Once I noticed I was on fire, I decided to relax and enjoy the fall

Yet I hate Christmas

Comments are enabled for now. If I get too many proselytizing for the holiday, I will turn them off. I have heard it all already, heard it all. I understand you have good and noble reasons for your love for it. I accept that they are valid. Update: No more comments.

I can't even put it into words anymore how much I hate it. Hate it with all of my being. Have always hated it, from the time I was old enough to realize I was to be dragged to another gathering of my drunken, self-loathing relations, to witness yet another attempt to pretend we had anything like peace on Earth and goodwill to men. I hated the pagan Odin-stand in that was repeatedly crammed down my throat. I hated the idiotic tree we'd cut down and stick in the house to shed needles everywhere. I hated the lights. I hated listening to the songs. I hated the rants about the materialism of the holiday and the anti-Christianity of it. I hated listening to the back and forth bullshit about which side of the family to spend which day with.

I hated it when I realized it was just Saturnalia in new clothes, that Christ wasn't born anywhere near it, that in fact the most significant Christian holiday is and always will be Easter, the celebration of Christ's death and resurrection. I hated the arguments as to whether or not Haddon Sundblom designed the modern Santa Claus. I hated the encroachment of the holiday earlier and earlier each yet. I hated that everyone expected me to enjoy it whether or not I did, and any attempt to just beg off was totally and completely ignored. All I want, every year, is just to avoid it. That's all. You go on and do whatever you're going to do. Please leave me alone.

I hate it even more now that the two blood relations I might possibly have wanted to share it with are dead. I hate having to hear about it. Hate it with a fire and a zeal matched only by Puritans. I do not seek to burn down your trees, or cast your presents into the wind. I do not seek to take out billboards denouncing the holiday. I do not care what you do. Go ahead and get the brotherhood and love for all out of your systems now so you can go back to however you act the rest of the year, however that is.

I hate the claymation specials. I hate that the very interesting life of the actual Saint Nicholas (whose day is the day before my birthday, December 6th) is erased. I hate that a man who really did amazing things, who may have confronted Emperors and who certainly helped shape the course of Christianity in all of Europe for over a thousand years, is now a shill for soda and razors. I hate that people assume that children need to be handed a colorful parody rather than any sense of the actual man, the actual history of the day, or any of it.

I hate listening to people tell me how special and magical this time of year is. I have seen blessed little of this special magic. I do not believe in it. I do not share it. I do not want it. I think all men are brothers all year long. I believe in peace on Earth and good will towards men just because they sound like good ideas. These are not seasonal, they are constants. They are ideals that require constant toil and effort to manifest. If you want to have a party once a year and pretend they have magically winked into existence, go right ahead. But stop pretending that makes you some sort of magical crusader for the children, because it does not. Stop attempting to drag us all into your delusional haze of happiness. We are not all happy. We do not all share your beliefs, your desires, or your festivity.

I hate Christmas. I realize that doesn't matter. So please, understand that your love for it will not matter, either. I will hate it all the days of my life with the special hate of someone who just wants to be left alone and is not. I have been unable to do anything since Halloween, now, without being reminded, sometimes forcibly by people who should know better, that Christmas is coming. Christmas is coming, Christmas is coming, Christmas is coming like Godzilla through Tokyo and if Christmas is for you a series of memories of people screaming at each other and the image of a perfectly executed flying tackle from an outraged mother taking your uncle in his ill-fitting red Santa outfit down like Troy Aikman at a Raiders game tough luck for you, Jack. I have spent Christmas on the floor of a barn, in an apartment with a girl I literally just met that month, in a car driving to nowhere in particular and hoping I hit a tree, in a dingy apartment fending off the phone calls from a demented father offering me a place in the shelter when the end of the world rolled around, I have spent it walking alone watching the snow bury the house my grandmother lived in as the flames licked away at the rooftop. It has been painful and sublime. It has never been a time I wanted to treat like some magical force had been unleashed, a time for peace and brotherhood.

I have read many, many arguments for Christmas recently. How it is special because it is for the children...and never mind that buying a few well-placed presents does nothing to patch over or fix any problems that might exist between a parent and a child. How it is a time for families to come together...disregarding the idea that if your family is close there does not need to be such a time and if it is not, there should not be one. Finally, I have read that it is the season of brotherhood and forgiveness and love, and I have wanted to scream You have to love all the time, the whole world, you have to love everyone all the time and know they are your family always or it just doesn't work.

You have to love them even if they don't worship the same God. You have to love them even if they hate you. You have to love them because they are human, because they are trapped in the same flesh and live in the same world and suffer the same doubt and loss and pain and confusion and know as little as you do. By all means, enjoy the big party. I would not see people lose something that they enjoy, because there's precious little joy in the world at times. But the presents and the egg nog and the tinsel are all immaterial, and they do nothing to cheer a surprisingly large minority of people who really find it rather painful to be told that for one day, we are all brothers and love is the rule. We don't want it for one day. We want it forever.

Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you
Matthew 5:43-44, The King James Bible

I hate Christmas. I don't hate anyone for celebrating it, whatever their reasons. I don't hate you for it, whoever you are. I don't think you should stop, I don't go around telling children that the real Saint Nicholas died in what is now Turkey 1600 years ago. I don't want to steal your holiday. But it is not mine and it never will be mine and it does nothing to improve my love for my fellow men, and trying to make me celebrate when I do not feel the urge is unlikely to work. Sooner would I enjoy the ministrations of a nest of aggravated wasps than the desperate insistence of those determined to light the whole world with the reflected glow of the holiday season. If we're all worthy of love one night a year, why not always? Have your carols and your sleigh rides and your yule logs...hell, make up whole new Christmas traditions if you choose. Go wild. See if you can eat more fruitcake than anyone else. Have Mistletoe kissing contests.

