A Post Birthday Greeting from Tralfamadore

 

"Billy Pilgrim says that the Universe does not look like a lot of bright little dots to the creatures from Tralfamadore. The creatures can see where each star has been and where it is going, so that the heavens are filled with rarefied, luminous spaghetti. And Tralfamadorians don't see human beings as two-legged creatures, either. They see them as great millipedes with babies' legs at one end and old people's legs at the other." (Chapter 5)

"If what Billy Pilgrim learned from the Tralfamadorians is true, that we will all live forever, no matter how dead we may sometimes seem to be, I am not overjoyed. Still--if I am going to spend eternity visiting this moment and that, I'm grateful that so many of those moments are nice." (Chapter 10)

- Excerpts from Kurt Vonnegut's 1969 classic Slaughterhouse-Five, (or The Children’s Crusade: A Duty-Dance with Death). In the quote Vonnegut addresses his mythical realm of Tralfamadore, an exoplanet many light-years away from Earth which first appeared in Sirens of Titan* and, later, in Timequake. It is to this planet Billy Pilgrim, the central character of Slaughterhouse 5, is taken after his abduction and where he is held as an entertaining specimen in a Tralfamadorian zoo. (Inset left is a digital image by Janmesh Shah.)

The unique thing about the novel is that Slaughterhouse 5 is not considered a science fiction tale. It is hailed as the primo 20th century anti-war novel, while, at the same time, the thinly disguised memoir of a former WW2 soldier who literally marched through a living hell but somehow survived to tell the harrowing tale.

"Kurt Vonnegut's fiction is often explicitly science fiction, yet Vonnegut recoils at the use of the term -- scared off, I suppose, by the books written by Kilgore Trout, his fictional alter-ego. So you won't find Vonnegut in the science fiction department either, even though "The Sirens of Titan" is about flying saucers, "Player Piano" is about the effects of  in a near-future society, and "Cat's Cradle" is about a lab-created crystal with the capacity to plunge Earth into a permanent Ice Age. These are science fiction themes, whether Vonnegut wishes to admit it or not. And since his books are so readily available, I won't complain. At least I know where to go in the bookstore to find his books..."

- Mac Tonnies via Posthuman Blues, Sunday, March 14, 2004. Mac was a huge fan of Vonnegut. For him, Vonnegut was right up there with Kafka, Kerouac, Ballard, Bradbury, Burroughs, Gibson and P.K. Dick.** His favorite Vonnegut novel was Breakfast of Champions (1973). It was one of the books he'd want on hand if he was stranded on a deserted island.

That being said, Mac's bewilderment regarding Vonnegut's attitude towards the sci-fi genre was not unique. Critics still debate this topic today in spite of Vonnegut's own essay on the topic, On Writing Science Fiction:

"Years ago I was working in Schenectady for General Electric, completely surrounded by machines and ideas for machines, so I wrote a novel about people and machines, and machines frequently got the best of it, as machines will. (It was called Player Piano, and it's coming out in hard covers again next spring.) And I learned from the reviewers that I was a science-fiction writer.

I didn't know that. I supposed that I was writing a novel about life, about things I could not avoid seeing and hearing in Schenectady, a very real town, awkwardly set in the gruesome now. I have been a sore-headed occupant of a file-drawer labeled ''science- fiction'' ever since, and I would like out, particularly since so many serious critics regularly mistake the drawer for a tall white fixture in a comfort station."

In the case of the planet Tralfamadore and Billy Pilgrim, Vonnegut was writing about alien abductions during a decade when "alien abductions" and UAP sightings were just beginning to trickle into the public domain via local mainstream news sources. The phenomenon emerged in the early 1950s but,75 years later, we are still none the wiser and have little understanding of the abduction experience.***

As it was, via an article entitled The Laughing Time Traveller, we learn:

"...that Vonnegut invented Tralfamodore as a child when he was stargazing with his extended family on a jetty at their summer home on Lake Maxinkuckee in north-western Indiana."

Hmmm... How many ways can we translate that line? Memories are such slippery things.

