So Long To 2012!

Well I'm back up here and ready to write some more exciting blog posts. My surgery went very well, much better than the last surgery I had before, and for this I'm thankful. I knew it would go alright but I'll admit I was a little apprehensive as the complications of the last surgery had left a sour taste in my mouth, just all around bad memories from waking up in the intensive care unit and staying in the hospital for longer than expected. Now I have the feeling of winter cabin fever but I guess it's better being down and out in the winter than summer. I've had summer surgeries and sometimes those are not pleasant recovering from being shut inside while the weather outside is warm and sunny. I ventured out a few days ago but came back, my insides felt odd and I was feeling a little short of breath. Much of this time recovering has been spent cleaning dried blood from myself, finding and removing tape, patches hospital bands and electrodes that are no longer needed. My free time is pretty simple, sleep, lounge around, stay warm, play music, browse the computer, work with the camera, take care of any indoor small jobs to get done when I feel like it, eat, drink juice, and take the pills I've been prescribed.

I've got a nice temporary early morning predawn ritual going now. I get up before sunrise, go to the kitchen to have refreshing drink, take my 3 medications and chase it down with an Ensure protein shake. The protein shake helps really disperse the meds throughout my body. I go back to the bedroom, light some incenses or candles (smoke 'em if I got 'em) check what's happening in the outside world on the computer do any work that can be done from there, (if you call it work). Then kick back feet up, back in a corner on the bed laying nestled in a giant pile of pillows. By this point I've either got a guitar out or a warm furry cat sprawled across my lap in a nice mellow strung out vicoden daze. It's relaxing but it's getting a little old. On that note I'll be excited for this first coming week of 2013, I'll get to do my follow up appointment with the surgeon. Maybe they will remove the gear that I can't remove yet, perhaps lift restrictions on what I can't be doing for now. I'm under restrictions to avoid infections and they don't want me doing something that will put stitches, tape, or large dried blood areas at risk. I guess I've already lost some blood so I need to take time to replenish that. So this sort of puts the kabosh on showering too much or getting out, I hate being housebound but I guess if there's a time of year for it, this is it. At least that means the less exposure to the dry winter conditions outside, less frigid unforgiving temps to deal with, and less chapped skin.

What all this means is my New Year's is very mellow and low key but that's no big deal. No drinking and mixing with medical drugs is not my thing anyway. Just some relaxing family time and alone time, the fondue pot has come out, fondue is good.

In reflection on a few notable events of 2012, I took an awesome road trip to Montana on my own, started my first blog, joined the ranks of Gibson guitar players, worked hard, had a career path change, received an IMDb credit from an indie movie I was in a couple years ago, began some serious spelunking/subterranean adventures. It was eventful, like every year I'm left with saying well "It could have been better" - I got to believe 2013 gets better. In 2012 I laid the ground work for a number of things, revamped my life organization skills, re-adjusted myself, revised what I use to get things done, became far more organized for the future, that was my big resolution last year and it's largely been realized. My resolution for this next year is to put myself back on track with what I've practiced, honed my skills on, anticipated, been trained for. I need to use these to the optimum while pursuing and completing some other endeavors I have going. For one, after this last surgery I'd say my medical challenges are now in the 90% or better completion range. My hope is in 2013 I'll put the finishing touches on the medical related needs, complete them and never look back. This will free up a large portion of my budget and open doors to many other possibilities. I'm thrilled. I know I still have much that I want to strive way harder than before and deliver more potential than before.

For those reading this post tonight, have a happy wonderful awesome fantastic new year and here's to 2013 bound to be way better than 2012. Remember, you can make it happen! It could be worse or better, I'm gonna strive to make it better every time I get the chance.

Be safe out there as this is a peak night of the year for traffic accidents. Drinking, sadly combined with too many people jumping behind the wheel who don't realize their limits leads to too much heartbreak. If your sober please, drive safely.. if your in doubt, sit it out! Get a designated driver if you can find one. Stay inside and crash at your party host's house or crash on a couch or wherever is safe, just don't crash in an automobile on the icy winter roads. I'm sure they'll understand. Be safe, have fun and have a Happy New Year's Eve!

