I want to write. I went through 110 credit hours of college and unpayable debt to realize the only thing I might be able to do professionally in my lifetime is write. Should I try to keep writing even though it will turn my working class poverty life inside out? Right now writing is the only thing keeping me afraid of death. Without writing I welcome death at any time. I've been living for years ready to die.

I want to write Furry Cyberpunk Horror. If I write it without sex scenes do you think other furs would still buy it at a convention if it became infamous for giving any fur who reads it nightmares?

"You ride a bicycle because it feels good. The air feels good on your body; even the rain feels good. The blood starts moving around your body; and pretty soon it gets to your head, and , glory be, your head feels good. You start noticing things. You look until you really see. You hear things, and smell things you never knew were there. You start whistling nice little original tunes to suit the moment. Words start getting caught in the web of poetry in your mind. And there's a nice feeling, too, in knowing you're doing a fundamental life thing for yourself: transportation. You got a little bit of your life back."
Nicholas Johnson, New york times (1973)

http://www.furaffinity.net/view/15844627/ click the link to check out this neat deer suit

"Why do you ride a bike?"



I ride a bike Because:

After a hundred miles or so
from the time the sun rises to the time the sun sets:
I Find myself in being Lost.


A chance to SEE Nature
A chance to prove the power of my own body
is all the power I'll ever need


setting camp in some forgotten
corner of the forest blesses me
To forget the corruption
Greed has spilled upon the world.

To witness unspoken truth
still alive
In the darkest heart of wilderness.
I'll take off my helmet
gaze into the stars
and suddenly

feel like an astronaut all over again.

I went on a hike just before dusk last night and was surprised to happen upon a mother porcupine and its spiky little baby waddling along the side of the trail. The adorable duo seemed to make an already magical evening even more awesome.

Perhaps in their own humble little rodent-ly fashions (porcupines are a type of rodent) they just stopped by to let me know I should pad around in the woods just before dusk a bit more often. I also think they might have said maybe, if you get the time, you should too. ^ ^

Is it ethical for employers to make generalizations about thier employees based on how they interpret infromation on sites like Facebook, Deviant Art or FurAffinity?


When we post information online about ourselves is it right for someone who decides whether we earn a living to use that information to make assumptions about our character? Should employers only judge their employees based on their behavior/performance in the workplace? Should employers also be able to use employee's personal artistic expressions made outside of work on their own time to judge their ability to serve them inside the workplace?

How many of these also apply to you?

1) Being shy and reclusive (possibly because openly mundane people often seem kind of creepy).

2) Watching werewolf movies at a very young age because its "neat when they transform".

3) Playing lots of video games.

4) Drawing more anthro video game/comic/cartoon characters than any others

5) Reading cyberpunk novels,

6) Falling in love with Nature

7) Open minded philosophical parent obsessed with computers that drew/painted wildlife for a living/hobby

8) Role-playing as anthro characters is most enjoyable

9) Main characters of any comic/story you made were anthro

10) Thinking that people who proudly proclaim "it's childish to watch cartoons" are lame robot people programed to destroy independent thought

etc.
ad Infinum

I hate Finals.

That is all.

The michigan state Anti-bullying law is a gutless wonder. This "law" is nothing short of being highly offensive and derogatory to the victims of bullying. People are dying from this despicable practice of rewarding children for practicing social sadism in public and this piece of trash is what they give to console the loved ones of the deceased? It basically states that bullying is still acceptable as long as they do it in the name of their religious beliefs.

If your relgious beliefs include spreading hate, than I'll assume, as anyone who supports "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" would allso assume: that your religious beliefs must be worshiping "satan" because the only thing hate will do is sew choas just like "the devil" wants you to do. Definitely not behavior congruent with the teachings of Jesus. For the love of your own God, please stop.

Have you seen the internet phenomenon that is Prequel yet?

http://prequeladventure.com/2011/03/prequel-begin/

If you haven't, you should. You owe it to yourself. It's good and it's practically made for us.

I would suggest setting a few days aside, brew up some tasty tea and/or coffee, get warm and comfy, kick back, elevate your paws and prepare to laugh your tail off, cry, cringe, swoon, get frustrated and maybe even allow yourself to be inspired by the all too personable antics of an unlikely feline heroine known as Katia Managan.

Did I mention shes also rather cute? ^ ^

Kazerad really tugged at my heartstrings with this one. Consider me a fan. (now if I can only find some time to make fan arts)

Yes, my dad was a naturalist and so please excuse me if I step up on the soap box he lent to me upon his passing from time to time:

I miss the way my father would talk to me about hunting; without his words I spent quite a long time blindly hating the activity. In retrospect I blame it on the same thing that kept me from most activities young males are "supposed" to enjoy ..... general overly competitive douch-baggery that ruins the activity for everyone but the most socially sadistic individuals present.