I hate Christmas. I have always hated it. I will always hate it. I hate it with the fury of a smart child forced to sit on the lap of a sodden drunk and recite a list of gifts I did not want. You will not convince me to change my opinion and I do not want to change yours. But just because you do not agree with me, that does not make me wrong. I hate it, and I will hate it, and I always, always have. There was one child, at least, who always despised it. So if it's the children you want to preserve it for, you should take the time and make sure they actually want you to.

Yet I hate Christmas

Comments are enabled for now. If I get too many proselytizing for the holiday, I will turn them off. I have heard it all already, heard it all. I understand you have good and noble reasons for your love for it. I accept that they are valid. Update: No more comments.

I can't even put it into words anymore how much I hate it. Hate it with all of my being. Have always hated it, from the time I was old enough to realize I was to be dragged to another gathering of my drunken, self-loathing relations, to witness yet another attempt to pretend we had anything like peace on Earth and goodwill to men. I hated the pagan Odin-stand in that was repeatedly crammed down my throat. I hated the idiotic tree we'd cut down and stick in the house to shed needles everywhere. I hated the lights. I hated listening to the songs. I hated the rants about the materialism of the holiday and the anti-Christianity of it. I hated listening to the back and forth bullshit about which side of the family to spend which day with.

I hated it when I realized it was just Saturnalia in new clothes, that Christ wasn't born anywhere near it, that in fact the most significant Christian holiday is and always will be Easter, the celebration of Christ's death and resurrection. I hated the arguments as to whether or not Haddon Sundblom designed the modern Santa Claus. I hated the encroachment of the holiday earlier and earlier each yet. I hated that everyone expected me to enjoy it whether or not I did, and any attempt to just beg off was totally and completely ignored. All I want, every year, is just to avoid it. That's all. You go on and do whatever you're going to do. Please leave me alone.

I hate it even more now that the two blood relations I might possibly have wanted to share it with are dead. I hate having to hear about it. Hate it with a fire and a zeal matched only by Puritans. I do not seek to burn down your trees, or cast your presents into the wind. I do not seek to take out billboards denouncing the holiday. I do not care what you do. Go ahead and get the brotherhood and love for all out of your systems now so you can go back to however you act the rest of the year, however that is.

I hate the claymation specials. I hate that the very interesting life of the actual Saint Nicholas (whose day is the day before my birthday, December 6th) is erased. I hate that a man who really did amazing things, who may have confronted Emperors and who certainly helped shape the course of Christianity in all of Europe for over a thousand years, is now a shill for soda and razors. I hate that people assume that children need to be handed a colorful parody rather than any sense of the actual man, the actual history of the day, or any of it.

I hate listening to people tell me how special and magical this time of year is. I have seen blessed little of this special magic. I do not believe in it. I do not share it. I do not want it. I think all men are brothers all year long. I believe in peace on Earth and good will towards men just because they sound like good ideas. These are not seasonal, they are constants. They are ideals that require constant toil and effort to manifest. If you want to have a party once a year and pretend they have magically winked into existence, go right ahead. But stop pretending that makes you some sort of magical crusader for the children, because it does not. Stop attempting to drag us all into your delusional haze of happiness. We are not all happy. We do not all share your beliefs, your desires, or your festivity.

I hate Christmas. I realize that doesn't matter. So please, understand that your love for it will not matter, either. I will hate it all the days of my life with the special hate of someone who just wants to be left alone and is not. I have been unable to do anything since Halloween, now, without being reminded, sometimes forcibly by people who should know better, that Christmas is coming. Christmas is coming, Christmas is coming, Christmas is coming like Godzilla through Tokyo and if Christmas is for you a series of memories of people screaming at each other and the image of a perfectly executed flying tackle from an outraged mother taking your uncle in his ill-fitting red Santa outfit down like Troy Aikman at a Raiders game tough luck for you, Jack. I have spent Christmas on the floor of a barn, in an apartment with a girl I literally just met that month, in a car driving to nowhere in particular and hoping I hit a tree, in a dingy apartment fending off the phone calls from a demented father offering me a place in the shelter when the end of the world rolled around, I have spent it walking alone watching the snow bury the house my grandmother lived in as the flames licked away at the rooftop. It has been painful and sublime. It has never been a time I wanted to treat like some magical force had been unleashed, a time for peace and brotherhood.

I have read many, many arguments for Christmas recently. How it is special because it is for the children...and never mind that buying a few well-placed presents does nothing to patch over or fix any problems that might exist between a parent and a child. How it is a time for families to come together...disregarding the idea that if your family is close there does not need to be such a time and if it is not, there should not be one. Finally, I have read that it is the season of brotherhood and forgiveness and love, and I have wanted to scream You have to love all the time, the whole world, you have to love everyone all the time and know they are your family always or it just doesn't work.

You have to love them even if they don't worship the same God. You have to love them even if they hate you. You have to love them because they are human, because they are trapped in the same flesh and live in the same world and suffer the same doubt and loss and pain and confusion and know as little as you do. By all means, enjoy the big party. I would not see people lose something that they enjoy, because there's precious little joy in the world at times. But the presents and the egg nog and the tinsel are all immaterial, and they do nothing to cheer a surprisingly large minority of people who really find it rather painful to be told that for one day, we are all brothers and love is the rule. We don't want it for one day. We want it forever.

Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you
Matthew 5:43-44, The King James Bible

I hate Christmas. I don't hate anyone for celebrating it, whatever their reasons. I don't hate you for it, whoever you are. I don't think you should stop, I don't go around telling children that the real Saint Nicholas died in what is now Turkey 1600 years ago. I don't want to steal your holiday. But it is not mine and it never will be mine and it does nothing to improve my love for my fellow men, and trying to make me celebrate when I do not feel the urge is unlikely to work. Sooner would I enjoy the ministrations of a nest of aggravated wasps than the desperate insistence of those determined to light the whole world with the reflected glow of the holiday season. If we're all worthy of love one night a year, why not always? Have your carols and your sleigh rides and your yule logs...hell, make up whole new Christmas traditions if you choose. Go wild. See if you can eat more fruitcake than anyone else. Have Mistletoe kissing contests.

I hate Christmas. I have always hated it. I will always hate it. I hate it with the fury of a smart child forced to sit on the lap of a sodden drunk and recite a list of gifts I did not want. You will not convince me to change my opinion and I do not want to change yours. But just because you do not agree with me, that does not make me wrong. I hate it, and I will hate it, and I always, always have. There was one child, at least, who always despised it. So if it's the children you want to preserve it for, you should take the time and make sure they actually want you to.

The Dream

For starters, you're all dead in it.

I walk, and there are no roads left but scourged earth, with cracks where the diseased plants fight to live, fight for sun, fight to reach the open air even though that air is sick with rotting smells that cling to everything. The eyesockets of children whiten in the sun, which does not have to worry that its rays shall be attenuated by silliness like an ozone layer...the cockroaches that share the earth with me bask in the pure mutagenic fury of the forge of evolution, the radiation that knocks DNA into new forms. I walk, and step over the bodies.

Occasionally I see someone I recognize. Like when I see the corpse of my first college crush hanging from a cross, crucified. Because she did not sign some loyalty oath, I muse, or just because someone was in the mood for atrocity. I do not know. Her long black hair, like coiled smoke, still drifts in waves down the nape of her neck. She has only begun to bloat, so she must not have been dead long. Her skin twitches and pulses from things inside that eat her. Sticky clumps of drying blood trail down the cross. I contemplate taking her down, but I have no tools to dig her a grave and no way to wrench the iron beams out of the earth. I continue to walk. For some reason, the smell of fires in the distance do not concern me much, and the radioactive dust that falls like grey snow does not kill me. I appear to be doomed to walk, and walk is what I do.

I come to a river choked with dead, human and otherwise. Some animals, mainly insects and arachnids, seem to be thriving but everything else is dying or dead. I literally use the rancid bodies of my fellow man to cross the black, putrid stain that was once a waterway.

There must have been reasons for all this. The miles of barbed wire encircling hastily erected shacks, now burned or half-burned, piles of meat which once had names and faces and dreams left in mounds that remind me of the Cahokia people, some rotten, some eaten, some burned. I don't ever seem to remember why these people were in camps. Some of the bodies have uniforms, others are naked and livid with purple and yellow marks the shape of human boots, human fists, and implements. There seems to be no defining characteristic seperating the groups...but they are dead. I suppose they may have been stripped away by time. I could be missing a vital clue that would explain. It seems pointless enough now.

I come to a man and a woman in each other's arms. Pieces of them are missing...their faces, a great deal of their torsos, the coiling grey and red ribbons of their innards torn apart, much of their soft tissue gone. I can't tell if they were embracing or struggling.

I don't know what killed them. I muse on this...holy war? Were we defending ourselves against attack and it got out of hand? It seems like someone launched the nukes, but I don't know that. I don't know if it matters afterwards. The dead don't seem particularly interested in who killed them, and for some reason, I have either forgotten or I missed it entirely. I walk by Keith Richards, who is playing a guitar for an attentive group of spiders and scorpions. He nods as I pass by. The song is Paint it Black. I half expect to walk by a half-sunken Statue of Liberty with the head of an ape, but apparently Keith is the only bit of levity I'll be getting.

I reach the edge of the world. I know it's the edge by the great grey mountains of water that crest and pound against the frail brown rocks that jut in defiance of fate out into that anger. I remember Frost. Did God finally say Put out the light or did we preempt him? There are things moving in that ocean that are not right and never were, things with fins and tentacles and flukes all together, and the sky that is hanging above it all looks like a drab belly stabbed many, many times leaking the light of its blood down on me. I can't walk any further, save towards those slick teeth biting back against the waves as they slam down.

I don't ever want to have this dream again.

I have had it every time I have slept the past week.

The Dream

For starters, you're all dead in it.

I walk, and there are no roads left but scourged earth, with cracks where the diseased plants fight to live, fight for sun, fight to reach the open air even though that air is sick with rotting smells that cling to everything. The eyesockets of children whiten in the sun, which does not have to worry that its rays shall be attenuated by silliness like an ozone layer...the cockroaches that share the earth with me bask in the pure mutagenic fury of the forge of evolution, the radiation that knocks DNA into new forms. I walk, and step over the bodies.

Occasionally I see someone I recognize. Like when I see the corpse of my first college crush hanging from a cross, crucified. Because she did not sign some loyalty oath, I muse, or just because someone was in the mood for atrocity. I do not know. Her long black hair, like coiled smoke, still drifts in waves down the nape of her neck. She has only begun to bloat, so she must not have been dead long. Her skin twitches and pulses from things inside that eat her. Sticky clumps of drying blood trail down the cross. I contemplate taking her down, but I have no tools to dig her a grave and no way to wrench the iron beams out of the earth. I continue to walk. For some reason, the smell of fires in the distance do not concern me much, and the radioactive dust that falls like grey snow does not kill me. I appear to be doomed to walk, and walk is what I do.

