Comments for The Wrath of Kon

Comment on Zen and the Art of Breathing Wrong by A.

A. — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 22:29:21 +0000

I learned meditation basics in a very matter-of-fact way from my mom without any spiritual baggage whatsoever. She called it “relaxing,” and it was more or less how she’d talk me down from assorted ailments/colds/insomnia when I was a kid. So I had it more or less down before puberty. This is recommended for obvious reasons.

You don’t actually have to clear your mind of thoughts. Let them happen, and just don’t grab at them: tell them “okay, noted,” and see what drifts in next. If you notice that you are, in fact, grabbing at one of them, well: notice that. Big fleas have little fleas, &c. ad naus..

Easier said than done, but still pretty helpful.

Comment on Fieldstones and Moleskines by A.

A. — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 22:05:42 +0000

For the last decade or so I've been using those marbled composition books, the green ones with grid ruling, but this last one is so chewed-up already that I'm grudgingly lined up something more durable for the next one. I like grids rather than lines because sometimes I draw in there, and the dot grid is best because I just like dots, generally. I also want the thing to be big and solid enough to last for a while, but small enough to fit into the smallest bag I regularly carry. The composition books are too big, but just barely, which is why the last few have been so physically mangled. And I do exactly what Ray says: read through them now and then, type up bits that seem useful. (What's "useful" changes over time. Every so often I'll re-read an old book and find stuff I missed on the previous round.) I maintain a bunch of google docs for various kinds of snippage.

Comment on Bank of Fucking America by L Swastikkko

L Swastikkko — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 04:34:24 +0000

FWIW, in 1999 I used my ATM card in both Dublin and Belfast (they have, or at least had, different currencies).

Comment on Zen and the Art of Breathing Wrong by motel todd

motel todd — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 20:51:07 +0000

I read a lot of books on Buddism in the 90s. I even got a book from the library on yoga poses and did that and worked out. I also read books on zen meditation which basically said sit in the lotus postion and try to think of nothing, concentrate on your breathing only, think on some “cone” like the one hand clappping thing or just counting to ten in your mind. I did this for a year to two years and it really does work in relaxing you but then does beer and a good joint – haha

Comment on Bank of Fucking America by motel todd

motel todd — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 20:41:59 +0000

I ended up owing Bank One – long since out of business at least in Texas – around $400 in back fees in the early 90s during my breif marriage – it took six months to pay back. Banks are a bitch, man.

Comment on Bank of Fucking America by Christian Alexander

Christian Alexander — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 20:26:03 +0000

This is completely fucking awesome. Thank you.

Comment on Fieldstones and Moleskines by jkonrath

jkonrath — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 14:22:16 +0000

I don’t type in things that have absolutely no value, are repeated, or that I’ve already used. I’m finding that about 80% of what’s in the book is worthwhile. Also the process of typing them in is somewhat generative, because I’ll have a sentence I wrote six months ago, and it causes me to write another sentence or two. All told, the process of scanning and typing in a 200-page moleskine takes me a couple of hours. I think without the scanning, I’d have the nightmare of having to hold the book open with one hand , having it snap shut during writing, the ergo nightmare of going back and forth between book and screen, etc. It’s way faster to have the PNGs on screen and type.

Scanners – you lost me at “software that came with my scanner.” I’ve never seen, for both Windows and Mac, a piece of software that came with a piece of hardware that wasn’t a total piece of shit. I use the same scanner with both my Mac and my work PC (Win7 ThinkPad) and on the PC, I had to install Epson’s garbage, which of course wants to put some retard thing in my task bar that pops up every other day to tell me it has to install new updates, which are probably just ads for Epson ink cartridges that will eat up 17% of my CPU for no reason. (I didn’t have PhotoShop then – I’m sure you can scan from that. And no problems with bloaty programs running in the background to bug the fuck out of you to install needless updates, right?)

I found out Acrobat Pro kinda-sorta does OCR. It will add “searchable” text or whatever they call it, and then if you save-as to word, you have a text document. But you’ve seen my handwriting – the entire fucking notebook looked like someone picked up the other phone when you’re using a dial-up modem. (Or you’re using it with any phone line in Elkhart.)

Comment on Fieldstones and Moleskines by Ray Miller

Ray Miller — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 08:28:50 +0000

Your described method for dealing with the “fieldstones” seems like ten times more work then simply looking through the book and typing anything that isn’t a “dud.”
And, not to defend Windows, but it really is less horrible now. No IRQ nightmares in recent years, at least, and OCR software came with my scanner, although I don’t think that I’ve ever used it (the OCR software, I mean – I use the scanner almost daily), so it might be worthless.

Comment on Muy Dangeroso by motel todd

motel todd — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 17:54:05 +0000

Tripped out -haha

Comment on Twenty years of e-publishing by motel todd

motel todd — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 17:47:19 +0000

Good piece on self publishing. I didn’t start self publishing until 1997 at the tender age of 30 – before that I was trying to be a rock star – mailing out cassette tapes got really expensive as well as paying for your own half ass garage studio to record in. I started with chapbooks and found the net, Robert, and anti-heroart. com in 1999. I sent a manuscript to bizarro press on Valentine’s Day. I’ll see what happens.