Lovecraft on Astrophysics: Yog Sothoth Found At Center of the Milky Way!!!

...the last, utter sweep which has no confines and which outreaches fantasy and mathematics alike.

From the direct statement of CNN.com:

German astronomers say they have discovered conclusive proof of a supermassive black hole at the heart of the galaxy.

...or the poetic musings of MSNBC.com:

Like ballerinas pirouetting around an invisible leader, a collection of stars orbits our galaxy's gravity sink, or black hole. New infrared images of the cosmic dance confirm that this supermassive black hole weighs as much as 4 million suns.

...only a congeries of iridescent globes, yet stupendous in its malign suggestiveness.

Yog-Sothoth knows all and sees all. To "please" this deity could bring knowledge of many things.

The study also enabled astronomers to calculate the distance of the earth from the center of the galaxy, now measured to be 27,000 light-years, and enhanced by six times the accuracy to which they were able to measure the positions of stars -- the equivalent of seeing a one euro coin from a distance of 10,000 kilometers (6,214 miles).

It seems that The Beyond One, The Gate Where the Hemispheres Meet is granting us some knowledge after all.

Viral Story

Okay, so this is what I'm taking part in, and here is the previous chapter (both chapters, actually). After the whole "serious scribbler" thingy, I've tried to shy away, but this looks like fun. Here endeth the intro...

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I could feel my heart beating in what felt like my throat, and I began to sweat again, reflexively wiping it up before it reached my electric eye. The eye that seemed like such a good idea after that horrifically ricocheting Yachtzee die two years ago claimed the one I was born with. The eye that got me into this sanity-draining predicament in the first place.

It was just this morning that I was presenting my proposal for my doctorate in theoretical physics, explaining how the inadvertent discovery of zero-mass gravitons at the Large Hadron Collider makes possible the existence of black holes that are mere "portals" - rips in space-time without gravitic influence - to other dimensions, presenting theory and a proposed re-engineering of my electric eye that could detect the EM spectrum emissions surrounding these portals and anything from the "other side" that could exist here. The reaction of the board members was less than encouraging. They jumped upon each other's attacks, like sharks on a bloody chum-bucket. "This is so underdeveloped, seriously, how much time did you take on this?" ... "We don't deal in such pseudo-science" ... "You do realize this is a secretarial junior college, don't you?" All except for the leering silence on the fourth board member. A mister "A. L. Hazred", who simply watched as I dejectedly gathered my work and walked out.

Two hours later Mr. Hazred called. He told me he found my proposal interesting, he would love to see my eye developed to its full potential, and he had pulled some strings and got me a seat on the graduate staff of Miskatonic University in the Department of Theoretical Paranormal Studies. I told him I wasn't interested, I'd just burned that piece of shit proposal and what the hell is Miskatonic University anyway. He said there was a more than generous research grant waiting for me at the university, as well as a ticket on the 1:15 bus to Arkham at the bus station. I have until tonight to get to the university, someone at Arkham will show me to the university. If I was not on the bus I would not hear from him again, but it would be such a shame and waste my talent if a shoggoth were to ooze out of the overhead ventilation of my apartment and decapitate me. It was just about then I heard a faint piping coming from the crapper. I bolted. No coat, and only the aforementioned wallet, nine-volt, pen and paper that I keep slung across my ass in my trusty fanny pack during every waking minute of the day. I made the bus with minutes to spare, without even time to grab a bottle of water after my hectic run across cold, slushy streets. My mouth and throat were parched. I needed a drink. I wondered if I might get any relief from the foetid, eldritch goo that was seeping out of the box. I fought off the thought. But I needed to drink. I stared again at the puddle. Grants. Waiting for me. How much? Who? Where? Arkham is not a nice place, I'm told. What am I doing here? What am I doing here?

"What am I doing here?!?!" I found myself croaking, almost too loud, as I snapped out of my my skyline-induced trance and instinctively looked at the closest face - it's face as fortune would have it. It emanated a brief sound that sounded somewhere between a cough, a grunt and a wet fart.

"Ooourglphghprblbl ... yew ookay, sonny?"

"Huh? Oh, yeah, thanks," I toed the box again as I wiped his cheap-whiskey-and-rotting-marine-life-smelling spittle from my lower lip, "hey, how easy is it to get to the university from the terminal?"

