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Things we don't talk about enough

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09:55 / 11.10.02

The board seems a bit sleepy... I thought a braindump thread on topics we'd like to talk about (but can't be arsed to start/research a thread on yet) might kickstart things.

- Future living spaces - how should house/apartment/whatever design be altered? What's your ideal? Are we hanging on to old technology simply because we haven't come up with anything better, or do current houses/apartments genuinely meet our needs? Is this the same across the world, or do environmental conditions make a significant difference - and cultural conditions?

- Symbols in everyday life (not magickal ones btw) - do we create our own meanings for them (and in doing so create our own symbols, I suppose) or do we accept the meanings which are determined for us by their creators?

- what was it about britpop bands which made them all go past their sell-by date so soon? Or is it in the nature of bands that they become overblown and pompous (unless they're the Ramones...) after about 5 years?

- how does Anglo-Dutch historiography (all of it) address the issue of English attitudes towards the Dutch? (Answer with reference to the use of source material) - 5000 words, for Oct 25.

Oh, sorry...

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

10:39 / 11.10.02

- the ironic reclamation of Roy "Chubby" Brown by the League of Gentlemen- daring, or shit?

- midgets. Enchanted, evil, or minority group?

- dwarves. As above. Only in reverse order.

- Alcohol viewed on a sliding scale ranging from social lubricant to shortener of life.

- is there such a thing as a "white lie"? Can honesty ever prevail over pragmatism.

- To what extent are your friends a) a boon, b) a responsibility, c) a privilege, d) a cross you have to bear?

Our Lady of The Two Towers

11:28 / 11.10.02

There was a thread I wanted to start based on Lilith's a few days back about whether blogs on the Net can be considered in anyway private to anyone, but I can't remember what my point was

15:59 / 17.10.02

The vaguest of vague ideas:

- Comedy/humour/laughter: is there too much of it about? Why must everything be funny? Are we under pressure to be entertaining? Has our culture fetishised it? Was Uncle Fred right that "laughter is the death of emotion" (or something like that)? Is a lack of a sense of humour in certain contexts neccessarily a bad thing?

- Taking The Piss: again, too much of it about? Why do we love it so much? How powerful is it as a weapon?

- Perpetual comfort: does the idea of a stable, Utopian society worry you?

Matthew Fluxington

16:13 / 17.10.02

I'd really like to talk about some movies I've seen recently, but they are very limited release - Igby Goes Down and Secretary come to mind. There's a thread for Bowling For Columbine, but I haven't added to it. Yet. But I only saw the movie yesterday.

There's tv shows I like a lot that I'd want to talk about, but I have no idea if anyone else here is into Gilmore Girls or ER. There doesn't seem to be too much demand for Sopranos talk either. Please, let me know if you like these shows, people. I'd love to have some threads about it, but I'm not eager to start threads that no one is going to add to. Surely there's more to Barbelith tv viewing than Six Feet Under, Buffy, and Big Brother?

16:29 / 17.10.02

Has humanity effectively stunted human evolution by adapting the world to suit us instead of the other way around?

What exactly do people mean when they they call themselves "humanist"? Who do they want humans to have equal rights and opportunities with? Do they want a vote on the next Alpha male election in the wolf pack in their district?

Where does the light go when you turn off the switch?

16:35 / 17.10.02

I would talk about the Sopranos; but I don't have actual TV, I'm watching them on DVD. Which means I am a season behind --I'm a third of the way through Season 3-- and I'm definitely avoiding spoilers, which I think would be easy enough to do by having a separate thread, say, for each season. But you probably want to talk about what's going on now, not last year?

Matthew Fluxington

17:26 / 17.10.02

I'm the total opposite of you, Persephone - I didn't start watching the show til this season, so I haven't seen all of the old ones and can't afford to get the DVDs. We negate each other!

17:58 / 17.10.02

And with that, the multiverse vanished.

*voom*

[/end threadrot, sorry]

18:11 / 17.10.02

I think we don't talk anough about my inner pain and how no one really understands me anymore.

I have plenty of examples that I could give, should you be interested in this. Really, I'm very miserable. On a night when I was sent home early from work. And I've finished school for a week. And have film noir's I've not watched yet. And am going to London soon. And just what the fuck is wrong with me??

(ignore that, I don't care. Talk about The Powerpuff Girls. I think they're super)

The Return Of Rothkoid

23:42 / 17.10.02

It's only by dint of your teenage years that I letcher get away with that, you know. You're still in the UK.

I think we should talk more about the evils of packaging advertising more. It's the advertising that's so ubiquitous that nobody bothers to go "hey!" about it any more. It's not on a billboard; it's on your pockets and watches and all that kinda stuff.

There y'go. A badly-thought out idea.

I'd also like to talk about how to get into printmaking, neon and photo-printing. Practicalities! Does it really end up being fake-it-until-you-make-it in the art world?

