The Modern Tragedy

The tragedy, as a plotline for plays, novels, short stories, poetry, etc., can be a brilliant expression, evocative of some of the most intense emotions man can experience. When I hear (or write) the word “tragedy”, I immediately think of Shakespeare, and other authors I was supposed to study in high school.

But Shakespeare lived hundreds of years ago. Surely there are modern authors writing tragedies as intense as Romeo and Juliet, or whatever your favorite Shakespearean tragedy is. I don't study modern literature; I don't have the attention span to it. However, I'd like to talk about a tragedy which can be experienced in six minutes and fifty seconds, with no reading involved.

It's called “Dance with the Devil”. It's a song by the rapper Immortal Technique. “Dance with the Devil” tells the story of a young man, and his ambitions to thrive in the manner which he was raised to respect. Immortal Technique, while he lacks the subtlety and finesse which so many of us know and love in Shakespeare, is (in my opinion) an equally brilliant writer.

This is going to be a relatively short post; I don't know enough about traditional tragedies to wax introspective on the style of writing, and I don't want to give away everything in the song. Basically, I just want to introduce it to anyone who reads this blog but hasn't yet heard the track.

I must warn you, it's an incredibly obscene song – both the word choice and the content would make most of my relatives over the age of 30 extremely uncomfortable – but if you don't mind obscenity, and you want to hear some fucked up shit that will make your mind spin, check it out:

"Dance with the Devil" - Immortal Technique 

Humans: We're Really Weird!

A conversation which I had with my father today inspired me to think about just how weird humans are.

The conversation was about the respective ecological niches of mice and rats. I won't go into the details, suffice to say that we concluded that rats and mice both follow very specific, quite different patterns of nesting and feeding.

The weird thing is that humans don't. Whereas every other animal I know of is programmed to behave in specific ways, humans are, as far as I can tell, not.

Okay, I lied. I am going to go into a bit of detail on our conversation. My father was explaining to me that whereas mice nest in one spot and travel within a short radius of their nest, nibbling on food here and there (but not bringing any back to the nest), rats travel relatively far from their nest, and bring food (and other random crap) back to the nest.

Humans, as a species, don't seem to follow patterns like that. Some of us are hoarders, like rats. Some of us "nest" in one spot, and refuse to move; whereas others are nomadic, and can't live in the same place for more than a few years or they'll go crazy. Some of us are violent and confrontational, some are peaceful and terrified of conflict. You get the picture.

The only circumstances that I know of in which other animals show so much variety in behavior is during speciation events. A speciation event is an event in which one species splits into multiple different species. These events typically occur during times of extreme population growth or shrinkage, especially when a population moves into a new environment.

When the population expansion or contraction occurs, individuals in the species occupy a variety of different ecological niches, and eventually become reproductively isolated and evolve into separate species.

Human population is expanding exponentially. And we're occupying a wide variety of niches, economically as well as ecologically. All it would take for a speciation event to occur, as far as I can tell, is reproductive isolation.

Reproductive isolation in humans has taken place over the history of civilization; it has brought us the different races of humans we see. But, at least according to the opinions of various people I've heard from, this isolation is decreasing as our abilities to travel and communicate become greater.

I see two possible futures for mankind, in this respect:

1. We continue to interbreed with others who are different from us, and patterns begin to emerge between genetics, upbringing, and ecological/economical niches

2. We begin to mate only with those relatively similar to us, and a speciation event occurs.

In my opinion, either of these two possibilities has astounding implications.

Just some food for thought.

The Effects of my Environment on my Mood

You wouldn't believe the variety of moods I experience. Unless you've read my post on bipolar disorder, in which case you would. In either case, I'm going to elaborate a bit on what type of shit I go through.

Right now, I'm in a pretty good mood. I woke up relatively early, drank a bunch of coffee, and went to the gym. All of these activities seem to have had positive effects on my mood. In fact, the latter two are the most consistent mood elevators that I have in my metaphorical toolbox right now.

Recently, I've been waking up in a quite sour mood every day. The world feels cold and unfriendly in the morning, and my body feels like it's lined with lead and bricks and heavy shit like that. Even drinking a cup of coffee seems like it will take infinite effort, partially because of the act of filling up a cup and then taking sips, and partially because my depressive inertia will have to be broken when it inevitably brings me up to speed.

Fortunately, this morning was a bit better. I'm not entirely sure why, but I woke up before nine o'clock, and while I did go back to bed for a few hours, I didn't do so grumpily. But enough about today. Let's talk about why my mood cycles so much, and why the things that help do so.

The first thing that comes to mind, besides my natural mental state, is caffeine addiction. As I discussed in my post "Caffeine and Other Drugs", caffeine inhibits the function of adenosine, a neurotransmitter responsible for, among other things, limiting neural activity. My body may be reacting to this consistent inhibition by producing and releasing more adenosine to make up for the caffeine. Thus, before I've had my daily dose of coffee, my neural activity might be limited more than it would be without the influence of psychoactive drugs in my life.

Since I'm prone to rapid mood cycles anyway, I suspect that the caffeine withdrawal joins forces with natural depression and kicks my ass. The only solutions that I see to this problem are complete abstinence from caffeine, or a consistent regimen of several cups of coffee a day. Hmm, which shall I choose? I'll be right back, I need a refill on my coffee.