It looked me up and down for a brief moment, it's neutral facial expression broken only by a tentacled appendage pushing a Riccola cough drop past his slavering, putrescent lips. It sighed briefly, turned, and lurched its way back to the front of the bus. I felt waves of exhaustion coming up through my body and into my head, along with a frantic, panicky nausea. My hearing grew fuzzy, the gross, ululating murmurings of the other passengers fading and white noise, ever so faint at first, growing, becoming louder, as my skin seemed to vibrate into concentrated gooseflesh, a dark tunnel enclosing my view of the bus as my vision failed me and my oxygen-depleted brain, leaving me only vaguely aware of a dim glow in my right eye socket as my eye shut down.

I sat bolt upright in a freezing cold bus, my billowing breath - the first thing I noticed in the dim light coming in from the bus lot - wrapping itself over the top of the seat in front of me, along the windows, and into the darkness of a now empty bus. How long had I been out? Where had It, the miniskirted maniac, and the rest of the degenerate, vaguely fishy-looking occupants gone? I felt my pockets again. The wallet and battery were still there.

As I rose up, I kicked something solid and heard it skid across the floor. It was the tentacled spawn, now out of its box, the watery ooze now freezing into a slushy ice in the cold. Looking quickly through the seats I found a small plastic shopping bag left by another passenger. Dumping out the contents I saw a half-eaten granola bar and a pair of nail clippers encrusted with some dark, fibrous material. I pocketed the clippers, maneuvered the bag over the half-frozen thing, and slunk out of the bus into the abandoned terminal - cold, exhausted, and unsure of where exactly I was or where I was going.

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Here endeth the chapter.

Hmmm...a few creative writers - Briwei, DrMomentum, Dawn. (I know at least one of you doesn't care for these, so no biggie...you can kick me next time I see you if you want.)

Randall, thanks for this.

Commemorations and Great Men

So today was a pretty busy day for me; my calendar looked like this:

1130 am - 3 pm Toys for Tots brunch, Charlestown Navy Yard
1200 pm - 1230 pm Pearl Harbor Commemoration on a ex-USS CASSIN YOUNG
2 pm - 3 pm Pearl Harbor Commemoration, Faneuil Hall
4 pm Christmas Tree Lighting, Charlestown Navy Yard

My plan was to hit the brunch, drop off toys and glad-hand, head to the first commemoration (CASSIN YOUNG is on the Navy Yard) and slip back to the brunch for another mimosa or two before I had to head to Faneuil Hall.

The weather shot my plans in the ass a little. The first snow of the year here in Boston came today; as the decks of CASSIN YOUNG were getting slick, and there were going to be some elderly Pearl Harbor survivors at the ceremony, it was delayed 30 minutes and moved indoors, and then move back to the ship for a wreath laying. Great - no mimosas. It doesn't matter, it's the kids and the survivors that matter today.

At the Toys for Tots brunch I ran into the first of two remarkable people. His name is Rudy. I was excited to go to the brunch because I knew he'd be there. To meet him is to meet a thoroughly pleasant, smiling and jovial old man, still in is USMC Sergeant Major's uniform - one that has a Silver Star and three Purple Hearts on it, as well as a master parachutist and diver's pin. To know his story is amazing; I once heard it from him when he spoke at a memorial event. His first landing was at this hellish place known as Iwo Jima. There he received his first Purple Heart. His second landing (and Purple Heart) was at Inchon. He was also at Hue City and Khe-Sanh, and got his third Purple Heart in there somewhere. Dunno' where he got his Silver Star; you just don't ask people where they get them. I made this mistake once; I was a young midshipman, and during "Marine Week" in summer training I asked a grizzled old Colonel where he got his. He looked at me and smiled, "Well son, this one time I got my ass in a crack and had to pry it out." I remember he smoked a pipe, but kept it upside down. He was more open about this, "That way I can smoke in the rain."

Okay, so back to Rudy. Between WWII and Vietnam he has 30 years of service and retires. He then spends the next 20 working security at U.S. embassies across the globe. And finally, when he's done doing that, he retires again and spends his time doing Toys for Tots. I wish I had a picture of this man. I can only guess the horrors he has seen and lived through in supporting and defending the Constitution, and all the stress and trauma he has been through. Yet he is just the happiest, kindest and most upbeat and caring person you could meet. Old but spry, you can tell he's a Marine for life. To me, he is an example of service. He had every right after WWII to say "I'm done America, and now I'm going to live my life secure in the confidence that I have done my part".

