Daddy said… (24)

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daddy said, terror, terrorism

You know what the problem is? There are too many people who hate other people; that’s why there are so many terrorists.

So I went out and had a look.

And I found a world torn by war. I found many places destroyed by bombs, people bleeding, children crying for their mommy’s who had just been blown to bits. I also found that most people were disgusted by the terrorists, yet hated their guts and wanted to return the favour. That was the straightforward bit.

I also found a lot of people who’d fallen into the fairy tale fish pot of YouTube (and other anti-social media) who’d started to believe our supreme leaders actually drink the blood of our children – and want to start a war to out them; for example by shooting up a pizza shop. Those terrorists breed hate too.

“Where is the love?” I asked, but all bystanders thought I was singing.

Areas dominated by one race, one culture, appeared to be dominated by a humongous hate of those who are different. People were ready to die in the fight to make the whole world like their own. In those areas I could mostly hear two credos. One was: “If you’re not with us, you’re against us.” And the other went: “The whole world is out to get us,” sometimes suffixed with: “… because our way of life is better than theirs; and they envy us for it.” Two credo’s I’ve come to associate with a desire to point out the differences in the world, and not the similarities.

Surprisingly, the greatest amount of love – or should I say, the best acceptance of one another’s differences – I found in places where many different people lived close together. In such places I could hear people saying: “I hate people who hate other people.” Few people realised though, that the unknown is feared and resented. Those who don’t know people who are different from themselves, resent them. Those who don’t know what our leaders actually drink, fear that they drink our children’s blood.

So was my daddy right?

I don’t think so. You can’t blame a bat for not seeing his neighbour! You can’t blame an anthill for attacking the other!

When trying to fight terrorism, we shouldn’t use bombs. We should try to take away the cause that brings it about. Talk about a cheesy solution, perhaps, but the way to achieve this is simple; and probably pleasant too! We should all get to know those who are different. This can easily be accomplished, with a smaller budget that you might think. All you need is a pair of binoculars, and a notebook. With this you can check out what the neighbours are doing. This way, you get to know someone who is not you, and who most likely lives differently. The better the binoculars, the more people you can get to know. The higher up your apartment, the bigger the crowd again. The notebook you can use to keep track of what they do, and truly familiarise yourself with their lifestyle.

This system will not only help take away the cause for terrorism, it will also help the authorities find the culprits behind illegal blasts. All they need to see is your notebook, to find who was there, and who wasn’t. A two-edged sword solving our problems!

Previously posted on My.Opera, when they still had a blogging service. I’m rerunning the Daddy Said series here; when I feel like, I’ll write a new episode. This one I wrote in 2008, but tweaked a bit to incorporate the current situation.

Daddy said… (23)

Tags

daddy said, delayed, trains

You know what the problem is? It’s too hard for the train driver to keep the train on the tracks. For as meagre a salary as he gets, I’d delay the train too!

So I bought a ticket, and had a look.

The first thing that struck me was the curiosity of the lady at the ticket office. She asked me where I was going… I told her Chiang Mai, but decided to get off in Phitsanulok instead; this way at least she wouldn’t know where I was!

I settled down in the back of the train, which happened to be an old fashioned one, with a locomotive at the front, and a window facing backwards. Watching the tracks shoot from under me, seeing the rails meet far in the distance almost put me to sleep. When we changed tracks, the interruption of the rhythm woke me up. And I was amazed indeed by the driver’s skill.

So I headed to the front, and found the driver only had an accelerator and a brake. When I asked how he steered, he explained me that the train was locked in the rails. This really dropped my respect for him more than a little. I thought he’d have to keep the train on the tracks with a wheel!

So was my daddy right?

Obviously not! You can’t blame a snail for being slow! You can’t blame the hare for losing from the tortoise! The driver isn’t the cause for the delayed train. It’s the people lazying around boarding and alighting. There are just too many lovers determined to stretch their semi-dramatic good-byes. And in some countries, there are too many people who think it’s wise to board without letting anyone get off.

I can see only two ways to make all trains run on time. One is a lot cheaper than riding a train in the first place, the second one is cheap.