I am not against hunting animals by any means but If you hold no respect for the natural ecosystem that made your "sport" possible in the first place than I will never respect you as a hunter. I'm not asking for a lot here. Just don't try to impress people with how much you've taken or how efficiently you take it from the wilderness .....this is not a game..... impress them with how much you can give back to it or your fellow citizens with what you've done. The other forms of life we share this world with are gifts one would be prudent to revere, please utilize the fruits of their labor as wisely and unselfishly as you can; at the very least out of respect for all they have done for humanity now and will continue to do for our descendants in the future.

Now .....back to my regularly scheduled insignificance.

Anyone else share my enthusiasm for some of the excellent dancers we have in the fandom? I have to say the first time I watched someone bust some crazy moves in suit was one of the biggest factors in getting over my fear of dancing in public. So thanks Mangusu, Tyzin, Oreo, Chi, and everyone else out there helping give us rather introverted furs some courage and motivation to get out there be brave and enjoy ourselves. ^ ^

From a life cradled in the arms of nature and "poverty" I rose on the notes of my father's guitar licks: richer than "the wealthy" in all the ways they were corrupted to forget, exploit and belittle. From the brushstrokes on your canvas I saw the light of day and like a dandelion up from the cracks in the concrete I found a way to flourish where few others could. I've watched many people buy their stairway to heaven dad, and though my awareness of this facade means I'll be damned to awkwardness, lonesome and "foresaken" to be the butt of many jokes, the scape goat of social sadism, I will not back down; I will remain patient, peaceful and courageous in honor of you. I will stay true to myself and the legacy of your knowledge: to embrace the true ethical voice of the natural world, unafraid to observe the living love of the earth and, as an Ecologist, to share it with as many people as I can find who are willing to listen.

Rest in Peace Noble Artisan
You have done good in this world

You may be asking yourself why you're here, the simple answer is ......you're here for art. I know it......because

So am I.

Its therapy. Stop over complicating things please.

Sing a song. Draw a doodle. Do a dance. Make a rant. Pet your favorite cat.

Have fun, be nice, give back, relax, take it all in, show a friend

Heal

Grow

Forget that there is anything you're really supposed to do

and do what you really need to have done.

The tragedies can have another day.

This is your day.

make your own path

sing your own song,

cry out every little emo in your heart,

laugh your ass right off this plane

you don't need to impress anyone

not even yourself

because you don't need a single word

just

some time

and a Place

to feel your own significance

as a piece of a greater gift

that unselfish and aware space

within you;

Just trust in what

you may have forgotten

that lies deep within.

I found mine.

Though sometimes its hard to remember exactly

how I get back there

you see.....




The wolf
was the one
who had long ago sewn the solemn song into the ridges of my being
and since I have long lost my muzzle
here I sit
stringing the old rhythm up
again;
into words;
ideas;
and like tufts in the wind
life will rise up
somewhere new
where its needed.
From a thing
insignificant
strange
and unlikely
as only love can be



Also

I made a rant...

its ugly

and its something I had to write first

before I could write what you may have read up above.


but sometimes you just have to drive your poisons out,

I expel mine in words,

to get at what really matters underneath:




I've had enough of the uptight, "sharp" dressing, hate spewing social engineers of this time and place and I suspect you have as well, unless you really think that you're one of them in which case go outside right now and promptly screw yourself please, you'd be doing us all a huge favor. Its the best thing they could do for the planet....honestly. That's right I'm talking about the ever present "THEM" The bigoted ones, the selfish and self-righteous ones, the proponents of social sadism; the greed laden lust fearing ancient dusty crusty money humping god puppet constructing fear mongers....oh yes.......they have a plan for you..............hope you didn't have one of your own......because they've got alot of money to make and not much more time to make it.......and the whole world be damned by their twisted perversion of god........because they're going to watch everything beautiful suffer long and hard before they can feel guilty enough to stop........usually it has to die long before that could ever happen. You see......as they say......."we're not so different, you and I".....You're here and you're looking at this........and so no matter how desperate and viscous you may feel..........you're already taken some important steps.........we're human and we need to be loved.......not beaten down with condescending jokes and superficialities until we break down and lose ourselves to the oily depths of greed that pass off as god these days. We need something real. Love is all around us.....we just have to be given an opportunity to do what comes natural.......swim to the surface......open our eyes.......gasp in the lucid and sweet morning air

and learn to be at home.