So, I drop off my toys, have a quick bite, the mimosa line was too long, and I head to the CASSIN YOUNG Pearl Harbor Memorial. There I run into another man I've met several times before. His name is Don, and he's a survivor of the attack on Pearl Harbor. He had just joined the Navy and had been stationed on Ford Island for about a month before the attack. In the two years I have been going to these memorials, he's brought up some interesting stories. If Rudy is spry, Don is the opposite; he's hobbled and slowing down and he knows that his "turn" is coming soon. But he's out here every year, running this memorial. The most moving part of the memorial for me was shaking his hand after wreaths were laid taps was played; he extended his hand and said, "I'm sorry about my eyes. Taps always does that to me." I could see the tears behind his glasses and running down his face. I told him it was okay; it's nothing to be sorry about. He also spoke at Faneuil Hall, giving the same remarks, but it was just as interesting to hear them again. It saddens me that as the years pass, less and less attention seems to be paid to this event.

The Christmas Tree lighting was fun.

Okay, it's bed time. But before I go, I'd like to talk about Toys for Tots one more time. Initially, it was intended that the Marines would actually work in Santa's Workshop for part of the year. It didn't work too well. There is early video of these failures:

Songs So Cheesy I Had To Put Them On My iPod 4

Wow...it's early. I need to be in bed. But oh well. I also needed (wanted) to get this done!

Even though it's advent, I still don't want to get into the cheesy Christmas spirit just yet. Instead, I wanted to do something VERY METAL.

As well as from the UK, just like Viv here. First, I have to state - I FUCKEN' LOVE THIS BAND. I have seen them twice (long, long ago) and they blew me away. They always had a great way of taking literature (Samuel Taylor Colleridge, Frank Herbert, Alfred Lord Tennyson), history (Battle of Balaclava, Battle of Britain) and Egyptian Mythology (Horus / Osiris) and turning out beautiful, overpowering, epic head-banging tunes.

And then there was the time they took on Greek mythology. They came out with a freakin' awesome song, but took a great amount of liberty with the story - as they are entitled to do. So really, I guess I don't have any complaints about this song. It's not really that cheesy. I just wanted to put some Iron Maiden on my mix.


Yeah, baby! That banner is The Trooper, but the song I'm posting is The Flight of Icarus.





Lyrics | Iron Maiden - Flight of icarus lyrics

And hey! With an epitaph like that, Maiden NEEDS to be on this site!


I want to come back as Eddie after I die...

Lose Your Virginity To A Whopper

Get your mind out of the gutter...no pr0n here. But pr0n might actually be more palatable than this unbelievably fucktarded bullshit.

Hey. I like a whopper every now and then. Especially with bacon and cheese. And if you could stuff a chicken breast fillet in there as well, you'd have the perfect trifecta of cooked meat on one bun! But I honestly don't give a rat's ass what a Croatian goat shaver thinks of it.

America says they are tired of the world knowing us only by our bombs. That includes grease-bombs.

Self Interest Wins the Day

So a close, long-time friend of mine poses a question on Facebook - to paraphrase:

Do you expect people to do the right thing and be disappointed when they don't, or expect people to be bastards and be pleasantly surprised when they do the right thing?

As you can imagine, answers were numerous and interesting. Replies ranged from positive to negative to non-judgemental to absolute moral relativism. Then there was my response, "Expect the right thing and ensure no good deed goes unpunished." I wrote it mostly because I was thinking very hard about this and I didn't want to write a book on this Facebook comment, so I was somewhat tongue in cheek.

I fall squarely in the first category. I expect the right thing to be done, and I'm perpetually disappointed when so many people don't do it. The more I think of it, the more this flies in the face of what I know of human behavior.

As Dr. Perry Cox says,

"Lady, people aren't chocolates. D'you know what they are mostly? Bastards. Bastard-coated bastards with bastard filling. But I don't find them half as annoying as I find naive bubble-headed optimists who walk around vomiting sunshine."

Well, maybe not. People are organisms. Organisms compete. To quote Michael Pollan, "All life is competition". Actually I'm leaving out "...for energy" because I don't want this to run off on a tangent about energy; it'll have enough tangents as it is. But to paraphrase him, plants compete for solar energy, herbivores compete for the plant energy, predators compete for the herbivores, blah blah blah. In other words, organisms are programmed to compete for what they need to survive.

In the case of us so-called "higher organisms" we compete with each other to satisfy our self-interests.

