Since I have been volunteering over at the local VA Hospital here in Chicago the more and more I take the side of the Vets vs. our own government. Some might ask, Aren’t both the same? I am sorry to say the answer is a solid NO, Vets as much as our elected leaders tell us differently get the worse of it. Don’t get me wrong if they are an inpatient at the VA hospital they get great care and all their meds are 100% covered. But what I am talking about is the stuff I clearly see. The quality of care is institutional at best, you know there is sometimes a 4-hour wait or longer just to see a doctor, and getting their meds can sometimes take hours. What every Vet has ever said to me that they should get the option to see a doctor in their neighborhood. I know Trump made a big deal out of this last year when he signed that Executive Order. But the reality of it is quite different, it only applies if you live 20 or more miles away from a VA hospital, and even then everything has to be approved by a VA doctor and yes this has cost lives. But yet no one will do anything, like the food at the hospital in the cafeteria. I will admit it’s about average for any hospital…meaning if it was replaced by a McDonalds it would be a step up in quality. Nearly everything on the menu is loaded with FAT, SALT, and SUGAR and we are talking about a place where most of the patients are on special diets. You know most of the staff there gets their food delivered.
Given all the budget cuts the VA has endured it is a fact the Volunteers are taking positions that the VA staff once occupied.
But that is not what caused me to write this piece.
World War 1 Memorial Service Trump doesn’t show up because it is raining. He was the only world leader who never came. Okay, Trump supporters back him up on that.
I know to some this means nothing (shutdown info), but I do have a presence on G+ and I do moderate the Greymuzzle group there. So this news took me by surprise, and have caused me to make my own plans. Not that you will see any difference here, except for my interest in video games will be seen more here. I love certain games, I won’t bore you with purchases, just to tell you if a game I get is good, weird or just plain sucks. I have noticed more and more are interested in retro games. Certainly, the buyers of retro games at my favorite gaming store have gotten noticeably younger.
You might have seen the post on social media or the subject on some sites of how the FBI did not investigate the Furry Fandom, and how someone found proof.
I kid you not that is longer than the actual post. But everyone is making this out to be a huge deal, me I just don’t get it. Why just ask yourself this why would the FBI conduct a criminal investigation of the Furry Fandom?
You can’t come up with an answer, can you? Neither can I but I know something that the other sites have either missed or just plain forgot. Remember that gas attack on MFF a few years back, I learned from one of the staff and I won’t say whom for. Told me that the FBI did check out the fandom, but in order to see if we had any enemies. They wore actual fursuits to some conventions bought furry items in the dealer’s area at certain cons and online.
There was no actual investigation they wanted to check out the fandom in general and see if some of the rumors were true.
Amazing no one even talks about that except for little me.
Recently Huffington Post did an article on Alt-Right Furries making it sound like what has become common place on Facebook. Namely the divisiveness, the name calling, taking sides. They even threw in Patch O’Furr, Deo, Pepe the Frog and the Furry Raiders. It’s hard to know who is acting like a bigger idiot. Where do you draw the line between getting your view known, and giving these idiots free publicity.
I have dealt with 2 of the 4 names I mention, and I would not let either one walk my dog. Now watch to see if they attack me, even though I did not mention them by name. That is why I say these groups want attention good or bad. 2 of them are complete idiots anyway, which is why I feel the hate comments coming.
99% of the furry fandom isn’t like this they just want to have a little innocent fun and leave the world and it’s problems at the door.
But still is that nasty and vile 1% who will do anything to get to see there view whether it is stealing someones meet, or making threats against a convention like some terrorist group. Just so they get people to talk about them.
One of the reason I don’t, normally talk about the Alt-Right or Leftists they just want publicity, like that nut job who runs the furry raiders. I call him that because what person in their right mind would try and join the american nazi party even though they don’t meet their standards.
It is getting so bad on social media in general my list of blocked names just get longer and longer. Social media is just blowing itself up to a point it is literally driving people away. As to the apps they are no better, many of them just have a personal agenda. Reason why I personally stay away from them, too many bad experiences.