Surgery Day

I just wanted to inform my readers that I may be taking a little break in my blogging here for a day or two, or three, perhaps less as I spring back very quick. I'm going into a surgery later today so I might be out and down for a little while. This is not much to worry about, I've had surgeries all my life. This one is significant but relatively minor in comparison, I'm happy it's not like the last one. Last one was some ten hours under anesthesia, higher risk of complications which did occur. I unexpectedly found myself in the intensive care unit for a little over 3 days after coming out, there was a lot of bleeding, phenomena, collapsed lungs and breathing problems. That was the the biggest one in my life, the one that put me into uncharted territory as far as I ever wanted to go. I experienced many wild things that in all my surgeries I'd never experienced before, many things I've yet told anybody the full extent of. It certainly left me with new outlook on life burned into my memory. One thing about it, before that last surgery I had a gut feeling about something an unlike others in the past I was nearly a nervous breakdown before it happened. Yes, every surgery there's a little nervousness but after so many it gets routine except for ones like the last, then even those are hard to comprehend for somebody that's had a lifetime of medical operations under their belt. Fortunately I don't have anything like that feeling right now. I cringe a little at the needle parts despite having a lifetime of surgical needles put in my arm and cringe a little at that walk from the waiting room down the cold hallway to the operation bed or table. Then there's always that last glance at people and gazing at the walls and ceiling before I completely black out. Then the recovery room next, where they better damn well remove the catheter before I wake, I hate those things! Right before the surgery last time I spent my time in the waiting room joking, laughing and smiling. It's the best I could do to calm myself. I listened to country music on my MP3 player as it was very calming. I remember high on my play list of songs was the music of The Band Perry and other genres of mainly calming acoustic music. Anybody that knows me knows I listen to just about everything, and I mean just about everything, my musical tastes and appreciation range all over yet the acoustic set the atmosphere of the last surgery, maybe this one too.

I want to write about what I found Wyoming ASAP, you don't want to miss it.. it was of a rather prehistoric nature, I believe.

That's all, wish me luck and I wish my readers best of luck in whatever endeavors or challenges they face today.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas & Happy Holidays to all who are reading this! I've got some exciting things to report from the my Wyoming desert, winter expedition but I'll save that for on here shortly in a few days.

As for now I wanted to rave and give a big time shout out about Cannon cameras.

The big thing I got this year was a EOS Rebel TO3, this camera kicks butt! I'm very grateful for this as it's just the thing I've been looking for. I've been scrapping along for years using an old Kodak Easy Share V570 dual lens. I won't knock it, the V570 was an incredible camera in it's time. I got mine in early 2006 (maybe one of the first models out) and it was and still is a charm for ease of use and quality for a little pocket camera. It seemed ahead of it's time at one point, it preceded the Nikon Cool Pix craze of the mid/late 2000's. In my humble opinion the V570 I had was doing a better job than many of the Cool Pix cameras floating around out there amongst people I knew that were using Cool Pixs. It was better to me on so many points. It is the most user friendly interface camera I've ever used, it was more compact than the Cool Pix and it put out clearer shots from what I could compare. It had an accurate and up to the second read out on it's screen of what was captured. The V570  Captured motion shots with ease, was quick to get to and could sport a heck of a zoom for a compact pocket camera. One of the best components of that little mighty camera was the Carl Zeiss lenses it sported, Zeiss being a world standard in often the best flippin' lenses made on the planet. Someday not long from now I'll furnish pictures of my old V570 on here, it may be either in one or in it's current state, a bit of a project sprawled out in pieces on a table. On an adventure this last fall I sadly dropped it in some tunnels at the bottom of a missile base I was exploring. The tunnels are partially flooded. I quickly pulled the camera out of the water and when I got home, immediately disassembled it to let the components dry and I'm hoping when I re-assemble it, it'll work. I like that little camera and while the best modern tablets and smart phones are just now beginning to rival the quality of pictures it took, and this camera has been outdated by successor V series models Kodak made, the V570 still has potential as an easy to grab little pocket camera, I know I'm stuck in the past, but this is where the new Cannon comes in!

The new Cannon Rebel will hopefully last longer, for sure some of the first things on my to-do list is to acquire some UV protection lenses to cover the each set of lens, I got a strap with the Rebel but for sure I'm gonna need to get the belt holster. They make quick, easy to get to belt holsters for these which is swcheeet! That would be ideal, before I go climbing around anymore dark spooky places that are flooded, using a holster to protect and keep it in place is a must and further more using a strap just in case it were to fall from the holster would be an added safeguard.. then I'm gonna want to find a good camera bag for it that would be padded and made for extreme conditions, between mountain climbing, wading rivers, exploring caves, going into subterranean tunnels, repelling on ropes, all that crazy stuff I best find optimal protection for "Teh hand Cannon."

