assist in your relocation. Have a nice eternity."

Before I could even hang up, an extremely obnoxious pounding set in against
my poor front door. I had to assume someone or at least something wanted
to come inside. My "counselor" turned out to be, I swear now, my counselor
turned out to be Elsie The Cow. She quickly informed me of my utter, or
udder, lack of rights and led me out to meet my fate.

That was many hours ago. Since then I've been set up in a really nifty little
condo (#175) in what passes for a suburban neighborhood off in some quiet
backwater of the Great Void. Only thing is, every time I try to go outside
a full grown Gurnsey jumps off the roof and squashes me flat. It takes only
a few minutes to recover but man, it sure hurts like a bitch when it happens.

So okay, so fucking what, you say? Well the thing is, it's a really neat
condo as I said, but there's no food and the water's not turned on so I'm
getting pretty hungry and thristy. Thing is too, there's a goddammned full
blown fast food heaven (excuse the pun) right across the street, not 100
feet from my front door. Smells of lucious yummies are driving me nuts. So
far I've been squashed 8 times and I'm getting ready for my next try. This
time I'm gonna run REALLY fast and I know it's silly but I'm gonna use this
umbrella I found in the hall closet. Wish me luck.

Feeling Rather Flat,
Jerome



=============================================================
Date: Sun, 18 Sep 94 02:16:29 MDT
From: WHIPLASH
To:Donkey
Subject: Just Married

well, this is probably going to be pretty disjointed, i've got
whiskey and confusion flowing through my head and the screen
to this terminal that at&t loaned me is all crooked since it
got knocked about a few weeks ago and i haven't yet applied
corrective chiropractic pracktik yacktik hominahomina to it.

haven't had time.

so. so! wish me luck, or wish me whatever it's customary to
wish me. monday, the 19th (as my wife so kindly reminds me--
i had honestly forgotten all about it) is our 2nd wedding
anniversary! i reckon we'll go out to eat at someplace nice.
all things considered, we did well. considering the circle of
people, or the intermingling of circles of people, that she and
i came out of, and the fates we all met, i think she and i
are right up there on the bell curve. bad, bad ol' acid. it'll
getcha. it will getcha. i'm glad i tried it, but it sure did
intensify my nightmares. just doing my job, sir, it says, just
the facts ma'am, just do it just blow me let's blow this taco
stand i didn't i never i was the seventh son of a swami salami

i'm a whitebread wetback spearchucker perma-PMS glass ceiling
reverse-discrimination proactive slimy sigilistic slanty-eyed
slope master race prisoner number zero one two dyspeptic dysenteric
dystrophic dismobile transpederastic weekend-pass-rocket-fuel
gymnastic anal relentive hairy hot highbrow mission accomplished
and your mother-in-law steam torch hard-tack and holy heat
whiplash memory of the last dreams launched in the dark
recesses of all the times i ever woke up scared and felt suddenly
relieved that it was only a dream only to realize i have yet
to die and i swear i'm scared isn't there somebody out there

this reality leaves something to be desired... "what say" we all
just get together as brother and sister and through cooperative
effort we can make those modest steps onward and upward and make
this the sort of reality that we all feel proud to take a shit in?!

c'mon?! c'mon!! WHO'S WITH ME?!!

please! please. no autographs.

so, anyways. i gave notice at work on friday. my last day is the
last friday of september, the 30th or 31st or whatever the hell it
is. in case you hadn't guessed, i'm referring to my job at AT&T
in denver colorado. you are receiving this from an account i still
have at an old job at the us geological survey, because AT&T has a
process that scans all outgoing usenet news articles for profanity
and (who knows what else and) i wanted to speak "naturally".

gosh. you must be just plain fascinated with me and my bullshit.
anyways, as i was saying. two more weeks of work for me, and i'm
going to disappear for awhile. i had told scott lesser (scott, you
really *must* see how this video of you at Boulder Falls in the snow
came out, to the tune of King Missile's "Jesus Was Way Cool", it's
wonderful) and joe provo that i'd be up boston way and while it's
still possible, it's starting to look less likely. we'll see though.
if i could just stand to work for a few more weeks, it could happen,
but i'm burning out. it bums me out, i really wanted to visit!
maybe it will still happen.