Yum, caffeine. Let's talk about the working out part. Aside from making me big and buff (hypothetically - not as much as I'd like, in practice) it seems to energize me and put me in a good mood. I wonder how exactly it does that?

Woah, I just learned some crazy shit. It turns out that aside from releasing endorphins (the body's natural painkillers), exercise releases anandamine, a neurotransmitter which hits the cannabinoid receptors in the brain and body. Yes, the same receptors that THC, the most active chemical in marijuana, hits. It undoubtedly has different effects on the brain than THC, but it is involved in mood and appetite control. So, in as few words as possible, it turns out that working out gets me a little bit stoned! No wonder it can be so addicting.

I don't use marijuana, for a variety of reasons (including the risk of getting kicked out of my house, and risk of extreme mood states, as discussed in my post "Bipolar"), but I have sure had some good times when I did use it. It's really interesting to me that exercise may reward the brain in the same way that THC does.

I'd really love to get properly addicted to exercise. It would be oh so nice to crave something healthy the way I crave cigarettes, coffee, and all of the drugs that I don't do anymore. I guess I'll just have to keep doing it as many times per week as I can bring myself to, and see what happens.

Well, that's all for now, folks. If you just learned as much as I did, and took as great an interest as I did, from my quick Wikipedia search, you oughtta come back tomorrow and see what I've got for you.

Hipsters

If you place two bugs in a jar, are they more or less likely to interact with each other if they're of the same species? Or two of any arthropod, for that matter? I don't know. I've only tried it once or twice. To tell you the truth, I don't even know what it looks like when two arthropods interact. Maybe I'd better stick with something closer to home for this metaphor.

If you place two primates in a cage, are they more or less likely to interact with each other if they're of the same species? It depends on the species. If they're particularly social, they're probably more likely to interact if they are the same species. For the sake of this thought experiment, we're going to assume that these animals have no predator/prey relationship, regardless of their respective species.

What about two humans? Will they be more likely to interact if they're of the same culture? Probably. How about subculture? One might expect so. When I had long hair and wore black and denim and boots and band shirts and considered myself a “metalhead” (around the age of 15), I would have been much more likely to interact with another person whom I considered to be a “metalhead” than someone who fit clearly into a different subculture, or didn't fit into a subculture at all.

Here's what I've been working up to: I just saw one hipster walking down the street (with his semi-expensive jacket, tight jeans, plastic framed sunglasses, and cigarette) pass another hipster (this one clad in a plaid shirt, thick black glasses, and one of those hats which was originally intended to hold dreadlocks, bearded, and playing an acoustic guitar) and they didn't give each other so much as a second glance.

When I deliberately placed myself into a subculture, I was always happy to recognize another member. I would, if nothing else, acknowledge him (or her) with a nod of the head. If I didn't belong to a stereotype which included “unpleasant demeanor” as a characteristic, I'd've given a smile.

This brings us to one of the characteristics of the “hipster” subculture which actually comes close to being unique: the tendency not to recognize oneself as a member of an easily defined group.

Metalheads, like my fifteen-year-old self, are usually quite unafraid to define themselves as metalheads. Gangsters (the fashion culture, not necessarily active members of gangs), to my observation, typically recognize and associate with members of the same culture. They may be less inclined to be friendly, and in fact may show aggression toward each other, but they at least understand the label which applies to them and acknowledge others of the same.

But hipsters rarely understand what the rest of the world means when it says “hipster”, nor, in many cases, that the label applies to them.

There are, of course, plenty of exceptions. I know a seventeen year old who dresses and acts like a stereotypical hipster, and proudly admits to it. Yet when I asked him to define “hipster”, he told me that a hipster is a person who doesn't really care what others think and does what he wants. Unfortunately (for him), this definition is quite inconsistent with how the rest of the world sees hipsters. Let's look at a few definitions of “hipster” which are easily accessible online:

Wikipedia defines the term “hipster” as such: young, recently settled urban middle class adults and older teenagers with interests in non-mainstream fashion and culture, particularly indie rock, independent film, magazines such as Vice and Clash, and websites like Pitchfork Media.

Wiktionary, Wikipedia's dictionary service, offers the following definition: A person who is keenly interested in the latest trends or fashions.

Urban Dictionary, an excellent source of public opinion on the definition of slang and popular terms, tells us that “hipster” means: a subculture of men and women typically in their 20's and 30's that value independent thinking, counter-culture, progressive politics, an appreciation of art and indie-rock, creativity, intelligence, and witty banter.

Or: One who possesses tastes, social attitudes, and opinions deemed cool by the cool.

Or: Aged indie kids, Hipsters still maintain the air of snobbery, still shop at salvation army, and still have a completely astonishing array of knowledge when it comes to obscure music, pop-culture non-sequiturs, and political sneers.

Or: Referring to young people of around 18-30 years of age, who drink cheap beer (most often Pabst Blue Ribbon, on occasion Budwiser), smoke Parliaments, Lucky Strikes or hard to obtain foreign cigarettes (such as Gauloises) and take recreational drugs, coke being the most popular. Use a great deal of sarcasm, claim to be ironic. Are usually less than 5% body fat, drink copious amounts of coffee and eat children's cereal. Listen to Indie Rock, rely heavily on Pitchfork Media to tell them what's cool. Don't dance at concerts. Wear a mixture of thrifted clothing and items bought at American Apparel (commonly Tri-blend v-necks) and Urban Outfitters.