I come to a river choked with dead, human and otherwise. Some animals, mainly insects and arachnids, seem to be thriving but everything else is dying or dead. I literally use the rancid bodies of my fellow man to cross the black, putrid stain that was once a waterway.

There must have been reasons for all this. The miles of barbed wire encircling hastily erected shacks, now burned or half-burned, piles of meat which once had names and faces and dreams left in mounds that remind me of the Cahokia people, some rotten, some eaten, some burned. I don't ever seem to remember why these people were in camps. Some of the bodies have uniforms, others are naked and livid with purple and yellow marks the shape of human boots, human fists, and implements. There seems to be no defining characteristic seperating the groups...but they are dead. I suppose they may have been stripped away by time. I could be missing a vital clue that would explain. It seems pointless enough now.

I come to a man and a woman in each other's arms. Pieces of them are missing...their faces, a great deal of their torsos, the coiling grey and red ribbons of their innards torn apart, much of their soft tissue gone. I can't tell if they were embracing or struggling.

I don't know what killed them. I muse on this...holy war? Were we defending ourselves against attack and it got out of hand? It seems like someone launched the nukes, but I don't know that. I don't know if it matters afterwards. The dead don't seem particularly interested in who killed them, and for some reason, I have either forgotten or I missed it entirely. I walk by Keith Richards, who is playing a guitar for an attentive group of spiders and scorpions. He nods as I pass by. The song is Paint it Black. I half expect to walk by a half-sunken Statue of Liberty with the head of an ape, but apparently Keith is the only bit of levity I'll be getting.

I reach the edge of the world. I know it's the edge by the great grey mountains of water that crest and pound against the frail brown rocks that jut in defiance of fate out into that anger. I remember Frost. Did God finally say Put out the light or did we preempt him? There are things moving in that ocean that are not right and never were, things with fins and tentacles and flukes all together, and the sky that is hanging above it all looks like a drab belly stabbed many, many times leaking the light of its blood down on me. I can't walk any further, save towards those slick teeth biting back against the waves as they slam down.

I don't ever want to have this dream again.

I have had it every time I have slept the past week.

It does not care (with thanks to Xkot)

This is AIDS.

I saw this at Xkot.net and I had to take part. I ordinarily don't participate in much of the weblog fads, but AIDS has a chunk of my life and I suspect it always will. AIDS killed one of my mother's best friends, it killed one of the men who destroyed any sense of innocence I might have retained out of my childhood, and it has gone on to kill many, many others. I have known those who thought they were immune, that it could not happen to them...and to one of them, it did. Despite what some might believe, AIDS makes no moral choices as to who to kill. It did not only strike down those that displeased God. It does not target you based on who you love or have sex with. It's not in the least bit concerned with your recreational drug habit. I'm not going to sit here and elucidate the relationship between HIV and AIDS...that's what the link to the faq is for...but I will say that AIDS has no more concern for your ethical or moral purity than does Anthrax or Smallpox. AIDS is what happens to your body when the infection begins destroying your ability to hold off disease. That's it. I'm sure there are plenty of people who would like to think that the man who raped me died of it as a punishment, but let me ask you this: what kind of punishment would that be, exactly, to kill a rapist with an incurable (and at that time, not even very treatable) disease that he could pass on to those he raped? I've spent the past decade getting tested every time I go to the doctor or get blood drawn, and believe me, when I was ill with a completely unrelated problem and I didn't know what it was, I had plenty of time to see every flaw on my body and every twinge or ache as a symptom of my death, because AIDS doesn't care who did what to whom.

It kills because it is a disease. Not because it was sent to scourge the planet of the wicked, nor because anyone was asking for it. It kills because it is a disease. Not because it has a problem with how people have sex, or because it finds intravenous drug use unacceptable. It's caused by an infectious agent that transmits itself via blood and bodily fluids. That's all. It killed those that it has killed merely because that is what it does. It is killing now, in Africa, in Europe, in Asia, in North America...it is killing now, worldwide, and it doesn't discriminate. There are people out in the world right now who ignore the precautionary steps, who think that it could never happen to them, who won't wear condoms, won't get tested, won't avoid shooting up, and some of those people already have it. Only because it spreads via blood and bodily secretions, only because it is caused by a virus that spreads via the medium of blood, only because it is a disease and diseases infect.

I can't say how it made me feel to see AIDS on a man's face, but I'll try anyway. I saw him die, even though he was still alive. I hated him. I wanted him to die for what he took from me, what he kept me from being, for the year of violation and the lifetime of rage and hate and fear I feel all the days of my life from those days to this one and probably well beyond. I wanted him to die. AIDS stole even that from me, stole any possibly joy I could have taken in his suffering, stole it in lesions inside his brain and growths on his skin and the scraping, groaning, satanic hiss of his useless lungs as he begged the air to come inside him. Machines to do everything the body needs to keep going, and even they couldn't keep him alive. He'd become simultaneously undead and cybernetic, and there wasn't even enough left of him to hate. Add to that the gift of fear, of knowing how what killed him killed, of forever wondering if it was now inside of me waiting for its moment to erupt in an orgy of cellular death. Would I have to watch as my limbs withered, as my skin swelled in small purple sarcoma, would I have to experience feeling my throat and lungs become coated and useless and the tissues of my brain as they were eaten away?

There's nothing here but death. No morality. No judgement. It would kill us all if it could get into us. It does not care. It is just a disease. And it is killing right now, and it will kill again tomorrow, and the next day, unless we do to it what it would do to us. This is no tool of the Lord. This is a disease. No matter what you think, no matter who you pray to, if you aren't careful you could well wind up knowing it far more intimately than you could ever want to. No one is immune.