How long has it been since you felt like you were?

Its not every night you vividly dream of cuddling on your couch with your GF and suddenly someone outside your window dressed in a leopard fursuit starts waving at you with his friends until you finally go outside to see them and wake up hours before you planned that morning yet somehow feel very rested.

I am a part of a relatively new social movement that everyone is trying to label with the word "furry." I will be included in its ranks as long as I feel that their is potential to do good and I will only leave when the distractions of corruption render it something I no longer recognize. In which case the reason I was here will have been labled as something else and it is there that you will find me.

Many have colored me "Delusional" but I really do want what is best for this fledgling culture because I have seen facets of myself, my friends and my family in its humanistic and ecologically aware underpinnings and I would love to see it grow into something that can contribute indefinitely to the collective mental state of humanity. Stereotypes notwithstanding, At its core I think it has some very admirable virtues to bestow upon my fellow sapient beings as we move through a new state of collective consciousness that is aware of our biosphere and the other living beings we share it with and just how interconnected we actually all are.

In our art we display the depth and breadth of this connection that we posses to our fellow denizens of the earth. For those who have selectively labeled certain basic human desires as 'evil' while ignoring the plight of their own greed, this is something they have trouble observing. It is the very connection we display to animals that some perceive as a chimera they no longer recognize worthy of person hood and instead be written off as a lowly stereotype, but if you ask me those are the same people who will never understand the importance life's many forms (especially their own) have in their own basic existence and will therefore be forsaken in the times that shall come as the revelations of science destroy their misconceptions.

In the beginning I believe the usage of the term 'furry' was done with the best of intentions. We were once a scattered lot of lonely souls drifting in the winds of our mother culture but now thanks to this one word.......furry.....for better and for worse, we have become united. I hope with all of my heart that my fellow furries can keep the good things that led them here in mind when contributing to our works so that we can create something worthy of passing on.

The most amazing thing happened the other night. I was just driving down the street with a friend to pick up some food for everyone and I saw two people in fursuits dancing outside the local bar, and I definitely recognized one of them from ann arbor furmeets. I couldn't help but giggle and smile and wish I was there, but I never dreamed I'd be brave enough to try to actually go there to see them.

But then this recently acquired friend of mine who was in the car with me immediately started talking rather negatively about "mascot fuckers"; amidst my teeth gritting I did my best to keep my calm, giving him the benefit of the doubt about his intentions with such statements and try to explain to him why stereotypes like that hurt everyone and how furrys are actually great people and maybe even put him on the spot by telling him I was one and why it was important to me but I didn't get a chance to explain everything (as usual, but next time I think I will anyway) because then we got back to thier place and talking about such things with new friends seems to create tension between me and my mate.

After we left thier place I drove by again with my mate in the car and they were out there once again. So I had to beep and wave ^_ ^ I couldn't help myself. My lady was getting jealous or something though because although we were having a disagreement beforehand it got much worse after that. She kicked me out of the bedroom and I was feeling pretty sad but then I said to myself screw all this.......I'm going to go try and see if those furries are still there; because regardless of all of these lies even my mate has been convinced into believing, it is these lies which keep them from validating our existence as furries and I know that I have yet to meet a furry who confirms these lies.

So I went there and I listened to loud music and I drank a few beers and I danced with those furrys and lo and behold they confirmed all my suspicions that they were great people by being very friendly and inviting. I had a great time, some good conversation and to see them both being so brave in the face of the same lies that almost ruined my night was very uplifting. They made me forget about all of that nonsense. I really hope to see more of Tyzin and Chi in the days to come.

I'm not sure what defines me as a furry but I do know that I have been drawing in this style way before I even knew of or used the internet (inspired from my interests in biology comics cartoons and video games). I have been aware of the fandom for a long time now but only recently ever tried to contact other members of it. I got into furry hoping to meet more people who are also interested in biology but I also like the cartoon/comic/videogame aspect of interest as well. I have only recently been introduced to other members of the fandom when I lived in ann arbor a little over a year ago.

My mom's house feels like the inside of a TV Commercial, right now. Outside, my bicycle is the thief, a Fantastic Mr. Fox in a republican hen house and like the song says there really is "No reason to get excited" because "In reality there is no experience of death. Properly speaking, nothing has been expierenced but what has been lived and made coinscious." So to the old pie-in-the-sky patriarchs I implore we need our circuitous journeys, as the power of the world always works in circles, because we all need something arduous and humbling and joyful to realize our true awareness; by which we arrive at the ground at our feet and learn to be at home.