i guess this is as good a time as any to advertise once again to the
people reading this that YOU MAY HAVE A VIDEO OF MY CURRENT LIFE.
I'm putting together this thing, on a noncommercial basis, that is non-
profit and non-whatever else you want it to be non- of. it will be a
video of a bunch of stuff that i want you to see. it will have music
and images and probably some dialogue and to be honest, it will probably
be a crappy video, but it will be a crappy video of MY LIFE.

i'm open to suggestions at this point. if there is enough support for
a scene of me waving my penis around in the park downtown, hell, i'm
a trouper, i'll seriously consider it. consider me your personal puppet.
provided that it doesn't cause me long-term suffering, i'll most likely
do it. drinking other people's spit (and other geek shit) as well as
anything that lands me in jail again, you can just forget honey.

if you want a copy, send me email, and i will send you a physical address
to where you can send me $5 to cover the cost to me of a video tape and
postage, plus your physical address. in other words:

1 you send me email
2 i send you my physical address in email
3 you send me $5 cash or postal money order (no checks)
PLUS your physical address so that i can...
4 ...mail you a copy of the video

i figure the video will be done in early to mid-october. if i get no
responses, then i won't waste time cutting the video together. i can't
afford to spend bucks buying a bunch of blank video tape and postage
stamps if i'm not going to get some of it back. if you are interested
and can shell out a few bucks, let me know, otherwise i'll spend the
time packing and getting the fuck out of denver. you can't hurt my
feelings either way.

BACK TO *OUR STORY*.

incidentally, i still don't understand why this person who is sending
all this stuff as "anon" won't send it as his/her/it ('s) real self.
no matter how much i read it, no matter how much i like or dislike it,
none of it is real, it's just nike commercials on fnord-l. for all i
know, it's being made up by the same guys who did the logistics for the
MTV video music awards. come out of your shell, anon, and gain our
respect. otherwise, go into advertising. you didn't write "help i've
fallen and i can't get up" did you? sounds kinda like you.

i had a motorcycle, and black leather boots and the boots looked like
a big black butterfly when i took them off and put them on the floor
next to each other way back when i used to live at spring lake apartments
in st. petersburg florida. somebody tried to steal my motorcycle and
then years later i sold it for about half of what i paid for it because
we needed the money on the very same day that i signed the title over
into my name the ink was hardly dry and i gave that bike away to be
shipped over to norway or some other fucking place and my wife and i
put twelve thousand miles on that bike in one year in the heat and rain
and night because it was our only form of modern transportation and if
you ever come across a black 1987 Yamaha Radian with gold-colored valve
covers and some deep nicks in the paint on the gas tank right above
the rider's crotch area (which I put in there carrying a gallon of wine
home in a glass jug from my wife's mom's place drunk one night with my
wife on the back bingy bingy bingy deep pits in the gas tank paint) then
there is a good chance you are looking at my old bike, which was an
excellent bike, and

anyways, i'm quitting my job and leaving the state, again. well dan,
i guess you won. i guess you're right, i guess my "methods are not the
methods of a friend". you win. i'm going out to the desert. i don't
care anymore. you're just one more human piece of shit who fucked me over.
take a number bud. i'm not gonna come looking for you. i know you
weren't worried. i know you are a brave man. i know that you do all
those stainless steel endoskeletonic things that a drunk like me can
never seem to muster except in braggart words after the fact. you're
my hero, etc. etc. now do be a good boy and leave me alone to rot in
my little personalized hell-hole. you don't know me dan. you think you
do, but you don't. stay away from me, and everything will be OK.