Taiko drums and alphorns: how do you get to be a player? How does one move into the more odd, niche-market instruments? Are all alphornists descended from alphornists from time out of mind? This is kinda serious, actually - how do people involved in artistic oddities find themselves at that point? Did Hermann Nitsch just stop being an accountant or whatever and decide that he wanted to throw blood around in five-day mystery plays? Did Stelarc just think one morning that suspending himself above the traffic with HOOKS IN HIS SKIN would be a good idea? Am I missing out on some bolt of experimentalist genius? And if so, where can I get some?

22:26 / 19.10.02

The Weather.

No-one to my knowledge has discussed the weather at length on this board. But,(excuse the offensive grammar) what else do we ever talk about in this godforsaken hellhole of an island other than how likely it is that it will rain, or how quickly the sun will take to go away.

So, I feel things need to change. Why has no one thought to start a thread concerning the weather. In fact, why is there not a separate message board devoted entirely to cynical ramblings concerning meteorology. It makes no sense.

07:05 / 22.10.02

Originally posted by: Flux = Nothing So Precious, Nothing So Rare
I have no idea if anyone else here is into Gilmore Girls

I loved that show. I think I only started watching it because the idea of a television show where I fancied the mother more than the daughter amazed me but I found it to be a lovely, touching, funny, warm and relatively easy to remember-to-watch show. Until they moved it to saturday nights (in Australia), I only ever saw it once again after that and now it's finished for the year.

Originally posted by: The Return Of Rothkoid
Did Stelarc just think one morning that suspending himself above the traffic with HOOKS IN HIS SKIN would be a good idea? Am I missing out on some bolt of experimentalist genius? And if so, where can I get some?

I have a friend who used to go by the simple name of Steve. Now he's known as Mr. Tetanus. He sticks skewers and pins and nails through his face and arms and hands and penis and has a 1/4" bolt through his leg (just behind the ankle). He joined a Jim Rose style circus. I know he's not exactly Stelarc but there was a time when he didn't do any of these sorts of things and then, suddenly, he did. A lot. If I told you that the apparent cause of this was his being attacked, beaten up badly and robbed at a cash machine, would you still really want to get some?

Ah there's a topic. I knew I'd think of one if I typed long enough...
Scary people who won't let you avoid them.

Catchy title.

jUne, a sunshiny month

07:11 / 22.10.02

"i love this thread !" <---- this is my next t-shirt.

07:38 / 22.10.02

Stelarc should be sawn into sections, then lacquered, so he'd be like one of those desktop suspended ball thingies. You know where this is going. Pull the head back and let it swing into the neck stump, and watch his feet shoot out. This would beat Body Worlds all hollow.

No star here laces

07:43 / 22.10.02

How does one live a free life in today's world?

The class politics of ethical living in a capitalist society

08:59 / 22.10.02

That guy that hosts Real Rooms... he CAN'T be that nice in real life... surely.. Can he?

18:30 / 10.11.02

Internet hermeneutics (relating to this absolutely fascinating seminar I went to on Friday about the growth in the history of the book - the internet seen as a perpetual negotiation between author/reader, reader/reader, author/author, especially in relation to bulletin boards where everyone is an author except the invisible lurkers - who don't contribute to discourse, how relevant are they? I must find my notes for this...)

Your personal intellectual icon (Conversation? Headshop?)

The current apathy of the left - could they/we make a blind bit of difference anyway?

Some of these ideas are good, chaps, we should do some of them...

21:33 / 28.05.03

Small objects of no intrinsic value which you nonetheless carry around with you for years and years and years. Everyone has a box or two of these. What are they? What are your reasons for doing so? Is there a pattern?

Potlatch thread: your most disgusting habit. No cheating.

A gazetteer of independent bookshops which should be supported if you happen to be in the area and fancy buying a book. Also small press publishers.

What would the world be like if [object X] had never been invented?

22:25 / 28.05.03

Kit-Cat: I'd actually love a thread on that third one.

We could talk about my coursework, and my exams, and my teachers. These things I know oh so much about. The lack of topics on these is only going to exclude me, as I annot talk about anything other right now. It is, I'm sure everyone will agree, just another form of racism.

Also, we don't talk enough about X Men. We can have a thread in books about the novelisations, one in Art about the movie posters, a thread in music about what songs most make you feel like Wolverine, one in the Lab about how, if you look carefully, you can actually see that the light's defracting at the wrong angle thru their DNA so they can't possibly be real, one in the Headshop about are they??, one in the Switchboard about the media treatment of their fans, something in the Magick about making Lady Deathstrike get fizzy knickers at the thought of you, a Policy thread on how to prepare the board's software more capable of shooting people who don'tlike them hard, something in the Gathering about dressing up like them and drinking, a Creation thread to make the costumes and a thread in the Conversation pointing out that yeh, getting at it with Wolverine would be "dangerous" because he's got claws. But then getting at it with heroin-addicted homeless guys who re-use needles would be "dangerous" too- what's yr point??

