Million dollars

Million dollars a video by Link.n.Logs on Flickr.

Victory to the Glorious Red Army!

Debacle!
Sure, we were all caught unawares by the swift victory of the Red Army. Nobody expected Capitalist resistence to collapse so quickly but that is the nature of class struggle.
The bourgeoisie lives by the acceleration of production but, at the same time, seeks to slow the pace of struggle.



But, in the end, the contending forces will take their position.



Stay alert, comrades!



The Red Army advances!



And, at last, the ruling class, appalled and disheartened, removes itself from the scene and retreats to the dustbin of history.

Tonight We Ride!!!

Game Night tonight.

Will I feast on the entrails of my opponents, drink the very marrow from their bones and show them a hell unlike any from their worst nightmares...or will I merely gorge myself on Fritos and Schoolboy cookies, and let the dice roll as they may?

Stay tuned, gentle reader, for tonight--WE RIDE!!

Roky Erickson - Night of the Vampire

Kitty in a Casket - Bride of the Monster

It's After the End of the World

Don't you know that yet. The words of the prophet, Sun Ra.  And this old white guy is on the spaceship  too. But let us break it into stages. 


Stage One: Unbridled Speculation


   

The young, the old, the idle rich, the dissolute, the desperate and the rapacious; by this stage all the parasitic elements of society have entered the game.
    
 Speculators surge from auction to auction snapping up classics and forgeries alike blinded by the belief that whatever unbelievable price they may pay today someone else will double tomorrow.
    
 Even untutored musicians gamble and win.


    

Until, that is, the game ends. 

 "As is always the case, prosperity very rapidly encouraged speculation. Speculation regularly occurs in periods when overproduction is already in full swing. It provides overproduction with temporary market outlets, while for this very reason precipitating the outbreak of the crisis and increasing its force. The crisis itself first breaks out in the area of speculation; only later does it hit production. What appears to the superficial observer to be the cause of the crisis is not overproduction but excess speculation, but this is itself only a symptom of overproduction. The subsequent disruption of production does not appear as a consequence of its own previous exuberance but merely as a setback caused by the collapse of speculation."  Karl Marx 

Stage Two: It All Comes Crashing Down


   
 There comes a time in all markets when promises and professions must give way to solid objects. As St. Peter says to Dante "Now the alloy and the weight of this money have been well examined; but tell me if you have it in your purse." Or, as Marx goes on to say, "Under the ideal measure of values there lurks the hard cash."
    
 And so the hapless and the hardy race across the denuded landscape scrambling for guns and groceries before popping into the shelter, if they're lucky. This fellow was, but what a price he paid.
    


 Stage Three: Madness


   

Which brings us around, as so often before, to the inexplicable, tangled world of Lovecraft. I've done that already and we all know where it leads:
   
Look carefully into the Die of Fate.
    
 Take heed in these dangerous times. Board games, are they the answer or can overindulgence lead to this:
   

Click here for even more Game Night goodies

October-pests!

Game one:"Masterpiece"
Art snobs sign in please! Round and round we go bidding on art that usually turns out to be worth far less than what we paid for it if it's worth anything at all! Is there some un-subtle message that the center of the playing board is a self portrait of Vincent VanGogh? It took me several years to hunt this baby down at a garage sale and it was worth the wait. Each player was assigned a character from the game box pic. I was ...uh ...Victor? Raul? Bah! That's me with the beard and my hand up on the cover wishing it was a booze filled glass. I made my character a sodden rich drunk and he played exactly as cast! I ended the game with the least money, completely spifflicated and holdiong a fake DeKooning to boot! Hey! I bought it 'cuz I liked it, not for some pedestrian monetary gain! *HIC!*

Here we see our winner the sly "Cinnamon"! A former rock groupie who cast a bewitching mesmer spell over the entire field of play. In the pic above she stares beyond her controlling eminence gris at a stark fave painting of a lonely midnight diner haunted by minimal patrons and help, a sure sign that Halloween is not far off!

Game 2:"Zombiegeddon"

Wait ...we played this one before! Yeah! I should just tell you to look at the other posting and save my aching fingers the torture of typing!
Wait yet again! Is this some kind of "POG" game variant?!? No!
Let's not ask this guy! He obviously isn't sure where he is let alone what he might be doing!

Yep! We played this before but half the crew was gone so we reprised it. And it was great! Again! AND (this is the best part ...) I won! WOO-HOO! Cheers to me! The top back stabbin', shelter hoggin', zombie poppin' king o' the board! POW! Bring on the walkin' dead! I'm armed and ready to go!

Game 3:"Cthulu Dice"
Roll the bone and bet you brains. You get 3. Lose your brains and you're insane but not out! Winner is the last one with a firing neuron. Fast, simple and fun. What more could you want? Inexpensive? Yeah ...it's that too!

Dr. K took the first round and clearly came too close to the edge of madness from the encounter to draw back in time. Easy there doc! Keep telling yourself: "It's just a game,IT'S JUST A GAME!!!!"
This is smilin' me after winnnin' the second go round! Why no mad stare from moi? Far too close to the borders of sanity on a daily basis to let yet another dance on the edge disturb me! See you in November!