WELL ROBERT, YOUR DREAMS OF A HIPPY LOVE COMMUNE ARE CHURNING IN A
VORTEX OF BLOOD AND TEARS IN THE BOTTOM OF YOUR ACCURSED SOUL. YOUR
WIFE HAS TAKEN HER OWN APARTMENT SO THAT SHE CAN FIGURE OUT WHO SHE IS
AND DISTANCE HERSELF FROM YOUR BITTERNESS. YOU HAVE OTHER BITS
OF MUNG AND SHMEGMA BINGLING AROUND IN THE FLOATING RANDOMNESS OF
I-CHING BONES POSSIBILITIES THAT IS YOUR CURRENT LIFE. WHAT DO YOU
THINK IS GOING TO HAPPEN? HOW DO YOU SEE THE SEASON DEVELOPING FOR YOU
AND THE TEAM? WHERE DO YOU SEE YOURSELF IN THE PLAY-OFFS?

anyways.

i bought a ruger stainless steel .22LR rifle. it's dandy. and it will
be cheap to shoot. so much for the 30-30 and the crossbow. maybe later.
but for right now, it's dandy. learn to hit a target.

before i split, i'm going to make the video i talked about.

that should keep me busy until around the middle of october.
my wife is putting me up for free. i'm going to explore eating lots
of potatoes and rice and onions and chicken/beef bullion and
grain and spices and god knows what just strive to live on very
little money

my first plan is to drive twenty or thirty miles out into the great
salt lake desert, and hang a right (north) and drive for ten miles or
so, and stop the truck and let the cats out and hang out there for
two weeks. i plan to read some charles dickens and will durant and
h.l. mencken and whole bunch of books about war. i'll probably
finish like three books. it all depends on how much alcohol i bring.
the idea is to bring none, but that hardly ever happens. we'll see.

say, diane, when did you say you were going to be in the southeast?
or did i hallucinate that? it's soon, isn't it? let's see who can
make the other have the most orgasms ho ho ho. anyways, when?

i've gotta be out of my mind thinking anybody would have plodded through
this much of my bullshit. BUT, if so...

drink a toast on me and my wife's anniversary, eh? wish us luck and
all that stuff. she really is a very kind and honest person.

i wish everything was OK.

robert holder



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Date: Thu, 22 Sep 94 08:37:04 MDT
From: WHIPLASH
To:Donkey
Subject: Guess what I woke up with yesterday morning?


"metroet" tattooed on both my forearms in inch-high uncial.
i think it's uncial. it's the same celtic looking script i had
the "unforgiven" word on my shoulder done in. it looks... like
some sort of... i don't know how to describe it.

at first, i started to get bummed about it, but i've decided to
just enjoy it. it's one of the geekiest things i think i've ever
done, but what the hell, it's too fucking late now, and i don't
have the money to get it removed or covered. likely i'll work
some sort of design around it so it looks less... like some weird
cult military insignia...

it snowed yesterday! it looks like it's going to be sunny today,
and so it's not like it's winter yet, but it was really cool to
see the snow. i stayed home from work yesterday and watched TV
and soaked in the various aromas in my apartment, and janice called
from her work and told me that it was getting real cold and sure
enough a few hours later is was snowing like crazy! it was nice.

i'm starting to get opening night jitters. no secret service at
my door yet, that's a good thing. i guess i oughta lay off that
kind of stuff. people might think i'm nuts or something.

oh yeah, and i bleached my hair, and shaved the sides. it looks
sort of orange-ish. and that's a pretty nice haircut!

Darlin' Don't You Go and Cut Your Hair,

Pavement




=============================================================
Date: Fri, 23 Sep 94 19:04:22 CDT
From: Bub <JMAC>
Subject: Ken Burns in Hell!
To: Donks! <donkey-l@sunshine.io.com>


COMING THIS FALL TO A PUBLIC TELEVISION SET NEAR YOU:

Strip Poker: An American Dream
120 hours of priceless sepia toned wrinkled old photos your mom threw out
when you were in the eighth grade. Legendary docu-hustler Ken Burns has
again talked the Corporation for Public Broadcasting out of scads of dough
in order to wank his pathetic excuse for a masculine member in your face!

Each 12 hour installment of STRIP POKER will feature the truth and justice
of American virtue ad nauseum while some pathetic old croaker moans on in
the background in a feeble excuse to provide relevant naration. It will move
you, it will stun you, it will make you want to heave public TV on the trash
heap of blighted human refuse where it so rightly belongs!