Man is fundamentally self-interested. I believe people do things largely out of self-interest. Even so-called "unselfish" acts have an element of self-interest. The unselfish actor feels that it is in his or her self-interest to do something for someone else, whether it directly affects or improves his/her well being / situation, or it provides a level of satisfaction knowing that you did something for someone.

When self-interests coincide and the individuals can (roughly) agree, they become a code of conduct of sorts, a law, a rule, an ethos, an ideology, what have you. They become "good" or "right".

So there it is - "right" or "good", an artificial classification of the self-interest of one or common interests of a group of highly evolved primates. If you're lucky, you get to be in a group that agrees on common interests and provides adequate room for you to pursue your self-interests.

Urgh. Dangerous ground. So I'll come out and say I am not into "relativism" and this "who am I to judge what is good just because I don't agree with it". These artificial classifications are necessary. How else would you know who the bastards were?

What's my point? I'm not sure, let me re-read what I wrote. Nope. Don't see one yet. I could go on forever but I need to wrap up, so I'll just say this - I don't think we'll ever overcome this "programming". So why am I constantly disappointed? Maybe my programming is better, and people really are bastards.

I Have Some Work to Do

In trying to set goals and a future vision for Cthulhu's Family Restaurant, I first decided to assess where I am at. I used a scientific set of analysis tools to obtain a snapshot of where I am.

Specifically, I used:

Typealyzer - a tool to analyze the writing on a website and return a (rough) Myers-Briggs Type Indicator of the author (h/t @drmomentum), and

Gematriculator - a tool to analyze just how evil a website is (h/t Randall).

Cthulhu would not be happy.

Apparently, Typealizer returned an MBTI of:

ESFP (Performer): The entertaining and friendly type. They are especially attuned to pleasure and beauty and like to fill their surroundings with soft fabrics, bright colors and sweet smells. They live in the present moment and don´t like to plan ahead - they are always in risk of exhausting themselves.

The enjoy work that makes them able to help other people in a concrete and visible way. They tend to avoid conflicts and rarely initiate confrontation - qualities that can make it hard for them in management positions.

(Author's note - of all the MBTI's I've had done in the last 5 years, I've never been an SF - I've come out NF, strongly. This could indicate the test can't tell S from N, or it could...COULD be the result of me using NaBloPoMo to put more "thinking" into my writing, hence de-emphasizing the "N" in my personality, which is quite strong. Enough psycho-B.S. back to the issue at hand!)

And the picture accompanying the ESFP analysis is:


Holy crap! Dread Cthulhu is an apparently intoxicated bar-fly in a skirt and "CFM" boots? Like this?


Azathoth save us...this is not good.












Oh, and if that were not enough, here's the "Evil" score:


Crap. Now Azathoth definitely will not save us. 31%?!?! Well, I can actually deal with that better; Cthulhu, a cosmic force to be reckoned with, is only "evil" by humanity's standards - in reality, humanity is just a pawn (at best) in his larger scheme of cosmic warfare. We are simply here to either be enslaved of trampled altogether. Still, that evil score must be upped.

And for that, I need a domination plan. And for the domination plan, I went to Darksites.com for their Evil Plan Generator - bwahahahahaha!!! (h/t Electronic Replicant)

Congratulations on being the creator of a new
Evil Plan (tm)!

Your objective is simple: Soul Accumulation.

Your motive is a little bit more complex: So another race can take over

Stage One

To begin your plan, you must first devour a military general. This will cause the world to slaughter a sacred calf to appease the gods, terrified by your arrival. Who is this nightmare beyond comprehension? Where did they come from? And why do they look so good wearing the skin of another human?

Stage Two

Next, you must seize control of the pacific ocean. This will all be done from a underground secret headquarters of doom, a mysterious place of unrivaled dark glory. Upon seeing this, the world will gibber like madmen, as countless hordes of cultists hasten to do your every bidding.

Stage Three

Finally, you must reveal to the world your armies of destruction, bringing about an end to sanity. Your name shall become synonymous with the spice girls, and no man will ever again dare interrupt your sentences. Everyone will bow before your supreme might, and the world will have no choice but to make you their new god.

I think Lovecraft, were he alive today, would certainly find the Spice Girls synonymous with the insanity and destruction that Cthulhu could bring.

So there I have it - properly executed, this should change that uncomfortably elvish, mildly evil internet booty-call into a full blown, mountainous and horrific visage of insanity and destruction, ready to unleash an evil upon humanity not seen since the Posh Bob.