It does not care (with thanks to Xkot)

This is AIDS.

I saw this at Xkot.net and I had to take part. I ordinarily don't participate in much of the weblog fads, but AIDS has a chunk of my life and I suspect it always will. AIDS killed one of my mother's best friends, it killed one of the men who destroyed any sense of innocence I might have retained out of my childhood, and it has gone on to kill many, many others. I have known those who thought they were immune, that it could not happen to them...and to one of them, it did. Despite what some might believe, AIDS makes no moral choices as to who to kill. It did not only strike down those that displeased God. It does not target you based on who you love or have sex with. It's not in the least bit concerned with your recreational drug habit. I'm not going to sit here and elucidate the relationship between HIV and AIDS...that's what the link to the faq is for...but I will say that AIDS has no more concern for your ethical or moral purity than does Anthrax or Smallpox. AIDS is what happens to your body when the infection begins destroying your ability to hold off disease. That's it. I'm sure there are plenty of people who would like to think that the man who raped me died of it as a punishment, but let me ask you this: what kind of punishment would that be, exactly, to kill a rapist with an incurable (and at that time, not even very treatable) disease that he could pass on to those he raped? I've spent the past decade getting tested every time I go to the doctor or get blood drawn, and believe me, when I was ill with a completely unrelated problem and I didn't know what it was, I had plenty of time to see every flaw on my body and every twinge or ache as a symptom of my death, because AIDS doesn't care who did what to whom.

It kills because it is a disease. Not because it was sent to scourge the planet of the wicked, nor because anyone was asking for it. It kills because it is a disease. Not because it has a problem with how people have sex, or because it finds intravenous drug use unacceptable. It's caused by an infectious agent that transmits itself via blood and bodily fluids. That's all. It killed those that it has killed merely because that is what it does. It is killing now, in Africa, in Europe, in Asia, in North America...it is killing now, worldwide, and it doesn't discriminate. There are people out in the world right now who ignore the precautionary steps, who think that it could never happen to them, who won't wear condoms, won't get tested, won't avoid shooting up, and some of those people already have it. Only because it spreads via blood and bodily secretions, only because it is caused by a virus that spreads via the medium of blood, only because it is a disease and diseases infect.

I can't say how it made me feel to see AIDS on a man's face, but I'll try anyway. I saw him die, even though he was still alive. I hated him. I wanted him to die for what he took from me, what he kept me from being, for the year of violation and the lifetime of rage and hate and fear I feel all the days of my life from those days to this one and probably well beyond. I wanted him to die. AIDS stole even that from me, stole any possibly joy I could have taken in his suffering, stole it in lesions inside his brain and growths on his skin and the scraping, groaning, satanic hiss of his useless lungs as he begged the air to come inside him. Machines to do everything the body needs to keep going, and even they couldn't keep him alive. He'd become simultaneously undead and cybernetic, and there wasn't even enough left of him to hate. Add to that the gift of fear, of knowing how what killed him killed, of forever wondering if it was now inside of me waiting for its moment to erupt in an orgy of cellular death. Would I have to watch as my limbs withered, as my skin swelled in small purple sarcoma, would I have to experience feeling my throat and lungs become coated and useless and the tissues of my brain as they were eaten away?

There's nothing here but death. No morality. No judgement. It would kill us all if it could get into us. It does not care. It is just a disease. And it is killing right now, and it will kill again tomorrow, and the next day, unless we do to it what it would do to us. This is no tool of the Lord. This is a disease. No matter what you think, no matter who you pray to, if you aren't careful you could well wind up knowing it far more intimately than you could ever want to. No one is immune.

Why I hate the Holiday Season

I could claim it was due to the week they closed the dorms for Thanksgiving and I was forced to live in my car eating a can of spam a day and drinking a case of Jolt from Wednesday until Sunday, having no place to go that year (my grandma having taken a rare vacation to go see Europe finally and my father and I not getting along). I could tell you that it's because I despise the commercialization of the whole event, or the way we seem to have totally lost sight of the whole ideals of these holidays (the Let's give thanks/celebrate the birth of the Christ Child aspects that get in the way of us recreating Saturnalia with gigantic floats and brightly colored lights, not to mention the insane feeding frenzies and the berserk assaults on Fortress Mall we stage every year like lemmings with credit cards) or even because I dislike being told when and how to celebrate my feelings of love and brotherhood for my fellow humans. All of that shit sounds good, has a great mountain of validity behind it and lets me assume a superior air when the constant hammering of cartoon turkeys and claymation reindeers starts up. I could even pretend I'm offended by the whole Let's celebrate the erosive process of the conquest of the North American continent that began with the first Thanksgiving deal, but since the holiday has practically nothing to do with that story (being more of a recreation of the old harvest festivals of Europe anyway, which could be seen as an oblique assault on the traditions of the natives...Thanksgiving as magical attack) anyway, I don't really think about that as much as I probably should.

But it's bullshit. Self-serving, self-satisfied bullshit.

I hate the holidays purely because you like them. (Obviously, I don't mean you specifically, but rather a more general you.)

And you're so fucking annoying about it, too, with your Christmas specials (I don't fucking care if the Smurfs discover the true meaning of Christmas, okay? They're little blue golems created by a mad wizard with a cat familiar named after the damn Angel of Death and so, their status vis-a-vis correct implementation of giving and sharing is completely unimportant to me) and your parades (look, just eat the damn turkey, okay? Is it so damn hard? You eat it. You don't create gigantic effigies, almost as if attempting to propiate the unholy ghost army of pissed off turkeys that are preparing to descend upon us...hmm, wait a minute...maybe that is what we're doing, confusing the avatars of Garuda and the animal fathers that we have turkey permission for the feast...sneaky Macy's) and the sheer clogged arteries of commerce making it impossible to get in and out of the store to buy a damn notebook without experiencing what it's like to be a red blood cell in Marlon Brando's left ventricle.