ALSO COMING SOON FROM THE KEN BURNS MONEY FACTORY:

BARNEY! 364 hours of moving old sepia toned photos of America's most disgusting
bloated purple vermin.

KEN! 1200 hours of moving old sepia toned photos of Ken Burns.

and

Sepia! 3672 hours of ratty old sepia toned photos found in trash heaps across
this moving, majestic and awesome nation of idiots.




=============================================================
From: "Merciful Lee Dickens" <DICKENS>
Subject: TEST RESULTS
Date: 23 SEP 1994 09:14 -06
To: Donkey

Dear Robert Holder,

Having just read your (trust me) deeply-disturbed treatise and
recognizing it for the child's cry in the night that it surely was -
yes, Robert, don't shake your head no - I am referring to "After A Time
She Became Sublime" - I am encountering unavoidable thoughts, issues
which demand faces and not just simple smiley faces but faces that jump
right out and bite you on the metaphorical hiney, which is likewise
unavoidably bright and shiny, and in the wake of those jetskiing primal
screams for Mommy I cannot help bobbing to the surface, gasping for
breath and confessing, from the bottom of my wellspringing sympathetic
heart: I am truly sorry that you were dragged unwillingly behind the
Cruel Speedboat of Life, my fellow being.

But ask yourself this: Aren't you glad that when that whore was
washing Jesus' feet with perfume in front of all his buds, he didn't
like get this macho bullshit attitude and, saying "Hey Bitch, fuck this
foot-washing crap - I got a better idea", grab a handful of her hair
and pull her face into his crotch? Dear God, I know I am. That just
would've spoiled everything. Yes, Robert, don't shake your head no.

Your kindhearted sentiments regarding the ethical treatment of our
fellow animals not withstanding, I hope you will take this golden
opportunity to realize that there are those of us in the world who do
love you now and all that other stuff is in the past and it's time to
move on to new ways of thinking. I don't mean imagining Jesus getting
head, either. By force, I mean. Non-consensual sex is not a new way
of thinking. Nor is tricking them into thinking they consent. That's
yesterday's thinking.

No, it's time for an Uplifting, Rob. Time to stop crying because we
are wet. Time to lift ourselves out of our personal puddles. Time to
dry ourselves in the warm desert sunshine and start on that journey of
a thousand miles - they say it begins with a single step, but I say
land on it with both feet if you want to: it's Up To You. Hell, son:
hit the path running if that's how you want to do it. Don't stop till
you get to the refreshment stand.

I think I can count on you to come up with the right solutions on your
own, Robert, but if you find that it's still too difficult - what with
the orange hair and the Portugese word for "synecdoche" inexplicably
tattooed on your forearms and all - let me be the first to genuinely
assure you, my beloved friend, that my door is always open to you and
that as long as *I* have a roof over my head, you do, too, Brother.
I mean that.

I will be your purple dinosaur of hope, Robert "Whiplash" Holder; come
on down.



Please Deposit Another $200
For The Next Minute,

Merciful




=============================================================
Date: Wed, 28 Sep 94 08:33:26 MDT
From: WHIPLASH
To: Donkey
Subject: 2020world


this idea of literacy as being a "dead technology" is miserably lame.
the computers that make this technology possible will *never* be
programmable and maintainable exclusively with cute little pictures
and icons. there are always going to be people who can read. guess
who is going to write the lawbooks and the bibles? the people who can
read, i.e. the people with the money. "twas ever thus, and ever thus
'twill be."

this idea is either inane (most likely, to my mind: i wrote to cpsr
and offered to work for them or anybody else they might know of in
the freenet movement for about 30% of what I'm making now, because "it's
something I can believe in" and they replied with a form letter only
after I followed up saying that I found their silence to be insulting
and inexplicable. How many such offers can they be getting? all the
people with my experience and training that I know would never work
for that money, no matter how "noble" the cause: cpsr is a bunch of
assholes) or the wet-dream of some power hungry wanker.

these guys left a bad taste in my mouth with their reply to me: they
didn't even read my damn letter. fuck 'em.