Speaking of which and you don’t have to post an answer. Did you become a furry for fun or do you have a political agenda which your trying to ram down peoples throats?
Me it has always been for the fun, that is why I love fur cons so much.
Are you with the 1% of Haters or the 99% who just want to have fun…only you can decide
I will be eternally grateful to the Doctors, Nurses and PCTs of Weiss during my recent health crisis. Some of you might of seen a previous post regarding the same thing, but something really happened beyond my control and I think you deserve an explanation. It is true that I had Colitis, (an infection of the colon). Both the infection and the meds really did a number on me. I lost weight, I couldn’t eat or drink, plus the vomiting was horrible. Well I was healthy for a week up until I got sick again with the same problems. I literally went to the emergency room 4 times at 2 different hospitals. But still nobody could figure out why I was sick and frankly after a couple of weeks I thought I was going to die.
Call it “Last Resort” which it really was. I contacted a GI doctor and made an appointment. He was in the same building as another doctor I see, and it worked out I made the appointment so I could see one then the other. In between this I got a blood test. Really I want to personally thank Dr. Steiner for having the wisdom to check me for Thyroid issues.
By the time I saw my second doctor of the day. I was half out of it and frankly way tooo ill to go home and I was checked in to the nearby hospital.
Now get this 2 hours later Dr. Steiner was in my room telling me that signs pointed to a Thyroid issue. By the next morning it was confirmed I was Hyperthyroid.
Those 4 days I spent in the hospital I went from a wreck to back to nearly I was before all of this started. I still a bit weak and it maybe a couple of days more before I could return to work. But I will recover and I will be able to inform all you furries and non furries out there.
So…. You know that “malignant narcissist” I talked about? Turns out we have a lot in common now. Because neither of us are malignant narcissists. We’re just anti-bullshit people. I’ve been called a narcissist multiple times, when in reality I was anti-bullshit. Though, I admit I nearly embraced it at one time.
This will be a short article, but I can say without a doubt that those terms are thrown around far too much nowadays… mostly by the people who have the personality disorders to begin with, such as the Alt-Right, Alt-Left, and many of the CEOs and big celebrities. I’m not saying they all have them, but the ones with codependency because of the treatment they have been given are the only people I feel sorry for.
…Welp, hope you enjoyed this little article – And remember – Before you label someone, please make sure you aren’t projecting.
I recently noticed of how Pre MFF several local furries said that they weren’t going to MFF. Main had some pretty good reasons, bad experiences, the crowds, etc, etc. But yet on social media without exception they had posted photos if not directly taken in front of the hotel at least nearby. Some say Animals hear the call of the wald, furries hear the call of the fur con.
As I previous mention here I went to this panel on Journalism at MFF 2017 hosted by both Tantroo McNally and NightfOx which I really found informative and you will notice some improvements here. It really straighten me out on a couple of points, of course this doesn’t mean I am going all news site here. That really isn’t me, and trying to put everyone in the same box is crazy to me. Everyone has to be themselves right or wrong. I fully admit I have made tons of mistakes and I still came out a winner. Yesterday I had almost 600 views and I really get thanked by a lot of cons for the stuff I post about them…check out my Twitter feed. Furry Migration actually thinked me for a 360 view video I posted. Crazy for a one man operation but it’s true. You Live and You Learn.
But really even signing in to a news site were at least 90% of the items I see submitted are outright rejected. Really nothing I submitted to Flayrah was even accepted, not even my interviews and despite what was said at the panel I was NEVER told why. I know back when I was on Flayrah I would see post after post in their newsfeed of people wondering why they never heard back of anything submitted, of course they didn’t last long it seems the old editor would delete them. Really doesn’t make sense unless you know someone on that site personally they don’t want you, really my suggestion to any wannabe reporter. YouTube, or at least a podcast there. Believe it for not you will get more views in 1 day than I do. I think if I had to do this all over again Furry Times would be a podcast. But don’t worry I am keeping my blog I just renewed my domain name.
