I remember when this song first came out how distinctly it sounded old school in a fresh sort of way. I think it struck everyone that way. Gotye sampled Seville by Luiz Bonfá which perhaps gave the song that seed.

The reason the song was and is so good is because it gives you that classic space, which is the one thing lacking in today's music. I know it's a cliche to talk about how all the music today sucks. If the cliche is not entirely true it is certainly partly true, and it's because the music lacks this sense of space, of giving the listener space. Every single second has to be slicked up and overcrowded with production values, and in all of it, where is the one person doing the math? Nowhere.

That's why I like Aphex Twin. I don't actually listen to electronica in general, but with Richard James, even in the pieces of his I don't like there's always this sense that he has done his math, and the math is in the composer's listening. There is the sense of space, and of things in their right place. If you listen to the song by Gotye you can understand it's the space that gives the song its intensity, its captivating quality.

If any organically grown food is worth the extra cost, it is apples. Or if you can find a farm/orchard that grows them using just the dormant sulphur/oil spray that is fine too.

A sincere injunction. Even if you are not into buying organic stuff and don't even go for fruits or vegetables. Make cleanly grown apples a part of your daily diet.

When you eat the apple - at least one a day - make especially sure to eat the seeds - the entire apple core. But make sure you chew the seeds before swallowing them, otherwise they will just pass through your system.

Do not pay attention to the idiotic parrots on the internet who mindlessly blabber about how apple seeds "contain cyanide" - LOL - and therefore should be avoided.

Let's repeat: eat organically grown apples everyday. Eat the seeds in the apple, chewing them well. Tell anyone who says to you "Oh, apple seeds contain cyanide" to eff off.

*

Also tell that to people who say, "Oh, figs have worms". People are so stupid. Any fruit that has gone overripe can and may likely have the larva of the fruit fly in it. This is especially true of overripe cherries and blackberries. You will know when a fruit is overripe, past its prime.

In fact, there is a smell the fruit will have that will tell you it has SWD - Spotted Wing Drosophila. And by the way, as an aside, while no one wants to eat the fruit fly larva, ultimately it really is only protein. It will not breed inside you. In other words, it will not "give you worms".

You want to know how this bullshit started with the fig? It's not because they have worms. In fact, they are less likely to have the fruit fly larva than other fruits. You want to know what happened? Some dumb schmoe opened up a spoiled fig that naturally had the fruit fly larva, and what did he see that sparked his imagination? Ever look at the inside of a fresh fig? The whole inside bears a certain resemblance to worms. (Though really to anyone who is more diligent and clear in his imagination the inside of the fig bears a certain fertile representation of sperms making their way to some nucleus.) Thus was born the whole stupid parrot fest about figs containing worms.

*

"Oh, you shouldn't plant bee-loving plants where children are going to be playing." LOL. People parrot this ignorant bullshit as though having plants that bees love near where children are going to be playing is the same as putting hives of bees and wasps there. Bees are never more safe to be around as when they are foraging nectar and pollen from blossoms. A single stray bee is more dangerous than an entire host that is busy at work on some flowering plant. And a host of bees busy on some flowering plant does not make for any strays, because they have found flowers, and are therefore occupied.

*

"Oh, putting coffee grounds into the soil will turn it acidic" - LOL. "Oh, you shouldn't bury meat or bones with your scraps in the garden" - LOL. "Oh, drinking raw milk will make you sick" - LOL. "Oh, the police in helicopters will descend on your garden if you grow opium poppies" - LOL.

*

"Oh, wild pigs are rapidly multiplying in Canada - they're taking over!" - LOL.

I'm all for that. Sounds like lots of free food to me, and delicious food, thanks to Global Warming. If they become that invasive the government can simply say, "Go out and kill. Take and eat."

But I can imagine the Pork Industry wouldn't like that very much. They would spawn a whole lot of official-sounding bullshit on the public about how wild pigs contain cyanide and worms and will eat children and the cops will come and get you and shit.

*

"Oh, this plant is seeding itself all over the garden - it's invasive!" - LOL.

Listen, I'm from the Pacific Northwest where the temperate rainforest climate is very conducive for invasive species, both flora and fauna. I know invasive. A plant seeding itself - or even aggressively seeding itself - does not make it invasive, alright? Be happy, and thankful, that you don't have to deal with horsetail, creeping buttercup, Himalayan blackberry, morning glory, Japanese knotweed, et alia - yes.