I'm totally stoked, there's so much I'm finding on this Rebel that's blowing my mind, with it I also got an extra high capacity storage card, and a second lens, a telephoto lens. The features are abound, numerous functions, fully adjustable shutter speed, aperture, and timing settings. Manual and auto focus, stabilizer. Too much to mention really, I'm still discovering much. One of the best things is it's a pro-grade digital camera that really feels like a camera should. I've been shooting digital cameras for a decade now, as a kid I use to shoot with my grandfather's 35 mm Nikon before I got access to digital. the Nikon was a great camera, so were all the other old film cameras I had access to. Two things the early digital could not do, had poor image pixel quality, I think we all know this and number 2, you could not feel the shot, there was and ever present vibration from the shutter and a "click" the film cameras had which digital could not recreate, until now that is. This Rebel has that beautiful feel to the shots, it's reminiscent an old film Hasselblad feeling, the 'blad had a little more energy to the feeling but this Cannon has more natural smooth follow through shot feel.

Jeez, I could rave about this all day. So as the reader your probably asking what this all means. Well I'll tell you, this means much higher quality, better pixels, more stunning in focus, lifelike definition photos are coming right at you on this blog. I'm dying for a chance to get back to Glacier National National Park sometime because the photos I shot were with the V570, those were alright, some good, for just a little pocket camera.. this well, I suspect me and the Rebel would make a real big dent! So here's a little taste of what this Rebel is capable of. Lookout! Prepare for visual sensory overload!

This is using the telephoto lens standing on the other side of the house! The outside temperature on the thermometer is not displayed, the wire is broke (darn 20 plus year old thermometers breaking!) but I could read the inside temperature as 63 degrees.



Suddenly this camera and my eye for the shot is bringing out the cat's expression in haunting clarity.

 Advante-garde absolute definition. I've been wow'ed!



Looking out a window at night. Probably hard to tell I was inside with this shot.

Perfect timing this year, many years we don't get snow on Christmas or if we have a snowy Christmas, it's a slush mess and ice storm in the days proceeding Christmas. Here it's coming down right on cue and began falling just after sundown on Christmas Eve, you can't ask for better timing from old man weather.

Muppet (the dog) bathing Smudge (the cat).

 

Another shot with the telephoto, from the other side of the kitchen.

From another part of the house, zoomed in on an old guitar in the family room. I can read the label on the inside of the guitar, better yet, this is not even full zoom, I can zero in on the part of the label alone, just then you would not know what your looking at, I backed out enough so it can be seen that it's a guitar. This is uber cool, it's like the SR-71 Blackbird of telephoto capable cameras, actually I know there's way stronger telephoto lenses out there, I'll probably add more to this rig but this is seriously cool stuff.. and yes the Blackbird is reference to the super sonic super duper secret American spy plane the US Air Force flew in the 1960's, a piece of technology so insanely ahead of it's time, it could allegedly read the date off a penny from some insane altitude many miles above the earth (not sure if I believe that one or if that's a myth) but you get my jest. The telephoto on this camera has some awesome potential.

How's this for checking to see if the food is done? I'm not anywhere near the microwave. I'm more than halfway across the house!

 

These were some of the better shots, as with anything new like this, there's a fine art to honing the skill and getting into the zone with this piece of gear. I love the auto focus feature but much of this I'm doing on my own as well, turning the auto off and doing my best to manually obtain clean results. It's like the old days with film cameras, I can remember carefully focusing by turning the lens and gradually dialing in on the wheels and knobs. Flashbacks in my mind to the old 35mm in the 1990's, adjusting every last thing, bring the subject into focus, steady, breath, wait for it... exhale and press the button. Now I can resume the fine science of tweaking aperture and shutter settings, adding my own signature effects on greater levels than I was ever equipped with in the past. I'll paint with light something fierce now.

This blows everything away from before, I've shot many cameras but this is now my favorite and it kicks ass! I know I'll capture some amazing stuff with this. I'm already going- "I need to make a list.. Arches and Canyon Lands National Parks in Utah, Glacier in Montana, Bridger Tetons and Yellowstone in Wyoming!" I'm getting all fired up, too bad it's winter :( Well I got other things on my to do list before then and this gives time to plan and practice as practice makes perfect and it's said a photo can be worth 1000 words.