Or: urban (or suburban import) dweller who goes to all the coolest clubs, listens to the coolest music, is into various aspects of the arts, including but not limited to street art, indie films, street displays, sticker art, etc.... A hipster also must know all the coolest other hipsters. If you have to ask what a hipster is, then you are definitely not a hipster.

Or: A young adult who emigrates from a suburban or rural area to a major metropolis and sets about aggressively and semi-publically slipping and sliding up the steep learning curve of urban culture.


Boy, that sure is a lot of definitions from one site. Let's look at just one more (my favorite) definition of a hipster: LaughingSquid defines a hipster as “a person whose self-assumed coolness, individuality and importance surpasses their ability to see their conformity”.


What a variety of opinions! How on Earth can we figure out what a hipster is when there are such varied and contradictory definitions? Let's try to list a few characteristics of a stereotypical hipster, drawing both from my personal experience and these online definitions:

A hipster:

-Listens to “indie” music
-Watches “indie” films
-Smokes slightly uncommon but not particularly well thought of (by the average non-hipster) cigarettes
-Drinks specific brands of cheap beer (Pabst Blue Ribbon)
-Wears clothing acquired either at thrift stores or at specific relatively expensive stores
-Believes himself to be cool
-Does not believe your average joe off the street to be cool
-May or may not define himself as a hipster


At this point, you may be wondering, “why is Brandon so fascinated by hipsters?” To tell you the truth, I'm not entirely sure why I'm so fascinated by hipsters. I guess it's just that they seem to defy consistent definition, depending on who you ask, yet there seems to be a relatively consistent set of traits associated with people labeled by others as hipsters.

So if there is, in fact, a list of traits to accompany the label, why are the definitions so different? It comes down to opinion, I guess. I mean, there are people who like and hate stereotypical gangsters, metalheads, scene kids, nerds, punks, jocks, stoners, ravers, or any other popular subculture of Western (yes, by Western I do mean American) society. But because these groups are all characterized by specific clothing items, phrases, music, etc., as opposed to simply cool (regardless of the connotations of the word) clothing, phrases, music, etc., they are fairly easy to pinpoint.

Since everyone (except, some might claim, hipsters) has his own unique definition of what is or isn't cool, everyone (this time including hipsters) seems to have a different definition of who is or isn't a “hipster”.


One of the definitions of “hipster” I found online includes something like “if you have to ask what a hipster is, you are definitely not a hipster”. Since I've just spent so much time exploring what defines a hipster, I guess I'm not one. Since Cracked.com's article on hipsters begins with the sentence, “Hipsters couldn't incite more blind hatred if they were all ginger-haired Al-Qaeda members,” I guess that's something to be happy about.

Language as a Mind

Language is, like, a giant mind, man. Also, my hands are huuuuge. And finally, no, I have not been smoking Lucifer's Lettuce.

“What the fuck,” you might be asking yourself, “is Brandon talking about? His hands are not that big. Also, language is not a mind.”

You are wrong on one account. It's not the one about my hands.

What is a mind? Well, it exists primarily in brains. But my brain is not my mind. There's a difference. I define my mind as the exchange of information within my brain. When the neurons in my toe say “oh, fuck, you stubbed us! Don't do that again!” the message gets carried up my leg to my spine, and up my spine to my brain. Then, my brain fires that information off into all sorts of different processors. I'm suddenly struck by the image of a stubbed toe, words like “ouch” and “oh shit” and “who put that rock there, anyway?”

The brain cells themselves are not my mind. The electricity and chemicals which allow them to communicate with each other are not my mind. My mind is the whole process between the neural signal which reaches my brain and the neural signal which leaves my brain, heads for my mouth, and causes me to spew obscenities at inanimate objects. It is internal communication.

You might be seeing where I'm getting the metaphor of language as a mind now. Or, maybe you're not. In either case, keep reading to lurn more.

Think of each person as a neuron. Forget that we have minds. Just imagine that we're all blobs of biomatter, and that we take in information and spit it out. Hell, you don't even have to imagine; it's true. As a neuron receives a signal, in the form of a chemical poppin' into its receptors, so we receive sensory information. As a neuron processes the chemical signal and fires off a wee bit of electricity to its own store of chemicals, so we think about what we see, hear, feel, and such, and prepare to vocalize it. And as a neuron releases chemicals into our synapses to pass along the message, so we run our mouths off about pointless stuff like stubbing our toes.

Language is the symbolism behind the collective vocalizations and hearingizations (I want a nickel every time someone uses that word) of a bunch of sacks of water and carbon and stuff. A mind is the symbolism behind the release and reception of chemicals.

Just think of those wee little molecules of dopamine and adenosine and epinephrine and melatonin as words, and the metaphor is complete. Just like I know what “Oh shit, I stubbed my toe” means, my neurons know what a lot of glutamate coming from other neurons which lead to and from my toe mean. And the meanings are about the same.

So what's the conclusion of all this rambling? Let's summarize:

My mind consists of the process of communication between my neurons. My neurons communicate with little bits of matter and energy. The neurons are not my mind, nor is the matter and energy. My mind is the action of sending and receiving these signals, and the symbolism behind them.