The first one is simple: just stay at home. What is the real desperate need to travel in the first place? Stay home! It saves you the train ticket, and if there are no passengers, there’s no one to notice the delayed train! In this day and age, can’t we all work from home? I’m doing it! You’re reading the result.

The second one involves buying a large bag of chilli peppers. It is common knowledge among the Dutch, that putting pepper in one’s bottom, makes that person rush. So take the peppers to the station, and just before your train arrives, apply the pepper to your fellow passengers in the appropriate place. This will make everyone rush into the train, and keep the train running on time!

Previously posted on My.Opera, when they still had a blogging service. I’m rerunning the Daddy Said series here; when I feel like, I’ll write a new episode. This one I wrote in 2009. Even the sentence about working from home isn’t new!

Conatus scribo

Tags

Borse Code, sex

I’ve started a manuscript called Borse Code; it will eventually be a book in Dutch. Occasionally, on some Wednesdays, I will post chapters I’ve written here – in English – to see if they work. Let me know what you think, alright? The scene too long, too short, for a book?

These attempts are not in chronological order.

Just before the start of this excerpt, my protagonist and his long-time girlfriend have decided to rejoin the social-media circus for research-reasons (the topic of which I will not disclose now). While driving home on a warm summer’s night, he’s started to sign on to Facebook; she was driving. Then they arrive home…

While Sally greeted Darwin by cuddling the long haired Berner Sennen, Harry walked past them without looking away from his screen, and plopped down on the sofa. He had just strategically filled his profile with the research-specific details, when Sally sat on his lap; her bare knees next to him on the sofa, and her buttocks under her short skirt heavy on his knees. She took the phone from his hands, and put it on the table behind her, without taking her green eyes from his. Then she put her arms on his shoulders, grabbed his head and kissed him passionately. Harry kised her back, took hold of her buttocks under her skirt and pulled her closer. He started to grow in his pants, while she wiggled her hips. He pressed his head back into the sofa, with which he forced her to move forward and press her breasts into his chest, as they still locked lips, tongues entangled. His hands moved up, under her t-shirt, towards her bra, which he managed to loosen after a little while. They both laughed mentally at a reference to Charley Sheen – Harry would never be that good.

They disentangled their tongues and they each pulled their t-shirt over their own head, after which they continued kissing. Talking was unnecessary; they knew each other well enough. Her naked breasts pressing against his chest pushed the tension up a few notches. He caressed her back, where he felt slight irregularities due to her tattoo. He’d grown so hard by now, that he was sure she would’ve noticed his hard-on through her panties.

Today he took the next initiative. He sat up straight, which put her nipples right about the level of his mouth. Without skipping a beat he took one nipple in his mouth, and the other breast and nipple received manual stimulation. His other hand travelled back to her buttocks, which he relieved of her panties.

Just before his fingers reached her labia, she suddenly got up. She sensually wiggled her hips, dropping her skirt and panties to her toes. She stretched herself with her arms above her head, and stood there a moment graceful as a nymph in front of him. Appreciative, desiring her, he allowed his eyes to explore her body. Even though she wasn’t famous for her beauty, Harry was proud that he could call this beautiful woman his own; nobody knew her like he did.

“You are beautiful,” he said.

Immediately she dropped to her knees, blushing shyly, pulled his pants down and start to give head passionately. With a pleasure moan he fell back into the sofa, and indulged in the moment, cautiously aware that he shouldn’t come just yet. Quite some time before that happened, he pulled back, lifted her up, and put her on the sofa; her turn. She was already very wet when his tongue touched her for the first time that night. A slight shudder travelled through her body, and the sounds of pleasure filled the room. He knew her body well, and just before she orgasmed, he penetrated her. While he moved above and inside of her, she fixed his eyes with hers, and moaned uncontrollably. The tension in her eyes increased quickly until, suddenly, she came explosively.