This is truly a great Christmas. Thank you so much, parents! This is one of those gifts that's been dropped in my hands at just the right time. This is just the exact thing I've been aiming for that I thought would be a great tool in doing what I do. Now it's my obligation to do great things with this awesome camera. It's seldom we have years like this anymore where things just come together and fit in place as they should. This is a win win situation, thank you so much!

I want to wish a Merry Christmas to friends, family & you the reader. What I bring to you all is not possible without the support you've provided along the way.

Mini Winter Road Trip

I'm taking a break today. I gotta get out and stretch my legs a bit. I've been couped up too much and got to expend some energy. I hate the cold and being inside but I'm getting a good opportunity and clearing in the weather to make a break, a mini road trip just before Christmas. As this post goes up, (I'm loving the automatic timed schedule feature on the page, I can post even while I'm away from the computer!) I should be somewhere in the middle of a desert in Wyoming looking for a ghost town. If I can find it I suspect it'll yield some interesting things as I came armed with a shovel and metal detector. I've done a series of calculations using, map and satellite photo analysis, carefully measured distances, checked coordinates of original Union Pacific track surveyors, and read from historical accounts. This is about half a year in anticipation, I've just have not found a time to make a break on this one until now. I'm looking for a place that existed on a barren stretch of alkaline salt flats. I need to find an old railroad track bed, if you look hard enough you can still find spots of the original transcontinental track bed from the 1860's stretching across the western US along I-80. The place I'm headed to also has a branch of the Mormon Trail running to it. I have to act like a detective and carefully pay attention to my surroundings. It's crazy to try finding this thing but even after 140 plus years, I'm confident in my ability to find at least some trace of something in the location I'm looking. Actually I usually attempt things this crazy because I think others have a hard time believing this place ever existed. For me, the better the hunt is, the less people have discovered and the more there is for me to find if I find it. Odds are stacked against me at least 90% that I won't find a thing but in my gut I'm hoping on that 10% that I'll strike something. I listened to a man last Spring who found stuff from this area, he placed his finds on the counter in front of me. Old artifacts like an ornate Freemasons pin, a 19th century mini ball .68 caliber bullet, and an old coin. To me it's worth taking a stab at at least once. Today I must travel back in time to the 1860's try and put myself in the footsteps of pioneers. The railroad is coming through, old trails parallel and lead off into the barren landscape, local tribes are making their attacks on rail laying crews more frequent as the rails mark a death knell on their way of life and threaten to bring a larger invasion of settlers from east. Today I'm going to the end of track or also known as "Hell On Wheels".

They were way out there. No air conditioned modern automobiles, no paved roads, no convenience stores to stop and get some bottled water at. The United States basically ended back around Iowa & Missouri, this was just a territory. Once you stepped foot west, that was the "Great Desert" though not all desert being out here was really off the beaten path. If only I could travel back in time with an off road modern vehicle modified to burn an available fuel source, some good snacks to packed, a cooler, outdoor gear, some friends and an Ipod with some good tunes It'd be a blast (from the past).

Hard unforgiving work. Back in those days you just went up to a tent and said "I'm ready to do some work, point me in the right direction" and they said "We need some more hands over there, sign on this dotted line please" or "Let me see you swing a hammer, (wha-ching) your hired!" like it was so easy to get work. Sure there were no HR departments but it was pretty honest and straight forward, no messing around with follow up interviews and stupid office politics or work place drama.. and what are they gonna do, outsource ya? Work place hazards: dysentery, cholera, fever, no real safety code, gun fights, drunken brawls, indian raids. Some severance packages came with a noose clause and in place of the contemporary office going away party was what's know as a "neck tie party" rather than write ups there were string ups if the offense was severe enough. Where trees lacked, there was always plenty of sand, ants and turkey vultures. This gives a whole new meaning to somebody saying "I'm fed up with this lousy job, right up to my neck!" - One could find themselves literally up to the neck buried in desert sand on a scorching day with honey doused on their head, an army of ants closing in and the buzzards hovering overhead. Yikes.

Okay I guess that is all a little over dramatic, those things happened but walking away from the railroad and having new guys drift in was common. People came and went in the construction with no precise documentation on the exact numbers. getting neck deep was probably rare unless somebody had done something to really anger somebody.