Language consists of symbols in the form of chemicals on paper, lights on a screen, or vibrations from our vocal cords. Language is not the people talking, nor is it the people listening. It is not the individual words – for if the only word in the English language was “hypothesis”, it wouldn't be a language at all – it is the collective symbolism behind the bits of communication. It requires matter (people) and energy (vibrations, the movement of ink onto paper, etc.), but it is not these things.

Okay, that summary was longer and less conclusive than I had hoped. Let's summarize the summary:

A mind is the meaning behind bits of communication exchanged by little chunks of biology.

Language is the meaning behind bits of communication exchanged by big chunks of biology.

Get it?

Bipolar

Q: What do you think of bipolar disorder?

A: It has its ups and downs.

Okay, it’s not really very funny… in fact, it’s not really even a joke. It’s just a question and a straightforward answer. But it’ll serve as well as anything else would as an introduction to this post.

I have bipolar disorder type 1. It can be great at times, and awful at others. At this particular moment, it’s pretty great; I’m on my tenth page of blog content in about six hours of on-and-off writing. That, I believe, is because I am currently in a hypomanic mood. Here are a few of the characteristics of hypomania:

-Mild euphoria
-Insomnia/less need for sleep
-High energy/hyperactivity
-Slightly grandiose thoughts
-Racing thoughts
-Increased or decreased sex drive

It has more characteristics than that, but those are the ones that come to mind immediately. Right now, I’m experiencing thoughts which come slightly more quickly than normal, grandiose thoughts, euphoria, and hyperactivity.

Now, bipolar disorder is called a “disorder” for a reason. But boy, it sure can increase productivity when it wants to. I feel great, and I’m getting shit done. The thing is, I often have a LOT of trouble getting shit done. I also often have trouble feeling great. For these reasons, I have deliberately induced this state of hypomania by drinking some coffee.

The trick, in the case of hypomania, is to make sure that I don’t slip into a full-blown manic episode, or crash into a depressive episode. I have a few ways of going about this:

-Make sure that I sleep at least six hours every night
-Make sure that I eat at least three small meals every day
-Take my medications
-Stop drinking coffee, or taking other stimulants

On most occasions, these “extreme mood control techniques”, as I like to call them, work pretty well. (Okay, I lied. I don’t like to call them that. In fact, this is the first time I’ve ever called them that. So sue me.)

However, on the occasions that they do not work, I am entirely likely to slip into mania or depression. If you have no experience with these states of mind, I suggest you keep it that way. You probably do, however; most people, as far as I know, experience depression at some point in their lives. Mania is a bit more rare.

Here are a few of the characteristics of my past manic episodes:

-Extreme insomnia
-Distorted thoughts or delusions
-Hallucinations
-Extremely grandiose thoughts, including delusions of grandeur
-Extreme euphoria or dysphoria
-Irritability

Now, this is a pretty potent combination of symptoms. Think about it: I could have delusions, and believe that someone did something wrong. I could be irritable, and get mad at them about it. I could believe that I am some sort of authority figure, and that I have the ability or permission to punish people. I could actually hurt someone.

I have come surprisingly close to hurting someone in the past. I ended up getting put on 5150 (a 72 hour hold for observation) when my father called the police in the middle of the night because I wouldn’t stop screaming at him, and because I thought I needed to “protect my” (then 12 year old) brother. I stayed hospitalized for eight days, and came out with several prescriptions, and a lot of rules about what I could and could not do.

I’ll go into more detail about that episode at a later time, because I really was insane to a fascinating degree. The point is, mania is bad, m’kay?

Depression, on the other hand, is just as bad. It is characterized by:

-Dysphoria
-Bleak outlook on life
-Fatigue/ncreased need for sleep
-Suicidal thoughts
-Distorted thoughts
-Increased or decreased appetite

Like all of my lists, this one is incomplete; not everyone who is depressed experiences these symptoms, and many people with depression experience unlisted symptoms. This is merely what happens to me when I get depressed.

In this case, it’s pretty easy to see where the danger lies. I could easily commit suicide in a bad depression. I’ll leave it at that, and move on.


There are many different perspectives on bipolar disorder out there. For more information, and an extensive personal experience with the disease, I recommend the book “An Unquiet Mind” by Kay Jameson, Ph.D. It is an excellent read, and she is an extremely intelligent (and slightly crazy) woman.

My Addiction

So what’s the deal with drug addiction? That shit sucks, man.

I’m a drug addict, personally. It sure does create a lot of havoc in my life. Not only can I not use psychoactive substances responsibly, which is a problem in and of itself, but there’s this stigma attached to drug addiction that can really be a downer.

I think I’m going to explain the disease of addiction, and how it is manifested in my behavior. Maybe you’ll learn something! (Like, for example, how crazy I am.)

Addiction is a psychological disorder. It is multifaceted, but its primary components seem to be lack of self-control, shortsightedness, and thought distortions; all brought on by any substance which changes the way one feels.

So what does that mean in the real world? I’ll give you an example:

A couple of years ago, I stayed at a friend’s uncle’s house for a weekend. She was in charge of house-sitting, which we interpreted as “getting loaded for seventy-two hours straight”. We brought a bag of marijuana, a fifth of vodka, and a few hits of LSD with us.

Now, my memory of the weekend is a bit hazy, so I can’t give you a play-by-play of how the entire weekend went; but I do remember quite a bit of it, so I’ll piece together the rest.