So eat the fruit of the book bound forest and be at one with the dust of the earth because those who talk do not know and those who know do not talk because we favor the simple expression of the complex thought, we are for the large shape because it has the impact of the unequivocal.

I've got a job working outside again and in most ways I really love it. Its landscaping and it should definitely help me get back in shape especially since its only 5 miles away so I can ride my bike to work all the time.

But for some reason I seem to be having terrible allergies now that spring has arrived and it seems that when I'm not sneezing my body just aches for no apparent reason. Its getting harder and harder to try and focus on my art. Plus most of the people I work with are very racist, homophobic and ignorant. But at least they trust me enough to let me learn how to use new equipment all the time. Its the first time I've driven a skid-steer and a tractor, which is actually kind of fun.

Our lives need variety. But what purpose do those lives serve? Today I'd like to convince myself and anyone reading along that life serves an indeterminable purpose as true and bright and nebulous and meaningfully undefinable yet universal as only Art could be. Art is what you make it. For me Art is what it means to truly share with each other what it is that makes us individuals, and in this process we see that we are far more similar than we are different and that helping others is helping ourselves.

I'm saying its not just for "The Artists." Because we are all artists in our own ways and our art is the path we must all make through the experience of life. The primordial artist of my childhood said that sharing is always worth the struggle and the struggle is a measure of how much what you share is worth, so do yourself a favor and struggle your little heart out would you please? Starve in your winters so that you may be fruitful in your summers. It will make you feel alive.

An artist has to feel alive to have enough of a “soul” so that they can put it down on the piece of paper or spit it out in their words or light it off in the blaze of their actions. Though comfort is nice in small doses. I have learned to only indulge in it long enough to catch my breath or it will paralyze me creatively. I've learned that a life of self-indulgent comfort can quickly corrupt you to apathy. Having hopefully passed my most powerful time with Apathy I can only say that it is a very selfish way of coming to terms with suffering that will leave you the choice of sucking the life from others or living in xenophobic solitude.

The Buddhists say that life is suffering and so too I believe that we must suffer at times, though we suffer together it is only so that we can know joy when its time is upon us. With respect for each other as we toil in the "filth" of tasks we may not enjoy at times we learn to endure so that we can know that comfort and cleanliness has meaning. As any good composition has contrast so must our lives be a dance with death; to make the meanings of a grand design pop into light in our vast and tiny human minds so that we can see past the illusions our societies require and behold that life's purpose was one we already knew though we often forget.

I just quit my job the other day and I have a number of reasons for this. First and foremost my Grandmother was diagnosed with brain cancer a few months ago and she was recently given 1-2 months to live and I want to spend time with her while she is still here. Hospice is there, she's been given morphine, I know this drill it's exactly what happened to my father and its very chilling to see it happening again to someone I love. I still have hope.....but I did for my father too.

Secondly I despise being a cashier. Trust me, I should know, I've been doing it for over 8 years now. I've paid my dues and anyone who tells me to stop whining should realize that I have every right to speak my mind about how I am not made for this kind of work. Its a job no one apreciates you for that you can never do well because everyone just takes it for granted and the harder I try to do my job well the more I am let down by how little anyone cares. Not to mention no one pays you well for it. I was experiencing serious anxiety at work on a daily basis and it was consuming my life because I was trying to do my job well and aparently no one cared. Everyday I'm living a lie. Nobody wants to hear the truth so I made an executive decision and took control of my own life for once by deciding that the damage this occupation inflicts on my psyche is not worth the pay.

If my girlfriend leaves me for it than it just means she cares more about the money I was making than about me as a person and my place in this world.

Just installed linux recently and I'm doing my best to tune myself to its cute little quirks.

I have two days off and I plan to do some serious lounging today. Maybe dig through some of my old sketch books and post some old junk just for fun.

Weee

Some greedy people somewhere are not very happy about this video. Just ask Mr. Far-Right Mc Facist Pants:

"Its horrible! Everytime you post these kinds of videos someone's boss loses thier SUV or luxury vehicle equivalent! They'll be like angel's without wings and they'll never get to drive back up to heaven ever again. So tell your csi-loving pastor or local cyber investigator/internet troll for jesus about anyone who posts video's like these so they can have them profiled as terrorists like they deserve."

Ouch, that'll teach those darn animal humping tree huggers Mr. FacistPants, you tell em.




http://video.stumbleupon.com/#p=vasilzyqyq

Many thanks are in order to the young James Cameron for his stunning contribution to the history of science fiction cinema. Consider me a fan but if you have any sort of biologist deep down inside you than you will love Avatar. It deals a serious blow to all those "desk bound people with their hearts in a safe deposit box and their eyes hypnotized by desk calculators"