and anybody tries to take away *any* tool, *especially* the ability
to read, from MY kids (if I ever have any), their gonna need a tow
truck to pull my boot outta their behind...

let me just recap here: as far as I'm concerned, cpsr is full of exactly
the same sensationalist, non-technical (yes, goddamnit, that matters in
this discussion), fuzzy-thinking members of the left-wing commie pinko
liberal vatican-owned press that they criticize in that article. bunch
of damn yuppy salary climbing assholes. and YOU BET i base this judgement
on this one bad interaction i had with them. they allowed their email
address to be included in a public access show about the internet, and
it pisses me off that they treat me like some scumbag because i happen
to WORK WITH THE INTERNET FOR A LIVING. I mean, listen to their
condescending tone about the VERY PEOPLE WHO KEEP THE NET RUNNING:
"what difference does it make if it's coax or fiber, blah blah blah"
these are the same people who call me everyday and whine because you have
to read the fucking manual to operate the computer, no wonder their numero
uno 25 year wish list item is computers (and a whole society, no less!) that
DON'T REQUIRE YOU TO BE ABLE TO READ TO OPERATE! maybe if i was some unemployed
skatepunk, disaffected from my parents who support me, dropping internet
jargon to impress my stoner friends who dropped out of art-class at the
fucking community college without having any more involvement with the
internet than IRC and alt.slack.one-joke.circle-jerk, and no technical
understanding of the net

pant...pant...pant...

...maybe THEN cpsr would have DEIGNED to read my damn letter and point
me in a direction where I could HELP the damn freenet movement. unfortunately
that doesn't sell copy, I guess. Fuck cpsr.

Sorry everybody, to have to get out the belt, but they wuz a bad dog, no
bisquit!

Jeez, the nerve of some people...

robert


----- Begin Included Message -----

From: "Merciful Lee Dickens" <DICKENS>
Subject: Year 2020
Date: 28 SEP 1994 08:56 -06

*** Original Author: LISTSERV @ COM - ** Remote User **; 09/28/94 05:21

>
Date: Mon, 26 Sep 1994 08:00:02 -0700 (PDT)
From: 2020 World <year2020@>
Subject: An Invitation to Hear Your Opinion!


The year 2020, what will it be like? By then, the big version of what we
call the info-highway will have been with us for some time. Society will
have undergone major adjustments, earthquake-sized shifts. Today's
journalism about the info-highway misses the point. What difference does
it make if it's coax or fiber, PC or set-top box, TCI or AT&T. What
matters is how it will change our world.

Our world will change dramatically. How? Where? What? Today, if you
are curious about this stuff, you have two choices; read the Time
magazine-type "general interest" feature written by someone who hasn't got
a clue, or read the Wired magazine-type "top ten" Industry-leaders/
futurists (you know who they are!) lecture us on their particular vested
interest. Either way, the real changes are not being discussed. Let's
change that.

I want to invite you to participate in a global group exploration of life
in the year 2020. Let me introduce myself and then explain. My name is
Kurt Dahl and I am currently the Vice President of Information Technology
at The Seattle Times (Seattle's major metro newspaper). I am writing a
new weekly column that will be published in the Sunday Seattle Times
Personal Technology section.

The column is called 2020world. The idea of 2020world is to explore how
our lives will change when the information highway is a familiar and
integral part of our society. The column will *NOT* be about technology,
that's why I picked the year 2020, by then we can all agree that a
broadband, fully switched, ubiquitous network will have been in place for
many years. How that network will change our lives, not how it will work,
is the question 2020world will address.

So now you are thinking -- I really don't need to read more simple-minded
drivel about the information highway. I agree, you don't, and won't.
2020world will explore ideas that are far outside the typical, boring
discussions of home-shopping and video-on-demand. Yet it will be written
for the general reader. Let me show you how. I have included the first
column from September 25th, as an example. Please read it, then you will
get the idea.