On the way there, I and one of my four acquaintances (we’ll call him “B”) took one hit of acid each. When we got to the house, we all immediately took a walk to go smoke a bowl of weed. Everybody got to his or her desired level of fucked-up for the moment, and we went back to the house to watch the movie “Tommy”.

To kill a bit of the suspense, I’ll tell you right now that the acid was bunk. Neither of us tripped on it, and we ate about five hits together by the end of the night. So that night we just got stoned and drunk and watched weird movies.

The next day, we looked at our supplies (a few crumbs of weed and about a quarter of the bottle) and decided that we needed moar drugz. I believe that I was the one who enforced this decision, as none of the other people involved are nearly as drug-crazy as I am.

So we went into Berkeley, the nearest city in which we were likely to find drugs, and hung out on Telegraph Ave looking to score. We came back with a box of nitrous oxide cartridges, a “cracker”, and a balloon.

Well, by the early evening, we had gone through all of the nitrous, booze, and pot. Everyone else was having a good time, but I was desperate for more intoxicants. Here’s where the story gets grimy:

The man who owned the house had been married, and his wife had recently died of some sort of cancer. Because cancer is a particularly uncomfortable disease, she had quite a stash of medications in the bathroom. I did a bit of exploring, and came across a bottle of 5mg Valium (diazepam) pills.

I had never done Valium before, but I had heard good things about it. First, I did a bit of research online. Then, I crushed and snorted two of the pills. A short time later, I either snorted or ate four more pills, giving me a total of six 5mg pills ingested, or 30mgs diazepam in my system.

It turns out that when you mix benzodiazepines (the category of drugs in which diazepam falls) and alcohol, you get really fucked up. As I understand it, this is because they both cause the release of the neurotransmitter GABA into some things called GABA-A receptors somewhere in the brain. I got wasted.

The rest of the night consists in my mind of little bits and pieces of memory and a lot of filled-in stories from friends. Apparently, I convinced a girl that we had to acquire more booze, and we walked ~2 miles in search. I loudly asked her if every single establishment we passed would sell me beer, including such places as a hardware store. When we eventually came across a 7-11, I hatched a quick plot to get beer.

You see, I was 18 at the time, and the drinking age in California is 21. So I waltzed into the 7-11 with a five dollar bill in hand, grabbed two 40 oz bottles of beer, ambled over to the counter, and slapped the five down in front of the cashier. I was intent on walking out of the store with the beer, having paid the cashier, without getting carded. Unfortunately, I hadn’t thought of what to do if any other variables came into play.

The cashier informed me in an Indian or Middle Eastern accent (not that his accent is relevant) that he was not allowed to sell alcohol after midnight. Despite my confidence in my plan to illegally buy beer, I was struck dumb. I skulked back into the beer aisle and put the bottles back, then walked out empty-handed.

The rest of the night involved me ranting and raving about some song that I enjoyed at the time (I believe it was by the Flowbots), and describing line-for-line what it meant to me to this poor girl I was with. The next day, I bought more nitrous and stole more Valium. I ran out of both after about a week of using daily.


This recall may seem at first like a typical college adventure, but let’s look at it a little more closely.

Here are a few signs that something is wrong with me.

1. I took three substances at once the first night.
2. While everyone else was relatively satisfied with the idea of a night of light drinking and smoking, I needed more (the nitrous).
3. After taking three substances the second night (nitrous, weed, and alcohol), I was unsatisfied; I needed more.
4. I did not hesitate to steal medication from my friend’s uncle’s dead wife, and snort it on his (the uncle’s) kitchen table.
5. In doing this, I was fully aware that it would horrify my friends.
6. After adding a fourth substance to my intoxication, I was still not satisfied.

The point is, when a psychoactive substance is introduced to my system, all I can think of is ways and means to get more. I’m broken; I cannot think properly. I have drunk myself into sickness more times than I can count, gone into hospitals and institutions a total of four times in two years as a direct result of my drug use, gone psychotic as a result of my drug use, been arrested as a result of my drug use, and given up my home and family in order to use drugs. Until I ran out of money when homeless and friendless, I would not stop. Only when it was impossible for me to get high again did I enter a rehabilitation facility.

There are many ways of feeling good. There are ways which do not involve drugs that feel just as good as your average high, if not better. I know that, and I have experienced positive feelings from many activities without getting intoxicated. But somehow, I always go back to drugs.

It is not logical. It is not reasonable. I’ve got a broken thinker, and I’ll have to live with it for the rest of my life. It is only with an AMAZING support group, books, meetings, and a lot of psychological conditioning that I am clean now. And I’m not even convinced that I’ll be clean forever. Despite the inevitable arrests, hospitalizations, homelessness, and death that will come of drug use, I’m probably going to go back to using.

So if you know someone who has a drug problem, don’t talk down to him, ignore him, judge him, hate him. Just get him some help.

Spirituality

I am not a religious person in the most traditional sense. I do not believe in any supernatural being, much less an all-powerful god. I do, however, believe in what I like to call “the god concept”. Here’s how it goes:
Somewhere in human evolution, I would guess between 50,000 and 100,000 years ago, we evolved a tendency to believe in supernatural beings. I believe that our intelligence and curiosity posed a number of different problems in our day-to-day lives.