As two satisfied rag dolls they lay spent on the sofa, together. He caressed her face, his fingertip following her hairline. She held him tightly around his torso, with both arms. Between them the heat was tangible. Sweat made for a slippery sensation. But the mutual flow of wordless emotions was too strong to let go just yet. Until Sally found her voice.

“If we’re going to do this, I want a strict agreement. If I ever have to take your phone from your hands to get your attention, we quit it.”

Daddy said… (22)

Tags

daddy said, endangered species

“You know what the problem is, the only animals that go extinct, are the ones that can’t take care of
themselves.

So I went out and had a look.
First I found lots and lots of dead animals. Especially along Australia’s highways I found so many dead kangaroos, that I thought they’d be extinct by now. But as it turns out, only some of them are truly endangered, and the larger ones have even increased in numbers since Europeans first saw them.

Then I searched closer to home, and found the Kho Khao Lamphun cow, which is used in the Thai
Royal ploughing ceremony. I wonder why this animal has become rare. Is it because kings have
become rare too? Or is it really because they can’t take care of themselves?

Last I went to a national park. And there I found a sick lot of animals feeding on the rubbish visitors
and residents leave behind. The animals were both common and endangered species.

So was my daddy right?

I don’t think so. You can’t blame the fox for stealing eggs when he can! You can’t blame an elephant
for eating 100kg a day! It’s in the animals’ nature to come where easily accessible food is available. But
it is this diet that is killing them. A plastic bag works for a grey-shanked douc about as well as a three-meals-a-day-Mickey-D’s diet for us. Three weeks, and we’ll be in the ICU.

So when trying to preserve our endangered animals, is taking care of a healthy diet. Taking care that no plastic bags make it into the doucs’ living area is nigh impossible; it’s in the human nature to instantly drop anything they don’t need any more.

Instead, we should all soon take a trip to the nearest national park. There, we should trap a pair of grey-shanked doucs and take them home. At home it’s easier to control the animals’ diet, and thus it’s more likely to live a long life! A long life will guarantee the survival of the species.

This way we can save one endangered species at a time!

Previously posted on My.Opera, when they still had a blogging service. I’m rerunning the Daddy Said series here; when I feel like, I’ll write a new episode. This one I wrote in 2009.

Rei publicae

Tags

alternative, neoliberalisme

In a small village in The Netherlands – you may not know it, but Google maps does: Ophemert – the streetlights have been infected with covid19 since May 2020: they’ve had such a high fever that usually they are lit day and night. The villagers have reported this to the local council, and they receive an e-mail within two weeks saying ‘your report has been resolved’; but the streetlights are still lit (it’s October 2020 now). Expect that the electricity bill will be added to next year’s council tax invoice. In the current privatised ‘public’ sector, there is nobody politically responsible for this, and from a business perspective, Ophemert is too small, and therefore too expensive to really take care of. A company serves but one master: money. And money never serves the public cause, just the private cause.

For a large portion of the twentieth century, social democracy ruled The Netherlands (and quite a few other Western nations). This led to monstrous state owned companies, where inefficiency was rule rather than exception. They employed expensive yet incompetent people who were glued to their position so tightly that no cruise missile could dislodge them. The answer to this was implemented in the 1980s under leadership of Thatcher, Reagan, following the teachings of economists such as (among others) Buchanan: neoliberalism. The ideal became privatisation of everything the state used to organise. This was supposed to bring, on the one hand, a smaller government and thus lower taxes. On the other hand these formerly state owned companies would have to become more efficient in a free market, which would give the consumers a lower price for a better service.

We all know the result of this: hospitals can now go bankrupt; instead of one Transporter with packages, four of them race down every street, every day; and the Rijkspostspaarbank has turned into a morally unacceptable corporation where corruption, environmental pollution and weapons deals have become the way to make money. People have even talked of privatising the school system, making private companies responsible for the education of our children. This would be awesome for the rich kids, for they would be able to go to schools that can afford teachers on a real salary. For the poor children, it would mean going to the CocaCola-school in Overvecht or the Schilderswijk, where teachers would get nothing more than a contribution for voluntary labour. And a tax reduction has only been implemented for the very rich.