The Knights Templar Boogie Machine

22:31 / 28.05.03

what about the microcosm on the left bannister as you walk into the houses of parliment? There are beings in there that taught me how to read the bible with my forehead...
On a more serious note, what about the fractals on turnips? I got one psychometrised once and the reader said that the turnip contained the entire back catalogue of phil collins in bio-organic format. Unfortunately i did'nt have the vegetational technology to play it back to my ricky martin esque reptilian siblings

22:47 / 28.05.03

The real invisibles, A thread telling the lurkers to come out of the shadows and give their opinions about the site without scathing verbal abuse. There's currently 2000+ posters, how many regularly look at the site and what do they think of it...

23:54 / 28.05.03

Hello. I was inspired by Rothkoid's idea for a thread about advertising. If yer interested come over here. Thanks.

02:25 / 29.05.03

how do you keep cats from pissing in houseplants? (I've tried aluminum foil. And large stones.)

do cats really use piss out of revenge, or does it just seem like it?

cat piss, I guess, is what I'd really like to spend, like, a lot more time thinking and talking about.

My Mom Thinks I'm Cool

03:12 / 29.05.03

I keep almost making a thread on "what's your favorite version of the apocalypse?" Death by zombie, death by nukes, death by transcendance to the nth plane of hyper-earth or whatever the hell happened in the last issue of the invisibles...

Had a weird vision at the Sasquatch Festival last weekend where I had sex with a ghost in return for knowledge. I'm not really sure what the topic would be, but there's got to be something I can put in the magic area about that.

And maybe include part of the discussion I'm having with friends right now on whether we're all just the same soul born over and over again and whether hive minds are bad...

03:17 / 29.05.03

Alas Put mothballs in the plant pots. That'll keep them away. They hate the smell! Its not suprising, have you ever smelled mothballs? How'd you get their legs apart?

07:30 / 29.05.03

Alas, wipe the sides of the houseplant's pot with lemon juice, because apparently cats don't like the smell of citrus.

10:27 / 29.05.03

On balance, I think the one thing we'll always need more of is pirate vs. ninja threads...

12:07 / 29.05.03

pants brigade:

'I keep almost making a thread on "what's your favorite version of the apocalypse?" '

Have a butcher's at this

12:18 / 29.05.03

Velvet Vandal... What, like this? or a less macho homophobic version?

Threads I'd like to see:

1) If you could change one event from history, what would it be and why? (eg stopping Princip assasinating Archduke Ferdinand thus (maybe) averting the first World War and so on).

2) Who would you not have to dinner? ie social stereotypes who you can't stand: eg (and my pet peeve) couples who fawn and mew over each other when you're trying to talk to them, and answering for each other etc.

3) What has been your shortest ever interview? (eg, mine: I suppose the main reason I want to work at [x company] is that... interviewer cuts me off with "this is actually [z company]" DOH!)

4) People who should be indicted as fashion criminals.

13:09 / 29.05.03

I'd like to see a thread about why people post great ideas for threads on a thread like this but don't post them as threads.

19:06 / 29.05.03

Although these probably don't warrant whole threads I definitely want more talk about the way dogs yawn and hair on your toes, "these are a few of my favourite things" etc.

@Jub really like your "which event would you stop" idea.

19:20 / 29.05.03

On a more serious tip, how about a thread on superstitions which you know are absolute bollocks and yet still indulge in? For example, magpies. Now, I know enough about causality to say with a fair degree of confidence that seeing a single magpie and not saluting does not presage bad luck at all, and yet every time I see a magpie on its own I give it possibly the wankiest salute known to man - not a millitary salute, more a Fonz-style raising of the index finger to the temple and then a kind of 'heeeeey' pointing gesture. Whether there are people around or not!

And in this way, actually, the magpies are actually presaging correctly, for they say 'aha, Mr Vandal, the man who likes to style himself as some cool urban fucker, well guess what, aha yes, now you're going to salute me, and that'll make you look like a total prick in front of all these people! Caw!'

Bastards.

I have a friend who reckons all magpies should be chained together in pairs. That's his solution to the superstition.

19:33 / 29.05.03

Interestingly, when my dog junps on my bed in the morning, we tend to go into a yawn cycle.
I yawn at her, she yawns at me - repeat ad infinitum. If that's not intersting then my names not.

02:19 / 30.05.03

thanks for the mothballs and lemon juice tips. I think I have more faith in the mothballs, since they are so clearly dastardaly, but of course then I have to smell the moth balls, and yes it is in fact very hard to get their tiny legs apart and have you noticed how moths seem to be made entirely of dust? they just turn to dust in your hands if you crush them.

happy housewife hints. bring 'em on.

poetry. when i'm not wiling away the hours thinking about cat piss, i like to think about possibly starting a poetry thread in books--I suppose?--sort of like the commonplace thread there but just devoted to favorite poems, fragments of poems (e.g., no one would wish to read the entire 12 books of Paradise Lost or the Fairie Queen in a thread--lyric I guess rather than epic would also probably be in order). but then I think, probably someone else has done that already. i should check, i say to myself, yeah, I'll check it, ummm. ... later...

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