It just isn’t practical for a caveman to sit around for an hour every morning wondering where the Sun comes from. He’s got more important things to be doing, like hunting and fucking hot cavewomen and not getting eaten by tigers. But if a person is intelligent and curious enough to wonder where the Sun comes from every morning, he’s going to do it for a while.

At roughly the same time as humanity evolved the intellect that it has today, I believe that it evolved an increased capability to project its own personality onto the world around it. This would be useful in a number of ways; for example, it would allow a person to predict how game would behave while hunting, because he could think (in some way – he probably wouldn’t think in English) “if I were a deer, and I saw a caveman running at me with a spear, I would run the opposite direction.” Once he thinks this, he can tell his buddy to go hide in a bush on the opposite side of the deer from where he is himself.

Well, at some point, I believe that these two phenomena (the excessive curiosity and the persona-projecting ability) crossed paths. I believe that the latter was the evolved solution to the former. Here’s how I think it went down:

A cavedude (or cavechick) possessed the necessary neural structure to project his persona onto the world around him. He also stared at the sun a lot, wondering where it came from. Not only did this burn the fuck out of his eyes, it also took precious time out of his day. When he had a kid, the “project your persona onto the world” gene and the “wonder what the fuck is up with the sun and shit” gene bumped into each other when his nutsack was making the sperm, and mixed together. His kid projected a hypothetical image of itself onto the sun, and decided that the sun was actually some sort of person who just happened to enjoy running laps around the sky.

When the kid grew up, he didn’t have to stare at the sun and wonder, because he knew what was up with it. Now, you might point out that he was wrong. Here’s the beauty of it: it doesn’t matter! All that matters is that he could spend that extra hour every day hunting food and mating with cavechicks and feeding the food to his offspring, so he had more kids than everyone else did. If all of those kids had the same believe-that-the-sun-is-actually-a-dude-who-likes-running-laps-around-the-sky gene that he did, they would, in turn, have more kids. In several generations, everyone would be believing the crazy idea.

The truth is, people today and in history blame gods for a lot more phenomena than just the rising and setting of the Sun, but my explanation was a gross (disgusting) oversimplification of the theory.

So that’s how I think religious beliefs came to be. Now let’s look at what they do for us.

When I was in high school, I used to try my hardest to ensnare religious people into arguments about their faith. I decided that there was no god, after a brief stint with Christianity, and I wanted to make everyone think the same way that I did. Since then, I’ve changed my mind a bit.

Belief in higher powers does a lot for people. It helps them get over sad events and come out of deep depressions, it inspires them to help others, it gives them ways to manipulate others into giving them money (that’s my cynical 16-year-old-self talking), and it helps them accomplish feats that they do not believe themselves to be capable of.

I know many people who fight the disease of addiction with religious beliefs. They can’t think their way out of addiction, so they think they’re not capable of not taking drugs. But they do believe in higher powers, or gods, or whatever you want to call them. So they turn their lives over to their higher powers, and ask them (the higher powers – I realize that there are a lot of pronouns floating around here, so I’ll try to be clear) to take control of their lives and help them not do drugs. And it works!

Now, let’s ask ourselves: Why could that be? I can think of two possible answers. One is that there are actually a bunch of higher powers out there, controlling these peoples’ lives and making them not do drugs. The other is that the belief itself gives them the strength to not do drugs. I don’t know about you, but I think that the second one sounds a bit more reasonable.

I think that belief in a god unlocks new capabilities in humans. It allows us to live better lives. “But Brandon”, you’re probably thinking, “who are you to say whose life is ‘better’ and whose isn’t?” When I refer to “better” lives, I do not mean to pass judgment. I simply mean that these people live lives which allow for more survivin’ and reproducin’ than the lives of us heathen atheists.

Now, you know that I am an addict. You might be wondering if I am sad that I am an atheist, because I can’t use the power of theism to help me with my addiction. If that’s the case, then you are wrong. All I need to do is find a power greater than myself which I can turn my life over to, and allow it to make my decisions for me. I haven’t found one yet, but I’m lookin’.

That’s enough about spirituality for now.

Caffeine and Other Drugs

Let’s look into why caffeine makes me so productive, shall we?

Well, I did a bit of research (Wikipedia, Lol) and it turns out that the primary mechanism of psychoactivity due to caffeine is the antagonization of adenosine, which is a neurotransmitter associated with, among other things, controlling (limiting) neural activity. There’s also some connection between one of the adenosine receptors and dopamine, but Wiki doesn’t know what exactly it does. This is just a wild guess, but I’d say adenosine inhibits dopamine function. This would mean that caffeine increases dopamine action, which would explain why I’m always so fucking happy when I drink a lot of coffee.

There is also some shit goin’ on with epinephrine when you take caffeine. Apparently one of the metabolites of caffeine somehow increases epinephrine action, which is just another reason why I get all speedy when I’m whacked out on coffee.

Wow! Antagonization of adenosine, agonization of dopamine, and moar epinephrine? If there is a god, he sure did a good job on Coffee. I wonder if it’s merely a coincidence that the brain reacts this way to caffeine, or if maybe it’s something more?

It sounds crazy (because it is), but what if humans evolved to be as sensitive as we are to some psychoactives because it was useful for us to be able to control our state of mind?

I guess that doesn’t make much sense, because other mammals (and at least one lizard) are also affected by psychoactives; I’m aware of a large body of anecdotal evidence suggesting that dogs and cats can get stoned, and I’ve seen it happen with my friend’s bearded dragon.