I was at the first workshop the other day where his goal was trying to gather ideas for what I think is a good premise. Not exactly what killed America more like what killed the American dream. If your older than 30 and lived all that time in the US, you can see how things have changed and not for the better. Rise in hate groups, more violence, greed seemly everywhere, meanwhile the voters feel disenfranchised. Which is the main reason I feel why Trump was elected. There he came in with BIG promises and frankly despite what he and other presidents have said in the past, frankly there is very little they can do to change things. That is solely in the hands of the congress and the courts.
Can you even name 1 of your elected officials? Not local because they are on the news most of the time. But those we sent to Washington, DC . Which rare exception most frankly can’t why and this goes for a majority of them. They do nothing but vote on other peoples idea’s. I don’t know of 1 that ever kept a campaign promise.
I could get into greed in business but that is all over the news.
So in my mind who killed American it was our own elected officials.
Have your own ideas use the link above and send a message to Lowell Thompson
This video seems to require some commentary. Though I agree that modern Pop Music has been boiled down to its most basic components, is mostly composed and produced by the same 4 people creating a noticeably limited range, and tends to be compressed down to lo-fi, I feel like this commentator is going a bit overboard. So you are about to see an old-time Art Rocker put in the position of having to defend Pop Music.
The commentator addresses the music he disparages as “Ambient.” This is obviously incorrect. The music I hear in grocery stores is not, by any proper description, Ambient.
Growing up in the 60’s, “Elevator Music” was a popular genre that had two or three terrestrial radio stations in every city entirely dedicated to it. Those hipsters who are into the “Space Age Pop” thing will no doubt have encountered quite a bit of this almost exclusively orchestral music that consisted for the most part of de-fanged pop songs. No vocals, no modern instrumentation. Just very familiar melodies be-reffed of anything that might offend or distract.
Well, Rock fans found it offensive, because Rock music was designed to be rebellious, and they looked on anything Middle of the Road (MOR) as watering down the rebellion. But on the whole it was just ignored, as it was designed to be.
To hear this fellow talk, you would think he was talking about 1960’s MOR, rather than 21st century Pop Music. But, even if he was, even those who were offended by MOR would have thought such an extreme condemnation of it a wee bit excessive.
“Ambient Music” is what took over from MOR in the 1980’s, more often referred to as “New Age Music.” And this type of Background Music (BGM) certainly did fit the description he gives. Ambient Music, unlike MOR, was not based on recognizable melodies. It was based on being devoid of any kind of memorable or attention grabbing hooks. It was literally pure atmosphere, not meant to be seriously listened to or to register on the brain in any way. But still, though it was dismissed as music, it was generally thought well of as a healing device.
Beyond the 80’s, BGM stations abandoned the idea of special music for background and went into what was called “Lite Rock.” This was basically concentrating on the normal versions of the least offensive Pop Chart material. Thus BGM was no longer considered to be an instrumental thing. Though such stations continue to exist, this is not the format that I hear in super markets and drug stores.
Many store chains now maintain their own internet based radio stations which tend to include store commercials. And the music played on these radio stations tends to be programmed according to the stores main customer base. For example, the Save-A-Lot where I do most of my shopping programs no music designed to appeal to me as a 55 year old white person. They program music for Hispanics and 55 year old black people.
Fortunately I love old Soul and Funk Music. So this isn’t a problem for me. But I have to say, some of those extended James Brown tracks would never have qualified as BGM under any definition. And they do visibly irritate some of the white customers, because it’s an old black culture thing the younger white people have never been exposed to. So it comes off as music from another planet.
Now, Walgreen’s Drug Stores also have their own radio station. And they program some current Pop songs midst various oldies. And the new Pop songs they play only offend me if it’s a really terrible and unimaginative cover of an older song. But the other new songs are usually bouncy and provide a good feeling. Though there is nothing memorable about them, and nothing that would have made me run to the record store back in the day.
So I have to dispute what this fellow says that you hear some kind of droning, mind destroying sound everywhere you go in the world today. You are far more likely to hear oldies while shopping than the new, musically dead crap the record companies are pushing now. And oldies serve to remind the younger generation that music was not always as it is today, and open them to exploration of the classics.