We Made It!

Wooohoooo! Give yourselves a big pat upon the back, so we passed the Mayan apocalypse date with no problem. The world goes on! Of course I knew we'd make it, it's just not every day the end of the world is suppose to come and give me an opportunity to poke some fun at it. Now we all need to start making T-shirts that say "I survived the 2012 Mayan Apocalypse and all I got was this lousy T-shirt."

Well, on the bright side I'm looking forward to a cancellation of all the doomsday 2012 shows on TV. Surely they'll find another doomsday to predict but they may have to do some doomsday searching for a few years before they set another date. I'm just glad this one is over because I can remember all the hype back in 2007 even. Whew, finally, 'cause this one has been along time in coming. Of course I mentioned this TV thing before but I'll mention it again because I'm happy that we are on the other side of that date. Also there went the Winter Solstice! No more shortening days, they'll finally get longer again. If you don't already know, you could probably guess that winter is my least favorite time of the year. I'm totally a Spring & Summer person all the way. I don't like the short days, cold, and dead bland grey, leaflessness and lifelessness of the outside much.

Now we can look forward to the holidays and new year and hope 2013 is hella f-ing balls to the wall awesome! :)

Somewhere I can just imagine some pretty disappointed peeps. I can almost hear the groans of their disappointment, the collection calls coming, angry spouses calling, the answering machines with their automated messages all in unison coming from hamlets across all corners of the globe. Yesterday they were saying to themselves:

- Quit my job and told my boss to go  O_o  #^@*!himself, check.
- Withdrew all my money from the stock market, check.
- Sent a nasty letter to my ex and all my old enemies, check.
- Maxed out my credit cards on a spending free for all, check.
- Graffiti on the sidewalk in front of the homeowners association, check.
- Went car surfing attempting to whack all the mailboxes in town with a baseball bat from car, check.
- Got arrested for lewd, shrewd and drunken behavior in public, check.
- Booked a flight to the Bahamas, check.
- Reserved a lavish suite with a jacuzzi and balcony overlook on the beach, check.
- Throw the television out the window and into swimming pool, check.
- Purchased several pounds of illegal substances from some guy named Pablo, check.
- Spent every last penny on booze, check.
- Threw a giant shindig and partied like it's 1999 again, check.
- Have no back up plan, totally up the creek without a paddle should this all go south, check.

If anybody knows somebody like this, please help these poor souls get back on their feet and forgive them as this is the charitable giving time of the year.

One can only assume that the Earth was in the sights of the Sloth Menace and a planet killing asteroid at the same time. The world's intelligence agencies learned of the sloth global domination plot well in advance. In fact the plot was learned about in the 1970's when a CIA operative went under cover disguised as one, he spent half a decade in the jungles of South America learning the sloth language and hanging out in trees, once the plot was discovered this provided ample time to prepare as sloths move slow, just a little slower than the CIA. Working with the world's space agencies they then enlisted the smartest scientists to come up with a solution. Kill two birds with one stone or rather us a very large stone and broadside a bunch of monkey like creature things with hook claws that dwell in trees. The plan called for flying rockets into the asteroid, nudging it's trajectory away from the earth and smashing it into the sloth mother ship thus thwarting the invasion and saving humanity and the planet. Of course they could not tell the general public, this keeps panic from breaking out and they keep the identity of their crack counter-space sloth team units secret. They only come together to save the world, then like everything else they return to bureaucratic in fighting. - This is just an elaborate sci-fi theory on why the "Slothpocalypse" was botched. The sloth mother ship has been some 4 billion light years in creeping here, or since the time Earth was allegedly formed if you count by the geological theory. By the time the sloths figure out on their home planet that the invasion failed, they might order a second wave but again they will be a long time in transit. By the time they reach Earth, they risk being consumed by the exploding sun turning into a red giant.

Thank goodness it's good to see today as it's officially the 22nd of December 2012!

It's Doomsday!

Happy Doomsday! ..and guess what, nothing so far! Surely by now I'd be standing knee deep in the Slothpocalypse, fighting for my life yelling "You dirty stinking sloths, you'll never take me alive!"