In the neoliberalist model, it turns out that profit is private, but losses are public responsibility. When banks make a profit, the shareholders and the board of directors share those profits; when they suffer losses due to continues mismanagement and poor judgements on risk assessment relating to investments, the population of a country has to cough up the money to prevent the bank from going bankrupt. When the corona-crisis has destroyed the tourism industry, a booking-agency that has sent billions in profits into private coffers, now is asking the public – the government – for aide to pay the salaries of their employees. Of course I do not begrudge the people who work there their jobs. But if their salaries are being paid through tax money, I expect that the billions that were skimmed off the profits of hotels in the previous years are handed over to the government. Of course it’s a very complex puzzle – who deserves help, and who doesn’t? Companies that made no profit before the corona-crisis… Do they deserve help? Don’t they? What is, and what isn’t fair? To make that call, we need a large government, with many capable officials who do not apply a one size fits all remedy, but decide on individual basis what is reasonable and fair, and what should be done in return for the help.

When will there be a politician who has the guts to start changing this neoliberalist system? Piketty has shown that everything is a choice; there are several very smart economists who offer alternatives. My question that will determine my vote in next year’s general election in The Netherlands is this: who has the guts to stand for an alternative to neoliberalism? Who has the guts to really change our household books? Roughly forty years seems to be the life span of an economic model; it’s time for a change, and in 2060 we’ll look for something new again.

Do I have the answer? Not in the least. I’m not an economist. But here in Ophemert, I see that neoliberalism isn’t working any more. This obsolete system has had its chance (and has done good too), but it has proven that it doesn’t serve the public cause. A service engineer has to be employed all day; there can not be a day during which he has no malfunctions to fix. Liander (the company running our streetlights) has promised in early June that there would be a service vehicle available to fix our streetlights ‘within two weeks’. What this service vehicle has achieved is unclear; the lights are still on. Day and night. Because Liander doesn’t serve us; Liander serves the profits under the bottom line, 246 million profit in 2018. And the extra costs for electricity will be demanded from the local council by 2021. The profits of Liander is private, but losses are to be paid for by the people. And nobody is responsible for that.

Daddy said… (21)

Tags

daddy said, writer's block

You know what the problem is? A man can only write so many words. That’s why so many great writers disappear into unproductive obscurity!

So I eh… I went to a library and read.

I found several writers who seem to have written a whole library of their own. A select few though have written well over five hundred novels. Top of the list is the late Mary Faulkner from South Africa who wrote a massive 904 books.

I also noticed that some great writers, with far fewer books in their stall, did suffer from writer’s block. At some point the words just wouldn’t come any more. Some eventually overcame it, and blamed fear, stress or a major change in their life to the fact that they couldn’t glue any more words together.

With 500 or more novels though, there doesn’t seem to be at all time enough in a life to ever suffer from writer’s block than during an afternoon tea.

So was my daddy right?

It doesn’t seem so. You can’t blame a swine for leaving an easy to follow trail! You can’t blame an elephant for leaving barely any! It’s not the limit in the number of words out there that causes writer’s block. It depends on the person. Lauran Paine nor Al-Syuti ever seemed to have suffered from it. Neither does Stephen King. But having read Lisey’s Story, we all know where he gets his diarrhoea of the typewriter. But that book does hold the cue to fixing this hard to overcome problem.

There’s lot’s of advice out there on the net that might work, and of course I don’t expect everyone to find their way to the pond where we all go down to drink, and some great ones even go out to fish (Many thanks to Stephen King for such great phrases). But it is the pond where we get inspiration. And if you can’t make your way to the pond, make it come to you.

The point with writer’s block is not a lack of words, but a lack of great ideas. And to obtain them we need to be creative. Share the story with a stranger, and ask them for a clue to what should happen next. That may give you surprising results.

The best way to get new inspiration though, is new viewpoints. And for that we need to get in touch with someone who really know how to make mind-blowing stuff.

Previously posted on My.Opera, when they still had a blogging service. I’m rerunning the Daddy Said series here; when I feel like, I’ll write a new episode. This one I wrote in 2009.