Then again, caffeine is poisonous to some mammals other than ourselves (i.e. dogs), yet it makes us more functional in some respects. I’m probably just crazy, so please for the love of Gzus do not quote me on this ridiculous hypothesis. I’m going to shut up about it now and get back to how great coffee is.

Isn’t coffee just fucking dandy? I wouldn’t be able to blog without it. I guess that’s partially because I take so many drugs to inhibit my dopamine and epinephrine function that I need a little boost to be able to think like a normal person. But it would appear that 28 ounces of coffee give me a bit more than a normal person’s dopamine and epinephrine action, because I’m fucking WIRED right now.

I realize that I just claimed that my meds inhibit epinephrine action, but I don’t actually know if that’s true. Let’s find out, shall we?

So it turns out that one of my meds, Divalproax, agonizes GABA receptors. I don’t know too much about GABA, but I do know that it is one of the main “downer” neurotransmitters. As such, divalproax can be used as an anti-seizure med or a mood stabilizer. However, Wikipedia did not say anything about interactions between GABA and epinephrine. I’m going to look up the rest of my meds and see if any of them do affect epinephrine.

Citalopram, my anti-depressant, doesn’t have shit to do with epinephrine or norepinephrine. It’s a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor, so all it does is increases serotonin action. Maybe that has something to do with epinephrine, but I doubt it.

I guess it’s possible that melatonin, which is produced after serotonin is released, inhibits epinephrine function in order to make you sleepy, but I think that’s a bit of a stretch.

I know that Strattera, my ADHD med, is a selective norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor, and norepinephrine is a speedy neurotransmitter like epinephrine… but it never makes me feel “up”. In fact, I don’t really notice it at all.

It doesn’t appear that Abilify, my antipsychotic, has anything to do with epinephrine or norepinephrine function. Well, that covers all of my meds… I guess it’s just the GABA agonism by means of divalproax that makes me so drowsy. That was kind of fun to explore!

Linguistic Fluidity

Isn’t it fascinating how there seems to be an inverse relationship between level of education and fluidity of language? When the literate and educated put rules to language, they restrict it. Think about it; how much has the structure and lexicon of the English language changed, officially, since the renaissance? Shakespeare gave us a thousand some-odd words to fuck around with, and since then it has moved at an alarmingly slow rate. But before then? Man that shit was zoomin’!

Have you ever read an Old English text? I don’t mean Old English like Chaucer (though, truth be told, Chaucer is pretty fun)… I mean Old English like the Venerable fuckin’ Bede. Let’s look at one of my favorite passages in Anglo-Saxon. (By the way, I’m going to use the terms “Anglo-Saxon” and “Old English” synonymously. That’s how my high school Brit-Lit teacher taught me to define them, and I’m sticking to it.)

Ic to soþe wat / I know it truly,
þæt biþ in eorle / that it is in men
indryhten þeaw, / a noble custom,
þæt he his ferðlocan / that one should keep secure
fæste binde, / his spirit-chest (mind),
healde his hordcofan, / guard his treasure-chamber (thoughts),
hycge swa he wille. / think as he wishes.

This is a little scrap of The Wanderer, which if I remember correctly was written down by the Venerable Bede himself. It’s called Old English, but in truth it’s closer to German than it is to English. Let’s break it down: (feel free to skip over this part if you’re already bored – it won’t help)

How many cognates do this passage in Old English and Modern English share?
Ic=I; that’s pretty close.
þæt=that; again, pretty close. The funky letter at the beginning of the Old English word is roughly equal to a “th”.
he=one, his=his; we don’t say “he” where they did, but it still holds the same basic meaning. His is actually the same, and in fact is the first true cognate we’ve run into so far.
fæste=secure; well, we might say “fast” in place of “secure”, so we’ll count this one.

Start reading again here if you followed my advice and skipped the last part

I’ve just realized that it looks like I’m writing out a lecture, which wasn’t my intention. I’m going to go back and edit the text before I started this little tirade to give the reader permission to skip a few paragraphs if he gets bored. Done!

So I looked it up, and it turns out that Bede guy lived around 1300 years ago. That means about 900 years before the start of the Renaissance, and it’s been about 400 years since. Please forgive my obscenely rounded dates; I can’t remember dates for shit. This is mostly just guesswork, and I acknowledge my ignorance (in the hope that you won’t feel inclined to point it out).

In 900 years, English morphed from this crazy, beautiful, bouncy German-Norse-Celtic mish-mash into what Shakespeare used. Granted, there was the small matter of the Norman invasion and the introduction of Latin to the mix. But still; a ridiculous quantity of change happened in that 900 years, and almost none has occurred in the past 400. None, that is, if you only look at the most famous texts from well-educated authors.

Now, look at a few different English dialects today. I have heard a lot of different people with a lot of different education levels from a few different geographical locations speak, and the differences can be astounding. For example, urban lower class West Coast Americans seem to enjoy adding the phrase “you know what I’m saying?” to the end of every statement they make. Some of them say it so quickly that it almost becomes a single word; “Y’nommsayne?”