Today is December 21th 2012, the predicted end of world date. To be honest I think it's much hype. Perhaps end of something, end of the Mayan calender for one thing. End of some other things as well, maybe the end of well over half a decade, ramped up year by year blabber of the  "2012 Mayan Apocalypse" - one can only hope. I sure hope the Mayans don't have another trick up their sleeve. Of course people will look on to the future to find a new big end of the world date to set their sights on. The last big one was Y2K in 2000, that one is about the only one in modern history that I suspect much credence could be lent to. The plausibility being that it would be a man made doomsday event. The thought of as a bunch of archaic 20th century computers ticking away on binary code, once they hit 2000, the machines don't know the difference between 2000 and 1900. The result could have been a disaster wrecking havoc on machines all around the world, shutting off power stations, crashing computer reliant machines, crashing the stock market and plummeting the world into a financial death dive. No communications, shipping halted, cash registers unable to function, currency useless and the public in a state of panic. Luckily none of these things happened, the remedy was found and disaster averted. The one aspect that terrified me as a child about Y2K was the remote possibility it could trigger the launch of nuclear missiles automatically with no human interaction, those machines too could have faltered as it was thought the programmers never anticipated making it 2000 hence the machine would reboot to 1900, perhaps programed to think a war has happened, power has gone out and to launch ICBMs (That sure as put everything back in 1900 at least if not the stone ages). That terrified me as a kid and I lost some sleep over it but like everything else with Y2K, it never happened thankfully. Thanks to forward thinking software engineers, computer programmers and any other computer wizards of the 1990's, we are still here. They must have made everything flow smoothly into the new millennium because none of the before mentioned events happened as everybody well knows. To this end they are the unsung heroes of the last doomsday date (If you see one, thank him or her as the case may be).

Well now if anything is going to change, some people have suggested a shift in human subconscious thinking towards greater enlightenment. That would be nice, I guess it's ideal. I certainly don't see the world changing over night nor mankind in all it's existence going "You know what, starting today I'd like to be enlightened." It would be interesting, maybe people should laugh more, add more humor to their lives. One possibility is for more optimistic thinkers, all too often I'm confronted with eternal pessimists. I can accept some pessimism as reality but to chronically resort to it and totally give up on the glass half full way of thinking is only ceding to being defeated in mind. To me the power of the mind is a strong asset, your not ever fully defeated in your endeavors unless your defeated in your mind.

If anything is bound to change from this day on, I'm gonna take a stab in the dark here and say, please no more 2012 doom and gloom programs on the History Channel, Discovery, and Nat Geo. Well okay, the latter two have not been as bad but certain channels on TV have beat on the December 2012 drum pretty bad, that poor drum's head is beyond cracked, it's worn out, beat totally bashed through. Lets make a rock & roll analogy here. It's beyond the abuse Bonzo's drums took after a 10 minute onslaught of the song Moby Dick, it's more like the Who smashing their instruments in a fury all over the stage, alas save Keith Moon's poor drums! My hopes, we can stopping thinking so much about 2012 and the end and think more about 2013 + and hopefully a bright future, even though I know we all deal with our challenges, we shall overcome those. From this day on maybe people I know can stop saying "Well, but if the world ends in 2012.." Guess it helps to anticipate the plan B rather than plan A.

Ok, I'll hush up now as we still have some more time to go on December 21st. I realize the day is not yet over and there's an old saying "Don't count your chickens before they hatch." - There's another one that goes "It's not over 'till the fat lady sings." Well, where's the opera? I'm not hearing it.

In the Rocky Mountain time zone it's in the afternoon, maybe the key here is if the sun is rising over the dateline in the Pacific Ocean on the 22nd somewhere, then I suppose we are home free. Here's the clue, if the sun is rising in Japan right now or soon, that's the 22nd and the future, we are A-OK if people in the eastern Pacific region see the sunrise on the 22nd of December 2012.

I just have to remember, in North America, we have yet to reach nightfall for the 21st. While we sleep, we are most vulnerable to sloth surprise attack, slogging along at a stunning 2 MPH! Stumbling past the yard gnomes an through the flowerbed. They aim for our throats in the dead of night. Sleepy sleepy, nighty night and don't let the sloths bite.

Images used courtesy of Izsu and Superb wallpapers. Also Cosmos Magazine.

The Slothpocalypse Is Upon Us!

One more day 'till the end of the world! One More day 'till the end of the world! (Sing this to the bass line of "Rock Lobster" by the B-52's) - It's an inside joke me and a coworker came up with, the words seem to fit the bass line.