Be happy. And eat apples and the apple seeds.

Fake Site News and the Neo Pharisaical Inquisition

Great post here by Scott Eric Alt:

So what we have here—do I understand this right?—is a case where no clarification could possibly be enough because Schneider has already decided before any of it that the document is heretical. If Pope Francis says, “No, I meant this,” Schneider just says, “Oh, then it’s a contradiction.”

H/T: Austen Ivereigh

Game of Thrones is over?

Huh, imagine that.

(revisited)
 
Title: Skeleton above the Falls

Medium: Oil on masonite

Size: 10 in x 14 in

Build Bridges, not Walls

"Last month, nearly 100,000 people crossed our border illegally. Ask yourself, is this sustainable? How can we absorb so many people?" --Dan Crenshaw

Interesting to see right-wing conservatives wholeheartedly embracing the myth of overpopulation in a bid to defend their anti-immigration stance.

Very interesting. Very interesting.

And duly noted.

Title: Girl/Woman

Medium: Oil on canvas

Dimensions: 16 in x 20 in

Always remember...

Absolutists are the absolute worst relativists.

Over and out!

Give me rhubarb or give me death

The smell of freshly cut rhubarb has a warm place in my memory bank.

Now remember this.

Rhubarb is the vegetable that is always more fruit than the tomato.

Tomato is the fruit that is always more vegetable than rhubarb.

If you have rhubarb, brown sugar, flour, and butter, then put them together and bake until bubbling.

Do I need to mention to have it with cream?

Anyways, Good D. lets me have her rhubarb.

That she uses gasoline to kill weeds in the garden beds doesn't bother me in the least.

LOL.

Oh and stop it with the "rhubarb leaves are poisonous" rubbish, please. They are not poisonous. The stalks have in them what the leaves have in them. The leaves just have a much more concentrated amount. And your kidneys won't like it. So considering that, water is "poison" if you drink too much of it.

A True Shepherd of the Sheep

Just grateful to God for this Pope. The Church exists today.

Your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

I love the Church today - that one can read and hear what the Pope says daily. I appreciate that I'm not holed away in some far flung colonial frontier age in which you hardly even knew who the Pope was. God seems to enrich the riches He has poured out, while pouring new riches in surprising ways, richer than we could ever come up with or imagine; more connected, more conducive and cohesive, always regaining, and never losing, their true vitality. He's not interested in "pat" - or order for order's sake. How much more of a magnification the Ordinary Form of the Mass is in structure than the Extraordinary Form, yet without nullifying the Extraordinary Form!

Is Game of Thrones any good?

I have my serious doubts.

I have been hounded with two questions for quite some time. One of them is, "When are you going to get a cell phone?"

The other one is, "You haven't watched a single episode of Game of Thrones?!"

"You need to get a cell phone."

"You have to watch Game of Thrones."

And so on.

So I did get a cell phone - not through purchasing, but just by waiting, hand-me-down from family. Now I just need to get a SIM card for it, and use of the cell phone would only be for certain, strict, bare minimum functions.

Of course, getting that SIM card for the phone...LOL.

Why not just stick the SIM card in the wrist and be done with it?

And I did watch an episode of Game of Thrones! Not because I wanted to, but because I was at a family due, some weeks ago, and they were chomping to watch Game of Thrones, so I watched it with them, knowing I would be lost for not having seen anything previous - though I could gather from the one episode what the refrains are throughout the series.

The main thing that struck me while watching it was, "Why are they constantly talking in severe gravel undertones like Christian Bale's Batman? Are they trying to ruin their vocal cords or something? Huh, this is kind of bizarre."

Aside from that, I'm pretty sure the whole series is sort of plodding, second rate solemnity and generic neo-Medievalist storytelling punctuated with Professional Grade, five-star fornication that conveniently produces no babies.

And I saw from the trailer that the series has dragons. From what I could tell, they are all evil dragons.

"What", said I, "You mean there's no good luck dragons in this show? That is most unfortunate."

Somewhere

Index of Unreliable News Websites

Lifesitenews made it onto the Index of Unreliable News Websites.

Excellent!

H/T: Fr. Martin