If we analyze the “Y’nommsayne” phenomenon from an educated perspective, and break it down into individual words, it doesn’t mean much. But if we write it phonetically, and think of it as a new word which is a request for affirmation, it’s positively fascinating. A brand-new word, only come to existence in the past few decades! And certain individuals use it in more sentences than they leave it out of! God, it just tickles me pink.
If you don’t think this is a kick, just try going around and including “Y’nommsayne” in every sentence you say for a few hours. It feels weird, y’nommsayne? But at the same time, it feels somehow comforting, y’nommsayne? Like certain people might relate to me better, y’nommsayne?

I certainly hope that this wee rant of mine hasn’t come off as too judgmental; when I was first surrounded by people who used “you know what I’m sayin’” excessively, it pissed me off. But once I thought about it for a bit, I realized that there’s nothing wrong with using the style of language with which you were brought up, and that I have no right to judge others for it. I certainly have a number of mannerisms in my lexicon which others might find strange.

“But Brandon,” you might be thinking, “’Y'nommsayne’ is just one word, and it isn’t even really a new phenomenon! You really expect me to take it as an example of language in a fluid state?” You’re right; I shouldn’t use “y’nommsayne” as my sole point behind the thesis of linguistic fluidity in populations of undereducated individuals.

I apologize for the term “undereducated”; I don’t mean to imply that a person who was brought up to speak differently than myself is “undereducated” [despite the fact that I flat-out said it], I only mean to suggest that such people have not been educated as extensively on the so-called “proper” use of the English language as I have.

Anyway, there are a lot more examples of linguistic fluidity even just in the aforementioned West Coast US urban culture. Take the “N” word. There are people, of all ethnicities (side note – my spell check wanted to make that “eccentricities”. Interesting), who use it in place of “I”, “you”, or “one”.

In his song “Smoke Dope and Rap”, rapper Andre Nickatina describes his daily activities as follows: “slang these thangs, and fuck these hoes, one line at a time goes up a (the “N” word)’s nose.” He is far from the only person to speak in such a manner. A (the “N” word) is often used to mean “a person” or “myself”. Just as the Anglo-Saxons said “he” instead of “one”, as in the text from The Wanderer, so certain urban cultures use what is arguably the most offensive word in the English language.

While “High English” (as I will call the version of the language taught in schools) has remained virtually stagnant for hundreds of years, masses of people choose to speak a version of the language which makes drastic changes each decade. While this phenomenon initially irked me, I currently hold great respect for people who alter their lexicon and grammar as they see fit.

Thoughts on Fashion

Fashion just fascinates me. I love few things more than buying a new clothing item or accessory. It’s an entire language, a means of symbolic communication which everyone interprets differently.

For example, I personally very much enjoy wearing black lace-up boots which are partially laced up and into which my jeans are tucked. Why? I’m not entirely sure. What does this little bit of style (I use the word “style” generously here) say about me? More specifically, what do I want it to say about me, and how is it interpreted by the rest of the world?

Here is a list of messages that I believe I subconsciously want to convey by wearing my boots in such a manner:
-I can kick your ass
-I’m laid-back and easygoing
-I’m messy and lazy, but I’ve still got it together enough to manage, on a basic functional level
-I’m a physical laborer, or similar in some way to a physical laborer
-I like metal music
-I like hiking

Wow! What a wide range of thoughts I assign to such a simple fashion preference. The truth is, nine out of ten people who pass me on the street probably don’t even notice my footwear. Hell, for all I know, 99 out of 100 people I pass on the street don’t even notice my footwear. And of those who do, maybe five percent of them actually receive one of the messages that I intend to convey.

What do the rest of them think? Let’s take a few guesses:
-That guy is compensating for something
-That guy pays too much attention to his footwear
-That guy doesn’t pay enough attention to his footwear
-That guy likes punk rock
-That guy wants to hurt me
-That guy is a construction worker
-That guy is violent
-That guy rides motorcycles
-That guy wants people to think [insert any of the things that I do, in fact, want people to think about me, and many things which I never even thought of]

What an imprecise science! Maybe one in a thousand people who pass me on the street actually gets the intended symbolism of my boots. Yet I keep on doing it, and I keep on attaching significance to it.
This same thought process can be applied to many other pieces of clothing and accessories which I own and display. Just for fun, I’m going to list several of my fashion choices, along with one symbolic meaning that I intend to send out, and one meaning which I believe people actually receive:

-Wife-beaters (tank-top undershirts, just in case anyone does not know what a wife-beater is):
I want to say: I’m big and strong and tough
People might think: That guy sure is arrogant

-My netbook:
I want to say: Look at me, I’m so trendy and high-tech.
People might think: … I’m drawing a blank on this one. I guess that I want to look trendy and high-tech, but actually I’m not?

-My leather jacket:
I want to say: I probably hang around in bars and ride a motorcycle and am cool like that.
People might think: That guy hates animals

-A black bandanna wrapped around my wrist:
I want to say: I’m artistic and unique, yet strong
People might think: That guy either is in a gang, or wants to look like someone who is in a gang.

You get the idea. I’m not so arrogant as to think that any majority (or even significant minority) of people with whom I interact actually hold any conscious thoughts or opinions of my apparel, but between unconscious assumptions and the occasional thought from a particularly fashion-conscious individual, I’m sure I convey some sort of message with my clothing and accessories.

Try the exercise that I just went through; list a few of your favorite symbolic pieces of fashion, what you intend to say with them, and how someone might actually interpret them. It really opens your eyes to the complexity of the communication that we have every day without thinking about it.