Here is where you come in, and this is the most impo
To join in, simply reply (as shown below) and you will automatically be
enrolled as a subscriber to our mailing list. Each week the new 2020world
column will be e-mailed to you as well as the best and most exciting
comments and responses. If you want to respond, simply send an e-mail to
our address (also included below). Any questions, send me an e-mail or
call.

But first, read the inaugural column! Here goes...

Copyright 1994 Seattle Times Company

2020world column title: Emily is illiterate

The information superhighway -- aren't you tired of reading about it?
And it doesn't even exist! But it will. And after it's built, we will
live in a very different world.

How different and in what ways? What you have read in the press so far
is a lot of trivial chatter about "home shopping" and movies-on-demand"
combined with boring technical details. These stories just don't come
close to capturing the profound changes we will experience. To better
understand where we are going we need a new approach, fresh ideas.
That's what this column will try to do.

Let's discover this new world together. Let's use one of the most
intriguing new capabilities of the information superhighway: the concept
of group-mind. Here's how: I'll start with an original, sometimes
outrageous, thought about life in the year 2020, and you send me your
reaction to that idea. I'll organize the most thoughtful, expansive and
mind-stretching responses, and we will print them.

Your thoughts and questions can lead us in new directions. Over time we
will follow these "group-mind" wanderings whichever way they go. If we
succeed, 2020world will be as much your space as mine.

It's the year 2020, your daughter Emily is 9 years old, and she
can't read or write. Is this your worst nightmare about our schools
come true? Nope, Emily just doesn't need to read or write anymore.

The written word is a means to an end and not an end in itself. We use
it to communicate with large groups and to preserve ideas, but we prefer
the spoken word. In 2020world, with the ability to create, store and
send audio and video as easily as written words, why would we need to
read and write?

Look inside your own head. Do you store information as written words?
Do you dream in written words? No, you don't. Visual images and spoken
languages are our natural form of information. Writing is nothing more
than a technology. It can be replaced by something better. In fact,
some forms of the written word are being replaced right now, like
shorthand. Can you think of other dead technologies?

I'll bet you are now in the "but what about..." stage:

But what about education? Video can do anything books can do;
well-produced video can do many things better. Which is the better way
to learn about the Civil War -- reading a text for 10 hours or watching
10 hours of Ken Burns' PBS production on the Civil War?

But what about the law? Don't we need the precision implied by written
rules? Perhaps, but wouldn't videos of the original trials, legislative
debates, rulings and precedents be a better guide to future generations
than law books?

Send me your own "but what abouts." But make sure to include your
thoughts about how the 2020world would deal with those situations, too.

Does Emily really need to read and write in 2020world? I don't think
so. Do you?

**************************************************************
* *
* Kurt Dahl is vice president of information technology at *
* The Seattle Times. The views he expresses here are not *
* necessarily those of The Seattle Times Company. *
* *
**************************************************************

SUBSCRIPTION INSTRUCTIONS:

2020world is currently an unmoderated list, however, there are plans to
implement the DIGEST option. All mail sent to this list will be sent to
all other subscribers.

To subscribe, mail to:

majordomo@seatimes.com
and, include in body of text: subscribe 2020world

If you choose not to subscribe, but would like to e-mail me directly with
your comments, my address is:

year2020@seatimes.com

or, call me at:

206-464-3339

or, FAX me at:

206-382-8898

Thanks for taking the time to read this loonnggg e-mail. Please join in
and help us understand the real nature of our world after the information
highway is built. Send your subscription e-mail right now! I'm looking
forward to adding your thoughts to our discussion.

One last request, please forward this invitation to those who you think
would be interested.

Thanks!