I'm aware how petty I am, by the way. I'm also aware you aren't going to stop loving them. I'm not asking you to. I am putting you all on notice that the next person who expects me to join in is going to get a candy cane enema. (Oh, how I wish I could, honestly...) Seriously, sure, y'all should enjoy your holidays, honestly. I wish you the best of luck and the best of health and I hope you have a great time. But man, I would love it if everyone would throttle back a little bit. Give those of us who have memories some breathing room, like the time my mom tried to kill Santa Claus because he was my uncle Paul and he'd pinched her ass (and man, it was quite a sight to see Santa hurdle the couch only to find himself tackled and dragged down like a wildebeest by my mom, who then began tearing his wig and fake beard off only to be bodily dragged off of him by my dad...for years, I thought the song was I saw mommy killing Santa Clause over by the presents last night) or the whole episode where one of my aunts got so angry at my grandmother that she stole the turkey and drove to her house with it. Her house was in Florida, by the way. Yes, she took the turkey and drove down the eastern seaboard of the United States with it.

These are the things I imagine when people start talking about the holidays. So now I hope you can understand why I tend to hide under a rock and wait for them to be over.

Why I hate the Holiday Season

I could claim it was due to the week they closed the dorms for Thanksgiving and I was forced to live in my car eating a can of spam a day and drinking a case of Jolt from Wednesday until Sunday, having no place to go that year (my grandma having taken a rare vacation to go see Europe finally and my father and I not getting along). I could tell you that it's because I despise the commercialization of the whole event, or the way we seem to have totally lost sight of the whole ideals of these holidays (the Let's give thanks/celebrate the birth of the Christ Child aspects that get in the way of us recreating Saturnalia with gigantic floats and brightly colored lights, not to mention the insane feeding frenzies and the berserk assaults on Fortress Mall we stage every year like lemmings with credit cards) or even because I dislike being told when and how to celebrate my feelings of love and brotherhood for my fellow humans. All of that shit sounds good, has a great mountain of validity behind it and lets me assume a superior air when the constant hammering of cartoon turkeys and claymation reindeers starts up. I could even pretend I'm offended by the whole Let's celebrate the erosive process of the conquest of the North American continent that began with the first Thanksgiving deal, but since the holiday has practically nothing to do with that story (being more of a recreation of the old harvest festivals of Europe anyway, which could be seen as an oblique assault on the traditions of the natives...Thanksgiving as magical attack) anyway, I don't really think about that as much as I probably should.

But it's bullshit. Self-serving, self-satisfied bullshit.

I hate the holidays purely because you like them. (Obviously, I don't mean you specifically, but rather a more general you.)

And you're so fucking annoying about it, too, with your Christmas specials (I don't fucking care if the Smurfs discover the true meaning of Christmas, okay? They're little blue golems created by a mad wizard with a cat familiar named after the damn Angel of Death and so, their status vis-a-vis correct implementation of giving and sharing is completely unimportant to me) and your parades (look, just eat the damn turkey, okay? Is it so damn hard? You eat it. You don't create gigantic effigies, almost as if attempting to propiate the unholy ghost army of pissed off turkeys that are preparing to descend upon us...hmm, wait a minute...maybe that is what we're doing, confusing the avatars of Garuda and the animal fathers that we have turkey permission for the feast...sneaky Macy's) and the sheer clogged arteries of commerce making it impossible to get in and out of the store to buy a damn notebook without experiencing what it's like to be a red blood cell in Marlon Brando's left ventricle.

I'm aware how petty I am, by the way. I'm also aware you aren't going to stop loving them. I'm not asking you to. I am putting you all on notice that the next person who expects me to join in is going to get a candy cane enema. (Oh, how I wish I could, honestly...) Seriously, sure, y'all should enjoy your holidays, honestly. I wish you the best of luck and the best of health and I hope you have a great time. But man, I would love it if everyone would throttle back a little bit. Give those of us who have memories some breathing room, like the time my mom tried to kill Santa Claus because he was my uncle Paul and he'd pinched her ass (and man, it was quite a sight to see Santa hurdle the couch only to find himself tackled and dragged down like a wildebeest by my mom, who then began tearing his wig and fake beard off only to be bodily dragged off of him by my dad...for years, I thought the song was I saw mommy killing Santa Clause over by the presents last night) or the whole episode where one of my aunts got so angry at my grandmother that she stole the turkey and drove to her house with it. Her house was in Florida, by the way. Yes, she took the turkey and drove down the eastern seaboard of the United States with it.

These are the things I imagine when people start talking about the holidays. So now I hope you can understand why I tend to hide under a rock and wait for them to be over.

An open letter to spammers...

What follows this paragraph is the (edited to remove email addresses) text of a spam email I recieved this afternoon and my response. I normally don't do this kind of thing, but I doubt this was actually intended as a private correspondence with me...in fact, I wouldn't be at all surprised if many of you reading this have seen this exact email recently. I know this won't stop these kinds of spam, and I'd be damn surprised if they responded although they may well do so, possibly even telling me that it isn't a scam of any kind. Perhaps even attempting to win me over by pointing out the moral deficiencies of the Nigerian government...I have no idea if Nigeria is particularly corrupt or evil and even if it is, I fail to see how stealing from them will make them become some sort of utopian democracy or whatever...but at any rate, here it is.

