the book i am reading, stimulated the following thoughts. i aim to be a "well-informed" person, whatever that may mean. and i hope to obtain that information in what i consider to be an open minded manner. meaning, when learning about something unfamiliar, no knowledge can be immediately discarded-my strategy is that of a sponge. i begin with the intention of infusing as many different people's points of view and psychologies into my own as i can, until a certain point. when my absorption of information reaches a certain threshold, unavoidably, opinions begin to form. the more well-informed i consider myself to be on a certain subject, the father i feel i have moved from open-mindedness. not that i ever reach a point where i would reject new information or ideas. but i realized that no matter how open i aim to be, how many different sides of the matter i discover and understand, the way i think about something will always be a point of view, the only thing that changes is how broad and/or stable a base those ideas are built on. "i say i am open-minded but what i think is." the reason this struck me was because on some level i had forgotten that every single thing in this whole damn world can be brought back to a matter of opinion. not that i was ever conceited enough to think that i could reach a point where i was truly enlightened on any given matter, but some sort of optimism had developed that somehow one could have a fair? or just? or justified? outlook. and that these people exist or have existed in the world. but i'm no longer sure if that is a defendable statement.

let me preface this sentiment by awkwardly pushing my glasses up the bridge of my nose with my forefinger. the new send feature/column in azureus 2.5.0.0? one click and you can send a torrent file by email, blog, or web page. SO FUCKING COOL. good work, guys. damn the man! save the empire!

Apparantly the cosmic combination of a blue star and some sort of smaller celestial object with a high density of matter (neutron star or a black hole?) is turning light into gamma rays. In other words, creating matter where none previously existed. (The picture is a computer simulation of the pair of bodies, collectively name microquasar LS5039. )

Upon stepping over the threshold of the Jersey City DMV last week, I was immediately greeted by this poster. It is a little known fact that a large part of the pervailing sense of hopelessness and impenetrable bureacracy that exists in these buildings is maintained by strict prohibition of bicycles.