Now, I can not say what people might hear in bars, or on modern Pop radio, because I don’t go there as a general rule. Second Life is the only space I get to share with the younger generations, and when I DJ they mainly want to hear oldies, because nobody there really disputes that oldies are better than newies.
However, there are some DJ’s in Second Life who specialize in newer genres whom I occasionally listen to. And some of the newer genres, particularly if they build on something retro, like Electro Swing, will actually get me punching up Amazon to buy an LP.
Where I think what this guy is saying actually applies would be various Techno genres that are so monotonous they could easily be composed and performed by computers with no human input at all. DJ’s have been fired from my virtual night club for concentrating too much on such genres.
But then he says you hear this music in every restaurant. I have never heard Techno in a restaurant. Techno, as far as I know, is mostly a club thing.
Then he talks about how music is no longer something you listen to as we did in years gone by. And I find this is true. But it’s not because I’ve changed the music I listen to. I play mostly vinyl. So the bulk of my music is between 30 and 100 years old. And it was all intended to grab the attention and be anything but ignored. Yet I continually find that I do end up tuning it out and ignoring it as if it were BGM.
This has nothing what so ever to do with the quality of the music. It has to do with my modern lifestyle. I simply am not able to divide my attention between the vinyl spinning on the turntable and whoever I’m typing to on Second Life. I am always doing something else, maybe as many as 3 things at once while the music is playing. I simply can not feel comfortable just sitting and giving my full attention to music, because I’ve been conditioned to feel like I’m being unconscionably wasteful of my time if my hands and eyes are not busy with something while the music is playing.
And, of course, while I’m composing something, like a story or this essay, no music at all can be played. Because composing is output mode. Nothing can be coming into my brain while it’s in output mode.
Then he says there is no law against noise pollution. And that’s just wrong. There are such laws in public space. And there’s no law that says you have to frequent private spaces that play music you don’t like. Seriously, why is this old white guy in a Techno club. Why isn’t he at symphony hall, a Jazz club or whatever? Or better still, just go home and play your records. Nobody’s forcing you to listen to Techno. Even in Second Life when the Techno or Death Metal gets annoying you can always turn the stream off and substitute your own music.
Then he talks about how the 2nd grade level of today’s lyrics probably has something to do with the diminishing vocabulary of the newer generations. I wouldn’t go that far. I would say that lack of creativity in Pop music hits them more in cultural terms. If all you’ve ever heard is Lady Gaga you’re not really prepared to tackle Beethoven, are you? You’re not necessarily even aware that there ever was such a thing as sitting down and listening to music.
I would think there are other things far more likely to be diminishing the new generation than music. TV, Video Games, Social Media, and above all else, an education system that ranks 14 midst other countries and 2nd in ignorance. Not to mention most children growing up with absent parents.
From every angle, the cards are stacked against the education of the new generations, and I really don’t think more stimulating Pop Music would do a hell of a lot to improve things. Especially when older, more intellectual music is out there if anyone wants it.
He recommends giving children an instrument to learn. Well, that’s all well and good if they take to it. But my recommendation is simply to do what was done for me. At the age of 4 I was given a record player and access to the record collections of everyone who lived in my house. I was thereby exposed to all the Pop Music of the early 20th century, Classical, Jazz, Folk and music from foreign cultures. As well as all manner of spoken word material.
Most people only read The Bible. I got to hear it fully dramatized. I was exposed to Shakespeare, poetry, history, famous speeches, literary classics, all before I had even begun to learn to read. I knew the entire evolution of American Popular Music before I started kindergarten because I had a record on the subject.
Thus I say that the true advantage to children, in terms of education, lies with the parents and what they choose to have in the house to expand the minds of the children before the educational system and the current pop culture get their mitts on them. Once that opportunity is missed, the education of children is out of the hands of anyone who really cares. And if the parents don’t care, kids are just screwed.
Anyway, in defense of Pop Music, it’s important to remember that there was a time when Pop Music sounded like this. And, by the grace of some future backlash against uninventiveness, it may eventually recover its former glories.
Furry Times 