From:     
Sent:     Mon, 18 Nov 2002 17:31:16 -0500
To:       (Edited to remove the possibility of someone sending this 
person money)
Subject:  thanks

ATTENTION:

Dear 

This letter is  not intended to  cause anyembarrassment  in  whatever
form,  rather  is compelled to contact your esteemed self, following the 
knowledge  of
your high repute and trustworthiness firstly, I  must solicit your
confidentiality, this is  by virtue of  its nature as being utterly
confidential  and top  secret though I  know  that a transaction  of
this  magnitude  will make anyone apprehensive and worried,  but I  am
assuring you that all  will  be  well  at  the  end of the  day.  A bold
step taken  shall not be regretted I  assure you.



I  am  DR kabiru A. musa and  I  had a seven man tender board in  charge
of contract  awards and  payment approvals,  I came to know  of you
insearch of a reliable and reputable person to handle a very
confidential business transaction which involvesthe transfer  of a huge
sum  of money to  foreign account requiring maximum confidence.  My
colleagues and  I are top officials of the NIGERIA NATIONAL PETROLEUM
CORPORATION {NNPC)OUR DUTIES INCLUDE VETTING, EVALUATION AND FORESEEING 
THE MAINTENANCE OF  THE REFINERIES IN  ALL  THE DESIGNATED OIL
PIPELINES.



We are therefore soliciting for  your assistance to enable us transfer
into  your account  the said funds.The source of the fund  is as
follows;during the last Military regime here in Nigeria  this  committee
awarded a contract of US$400MILLION to a group of five construction
companies onbehalf ofthe NIGERIA NATIONAL  PETROLEUM CORPORATION (NNPC)
for the  construction of  the oil  pipelines in Kaduna,Port-Harcourt,
Warri refineries,  during this process my  colleagues  and  I 

deliberately inflated the  total  contract  sum  to the tune of
US$428MILLION with the intention of sharing the inflated sum  of US$28M.



 The government has since approved the  sum  of US$428M  for us as the
contract sum,  but since  the  contract  is  only  worth US$400M,  the
remaining US$28M is  what we intend to transfer  to  reliable and safe
offshore account, we are prohibited to  acquire the money  in our name
right now,  I  have  therefore been delegated as a matter  of  trust by
my  colleagues to  look for an oversea partnerinto  whose account we can
 transfer the sum  US$28MILLION.



My  colleagues and I  have  decided that  if  you/your company can 
bethe beneficiary of  this funds onour behalf,  you or your company 
will retain 20% of the  total sum US$28million while 75% will be  for us
the officials and remaining 5% will be  used for offsetting  all
debts/expenses incurred during this transaction.



We  have  decided that  this  transaction can  only proceed under the

following conditions:

1.That you treat this transaction with utmost secrecy  and
confidentiality  and conviction  of your transparent honesty.

 2. That  upon  the  receipt of  the  funds,  you will release the funds
as  instructed by  us after  you have  removed your share of 20%. 



Please acknowledge the receipt of  this letter  using the above
telephone [and  fax numbers.  I  will  bring  you into the nomenclature
of  this transaction  when  I have heard from  you.



Your urgent response will be highly appreciated  as we  are catching
onthe next  payment schedule for the financial  quarter.  Please be
assured that this transaction is  100%legal/risk free, only trust can
make the  reality  of  this transaction.

Best  regards.

ENG. K. M.MOHAMMED

My response, which I emailed to the address on the previous email: I'm really curious. Does anyone buy this? I mean, this scam's been covered in Newsweek, Time, on CNN...do you actually make money with it? Does anyone with a pulse and a functioning nervous system read an email that basically says "We want to defraud our government with your help" and then leap to provide you with the information to transfer money into...or out of...their accounts? Especially anyone with the transparent honesty you so praise, whatever that means? Is it a code for gullibility I've not heard before?

The idea that you would just send an email to a complete stranger and ask him or her to assist you in a monstrous crime to be committed against people who use force to control their nation, people likely to look ascance and possibly even violently upon such a theft aside, does anyone think that someone who would steal from their own nation can be trusted? I mean, would someone of the supposed repute and reliability you attribute to me (which is not mine, in any case, but really you have no way of knowing that) leap to aid you in your defrauding of others, much less participate in the revelation of their own financial data?

Furthermore, any rational human being would realize that I would be likely to keep all of the money in such a transaction. It would make far more sense for a prospective theif such as you think I am to close that account the second the money was in it and hide it. I certainly wouldn't give any of it back to you if I was at all covetous, which I would have to be in order to participate in any such scheme in the first place. Just off the top of my head, it occurs to me that a good plan would be to create a seed account with a minimum of disposable funds, give you the information, and allow you to either steal that small amount (which would give me a paper trail towards informing my government of your actions, which are illegal in this country) or to allow you to transfer the money and then keep it. It seems fraught with risk. Obviously, since I know you won't actually be sending any money, I see no reason to take that risk. But others must, I assume, or you wouldn't bother to keep sending these kinds of emails. How many do?

At any rate, no, I am not interested in stealing millions of dollars from the government of Nigeria, especially since I believe this to be a scam. However, even if I believed you were telling the truth, I have no interest in stealing from a military government that might well hunt me down and kill me for my crime at worst, and have me extradited for my theft and tried at best. Good luck in convincing other people of intergrity to steal so that you can steal from them, I suppose.

An open letter to spammers...

What follows this paragraph is the (edited to remove email addresses) text of a spam email I recieved this afternoon and my response. I normally don't do this kind of thing, but I doubt this was actually intended as a private correspondence with me...in fact, I wouldn't be at all surprised if many of you reading this have seen this exact email recently. I know this won't stop these kinds of spam, and I'd be damn surprised if they responded although they may well do so, possibly even telling me that it isn't a scam of any kind. Perhaps even attempting to win me over by pointing out the moral deficiencies of the Nigerian government...I have no idea if Nigeria is particularly corrupt or evil and even if it is, I fail to see how stealing from them will make them become some sort of utopian democracy or whatever...but at any rate, here it is.