Kurt Dahl

----- End Included Message -----




=============================================================
Date: Thu, 29 Sep 94 19:46:35 MDT
From: WHIPLASH
To:Donkey
Subject: a million stories in the naked city


this is my last message from home, unless i get everything packed
up here in my apartment (this won't happen, guaranteed). so this
is the last drunken message you'll be getting from ME for awhile!

hey, here, you can borry my hanky.

it's weird, all day i was in a trance, with vapors rising off the
swamp pools of email i sifted through at the last minute, yet right
there in my "old" life of working the helpdesk at at&t... it was
like a mixture of home movies from somebody else's life, with the
cameraman there shooting it all in real time, watching the movie
and being in it at the same time, in the seat nearest to the
theater's "EXIT" sign. Even now, in my apartment it's like that:
leaving this place, no more morning hungover late drive into work
up I-25 to 120th avenue, no more wandering around my apartment at
night like somebody who's boarding pass tells him "Gate 24" but
the destination on the board behind the snide, smiling attendants
has the wrong name on it--a whole new trip, all wrapped up in fancy
papers with ribbons and a little canary garnish, just a-waitin'
for me to stumble down the paper funnel of the tinsel wrapping and
beat my skinny fists against the box and claim my new birthright...

but what am I doing, rambling? I've got to go pack, I've got to
get organized, and get packed, and get ready for The Big Day at Work
Tomorrow!

Etc.,

robert




=============================================================
Date: Fri, 30 Sep 94 15:11:49 MDT
From: WHIPLASH
To: Donkey
Subject: that's it, i'm outta here

peaceout souldaddies. good luck and all that shit.

love

robert




=============================================================
From: "Merciful Lee Dickens" <DICKENS>
Subject: Reply to Re: Reply to Re: MES
Date: 30 SEP 1994 13:42 -06
To: Donkey
>
Hey, pal, all I have to say is: What's the make and model on that old
piece of shit you drive?

And I'll get all the NA Beer you can choke back, compadre.

EJ


*** Comments from DICKENS; 09/30/94 01:12pm:
I've got two of them and they both need about the same amount of work
and cash to make 'em wanna do right:

76 Camaro - 350 V8 dual carb - needs machineshop work - one of the
pistons is bad (well, the oil seal is) and I need to pull
the manifold and head and change out at least one freeze
plug and might as well replace the other shit that I can
get to once the head is off (gasket & whatever else).

Plus, I need to replace all the front end steering assembly
(including maybe the damn pitman arm - don't know yet).
I need to put a new emergency brake cable on it and have
at least one new hanger put on my right exhaust and replace
the left muffler (it's got a big old hole in it). (That's
Figure about $400 at the very least/$600 probably closer to
reality...


65 Chevy 10 Pickup - straight 6 292 (thereabouts - not even sure)
machineshop work to resurface and correct for warpage in
manifold facing, new bolts, new gaskets, new exhaust, 3-4
hours worth of labor at $47 per, we're talking about the
neighborhood of $300 minimum/$400 more likely.

Now - the truck doesn't have a heater or a turn signal switch (turn
signal switch $105 when last priced a month ago) and winter is on
its way. Smart man might tend to lean toward fixing the Camaro. Hell,
I might, too.

Question: do I spend that much to fix the Camaro or spend just as much
to buy a new 350 V8 engine from Western Auto, uninstalled, and shell
out another $150 or so to have this one installed in my Camaro?

Run go get me that left-handed monkey wrench and another Falstaff.


Don't let the hood hit you in the ass on your way out,
merc

=============================================================
Date: Tue, 20 Dec 1994 07:50:10 -0500 (EST)
Subject: If Nudity Offends, Read No Further...
Sender: Soft Powder and Still Water <00BCPALMER >
To:Donkey

So, how the hell is everybody?

We got an evergreen from a sassy broad who complained that "the shabbier
their clothes, the more they spent, while they're children starved" and
we put mucho mas lights on it and the gold ribbon and new and old and blue.

Just what exactly is happening?

With care, we hung three stockings, quilt-ish, yet cost-friendly, ready for
handfuls of coal, the stray Elmo doll, magnetic letters...

Um, Cynthia, are you? is she? Is everyone okay?

Completely insane yet entrusted with a job,
b<p>

p.s. I told the truth to the government about working and all about a month
ago. Yesterday I got a letter. My benefits (SS) have been *increased*!

Go figure.

Go, Figure! Ooh, baby!

Thank you. Thank you very much.

LIPS

Lips are amazing machines which also represent status in certain cliques.
Man, are you ever out of it if you ain't got no lips.


b "not out of it" pollen

happy winterness