Nah, it will probably all be good in the hood. I doubt too much is gonna happen. More than likely a few crazy people will do some wild stuff, somebody is maxing out their line of credit as I type this. Some people hunker down in preparation, others are sitting on a beach somewhere drinking themselves into a stupor, while puffing on a Cuban stogie. Some naughty people are playing with too much nose candy and some guy just put money down on a exotic sports car he can't fully pay off but he's driving off in it anyway because what the hey, where are the repo men gonna be after civilization has vanished into the sands of time, right? As for the rest of us life will likely go on as normal but now here's something to have a chuckle at while the world holds it's breath.

Now about the "Slothpocalypse" - yes I just coined that term. I got the idea last night when I sat down to the computer and saw an image from the Memebase generator:

Needless to say, I almost fell out of my chair laughing. I don't know why. Out of all the possibilities, one could conjure up tsunamis, hurricanes, tornadoes, lightening storms, drastic weather change, floods of biblical proportions, firestorms, pestilence, famine, plague, disease, pandemics, pole shift, asteroids, black holes, planetary collisions, alien invasion, red giant exploding stars, super volcanoes, earthquakes, nuclear war, and a partridge & a pear tree, etc...

Yet out of all the possibilities people fathom, SLOTHS? SLOTHS! Now that's pretty freaking darn funny. So this brought idea of a comical and parody nature. What the heck, the end of the world is something we have been hearing of for sometime now. We might as well celebrate with some fun and have a laugh before this Mayan prediction passes.

I can just see myself now, standing waist deep in a pile of brass with the last remaining survivors in the area, fighting for the future of humanity. We are on a roof top guns a blazing, hot lead flyin', burning automobiles are laying on their side, tipped over in the sloth melee. Wreckage and debris is strewn about the city streets, plumes of smoke rise from nearby buildings. The place is a war zone, like some scene out of a zombie apocalypse flick. Except instead of zombies, the burg is swarming with sloths, hundreds of thousands of sloths! Humans are grossly outnumbered approximately 10,000 to 1. The sloths came in space ships (Proving they really were an alien species all along) took the world's nations by surprise disguised as slow moving furry rocks for camouflage. They felled entire militaries before they could mobilize their troops. The most destructive weapons were deployed but to no avail. In the end, the sloth onslaught managed to survive repeated artillery barrages, tank charges, air strikes. The world's nations expended their entire nuclear arsenals, this brought down many sloths but there were many more to fill their ranks. Soon all that was left was the sloth, cockroaches and the remaining bastions of humanity. By now it's every survivor for himself, it's up to the common person to turn the tide of battle around. The survivors have one thing to their advantage, the sloths make easy targets moving slow but one problem, there's more sloths than bullets. For every sloth that keels over, 100 more to take it's place. By now the survivors are surrounded by mountains of piled up sloth, a scene reminiscent of the movie "300." Copious amounts of sloth clumsily lumber over their fallen comrades and continue an ever tightening encirclement of the last standing survivors.

Yeah, that's actually sort of a dramatic interpretation in my mind of the Slothpocalypse Just had to get creative here, it got the wheels turning in my brain for some crazy satire of disaster and zombie movies. I don't harbor any hard feelings for sloths, I'm an animal lover person and think sloths are actually intriguing and they sort of remind me of certain dogs my relatives have. Yet they seem to make a good candidate for such a plot. Think of the old cheesy horror movies, one that comes to mind is 1972's "Night of the Lepus" - a movie about gargantuan, destructive, carnivorous, killer bunny rabbits run amok in Arizona. Then there's the more successful "Planet of The Apes" movies, I suppose "Planet of The Sloths" will be the sequel to the before mentioned plot once they've forced humans into hiding in secret caves and sloths rise as the rulers of the world.

THE "SLOTHPOCALYPSE" DECEMBER, 21st 2012! Are you ready?
The Mayans most feared prediction, coming to a city near you.
(I did get slightly carried away with photoshop on this one)

If I'm not back with a new post tomorrow, I'm likely caught in the middle of the "Slothpocalypse" fighting for humanity. If we lose, I reckon it's curtains for humanity, if we win.. well it looks like we will be enjoying roast sloth on a skewer for the remainder of the holiday season, usher in the new year with a dish of sloth brisket and campaign, have plenty stored in the freezers for summer outdoor sloth barbecues and still have an abundance of smoked sloth jerky for years to come.