From:     
Sent:     Mon, 18 Nov 2002 17:31:16 -0500
To:       (Edited to remove the possibility of someone sending this 
person money)
Subject:  thanks

ATTENTION:

Dear 

This letter is  not intended to  cause anyembarrassment  in  whatever
form,  rather  is compelled to contact your esteemed self, following the 
knowledge  of
your high repute and trustworthiness firstly, I  must solicit your
confidentiality, this is  by virtue of  its nature as being utterly
confidential  and top  secret though I  know  that a transaction  of
this  magnitude  will make anyone apprehensive and worried,  but I  am
assuring you that all  will  be  well  at  the  end of the  day.  A bold
step taken  shall not be regretted I  assure you.



I  am  DR kabiru A. musa and  I  had a seven man tender board in  charge
of contract  awards and  payment approvals,  I came to know  of you
insearch of a reliable and reputable person to handle a very
confidential business transaction which involvesthe transfer  of a huge
sum  of money to  foreign account requiring maximum confidence.  My
colleagues and  I are top officials of the NIGERIA NATIONAL PETROLEUM
CORPORATION {NNPC)OUR DUTIES INCLUDE VETTING, EVALUATION AND FORESEEING 
THE MAINTENANCE OF  THE REFINERIES IN  ALL  THE DESIGNATED OIL
PIPELINES.



We are therefore soliciting for  your assistance to enable us transfer
into  your account  the said funds.The source of the fund  is as
follows;during the last Military regime here in Nigeria  this  committee
awarded a contract of US$400MILLION to a group of five construction
companies onbehalf ofthe NIGERIA NATIONAL  PETROLEUM CORPORATION (NNPC)
for the  construction of  the oil  pipelines in Kaduna,Port-Harcourt,
Warri refineries,  during this process my  colleagues  and  I 

deliberately inflated the  total  contract  sum  to the tune of
US$428MILLION with the intention of sharing the inflated sum  of US$28M.



 The government has since approved the  sum  of US$428M  for us as the
contract sum,  but since  the  contract  is  only  worth US$400M,  the
remaining US$28M is  what we intend to transfer  to  reliable and safe
offshore account, we are prohibited to  acquire the money  in our name
right now,  I  have  therefore been delegated as a matter  of  trust by
my  colleagues to  look for an oversea partnerinto  whose account we can
 transfer the sum  US$28MILLION.



My  colleagues and I  have  decided that  if  you/your company can 
bethe beneficiary of  this funds onour behalf,  you or your company 
will retain 20% of the  total sum US$28million while 75% will be  for us
the officials and remaining 5% will be  used for offsetting  all
debts/expenses incurred during this transaction.



We  have  decided that  this  transaction can  only proceed under the

following conditions:

1.That you treat this transaction with utmost secrecy  and
confidentiality  and conviction  of your transparent honesty.

 2. That  upon  the  receipt of  the  funds,  you will release the funds
as  instructed by  us after  you have  removed your share of 20%. 



Please acknowledge the receipt of  this letter  using the above
telephone [and  fax numbers.  I  will  bring  you into the nomenclature
of  this transaction  when  I have heard from  you.



Your urgent response will be highly appreciated  as we  are catching
onthe next  payment schedule for the financial  quarter.  Please be
assured that this transaction is  100%legal/risk free, only trust can
make the  reality  of  this transaction.

Best  regards.

ENG. K. M.MOHAMMED

My response, which I emailed to the address on the previous email: I'm really curious. Does anyone buy this? I mean, this scam's been covered in Newsweek, Time, on CNN...do you actually make money with it? Does anyone with a pulse and a functioning nervous system read an email that basically says "We want to defraud our government with your help" and then leap to provide you with the information to transfer money into...or out of...their accounts? Especially anyone with the transparent honesty you so praise, whatever that means? Is it a code for gullibility I've not heard before?

The idea that you would just send an email to a complete stranger and ask him or her to assist you in a monstrous crime to be committed against people who use force to control their nation, people likely to look ascance and possibly even violently upon such a theft aside, does anyone think that someone who would steal from their own nation can be trusted? I mean, would someone of the supposed repute and reliability you attribute to me (which is not mine, in any case, but really you have no way of knowing that) leap to aid you in your defrauding of others, much less participate in the revelation of their own financial data?

Furthermore, any rational human being would realize that I would be likely to keep all of the money in such a transaction. It would make far more sense for a prospective theif such as you think I am to close that account the second the money was in it and hide it. I certainly wouldn't give any of it back to you if I was at all covetous, which I would have to be in order to participate in any such scheme in the first place. Just off the top of my head, it occurs to me that a good plan would be to create a seed account with a minimum of disposable funds, give you the information, and allow you to either steal that small amount (which would give me a paper trail towards informing my government of your actions, which are illegal in this country) or to allow you to transfer the money and then keep it. It seems fraught with risk. Obviously, since I know you won't actually be sending any money, I see no reason to take that risk. But others must, I assume, or you wouldn't bother to keep sending these kinds of emails. How many do?

At any rate, no, I am not interested in stealing millions of dollars from the government of Nigeria, especially since I believe this to be a scam. However, even if I believed you were telling the truth, I have no interest in stealing from a military government that might well hunt me down and kill me for my crime at worst, and have me extradited for my theft and tried at best. Good luck in convincing other people of intergrity to steal so that you can steal from them, I suppose.