Inset right is Vonnegut in 1940 when he was a lad of 18.  Two years later he enlisted in the army (joining the Children's Crusade). Soon afterwards his mother committed suicide. Maybe a year after that Vonnegut, an American of German descent, emerged from Slaughterhouse Five as a POW in Germany to watch helplessly as the great city of Dresden and most of its people were burned in a firestorm created by Allied missiles; a sight which haunted him for the rest of his life.

In any case, in the photo, he was just a kid. What you can't tell from the photo is that he was very tall. Oddly enough, he reminds me of Mac in some way. Mac may have thought so, too.

(Continued below the jump...)

Cats, Our Mysterious "Others"

Our resident alien, Charlie, who has diligently overseen the creation
of this post. (2026, DS.)

"When a man loves cats, I am his friend, and comrade, without further introduction."

- The words of Mark Twain (1835-1910), American author, humorist, and champion of cats. He was known to rent cats when he was away from home (missing his own, vast feline collection.) His favorite cat was a black cat (with a white ruff) named Bambino. Twain is also credited for stating: “If man could be crossed with the cat, it would improve man, but it would deteriorate the cat." Both quotes and the photo of Twain insert right were sourced from the Smithsonian article: Mark Twain Liked Cats Better Than People.

"Mark Twain" was, incidentally, the name of of the building in Kansas City in which Mac Tonnies (and his cats) resided. (See blog sidebar.) Mark Twain is also one of the memetic connectives between this post and a new  cross-post on my other blog which will appear shortly regarding Kurt Vonnegut. Had Vonnegut, another of Mac's favorite authors, been a cat person, he would have appeared here as well.

Sunday, January 26, 2003

"Why 'Posthuman Blues'? Jack Kerouac's Book of Blues contains some essentially worthless poetry...but if he'd toted a palmtop instead of a ruled notepad, his output would likely find a small but fervent niche audience. His Book of Blues is rich blogging material, written as one would scribble postcards to one's own clone or multidimensional counterpart."

- Mac Tonnies completing his very first post on his new blog, Posthuman Blues. I wasn't aware that the "Blues" half of his title was inspired by Jack Kerouac (March 12, 1922 – October 21, 1969) and wasn't aware of Book of Blues although I did know of his reverence for On the Road.

Inset left is a vintage photo of Jean-Louis Lebris de Kérouac (his parents were French Canadian) and his cat. This photo, in essence, inspired this post. I suddenly had the hunch that there were more unexpected cat people to be found... and I was right!

(Source: Ranker. Note: slow-loading page but well worth the effort. Numerous celebrities with their cats... from Herman Hesse to Sartre to Bette Davis to Stanley Kubrick!)

Sunday, August 17, 2003

"I was on my computer waiting for a pizza to arrive when I noticed that Spook, my oldest cat, was unusually interested in the window above my air conditioner. I followed her gaze.

The bat from the previous night was hanging from the blinds! Inexplicably inside my apartment!

It immediately started flying all over the place, coming perilously close to the ceiling fan. I ran to the phone and called my apartment's emergency maintenance number and was told that a loose bat in my apartment didn't constitute an emergency. I told them it fucking well did and that they better send someone to help me trap it. (None of this was the bat's fault. I actually like bats; I just don't like sharing my living room with them.)

By this time both my cats were chasing the bat with gleeful abandon. The phone rang: the pizza guy calling from the lobby nine floors down. I grabbed my checkbook and met him at the door just as a maintenance guy and my building's new manager began conferring about the Loose Bat Situation.

The bat, probably exhausted and starving, flew into the kitchen as we walked into my apartment, and the maintenance guy was able to trap it in a towel. It made angry buzzing noises through tiny fangs as he escorted it into the hall. Fortunately, he had every intention of setting the bat free outside.

Now my cats are listless and forlorn. At first, Spook diligently kept looking for it and meowing plaintively. I think the realization that the bat is gone is finally hitting home. But it was certainly fun while it lasted."

- Mac Tonnies via this humorous Posthuman  Blues post. Mac had been blogging for 8 months before mention of his feline companions entered his Posthuman narrative. I guess he was looking for some comic relief... and he found it.

Inset right above is great photograph of one of Mac's fave songwriters, Morrissey, having a magic moment with his tabby found here.

Inset right is one of the most remarkable cat paintings I could find: Suzanne Valadon's glorious Raminou (1920). Valadon was a pretty remarkable artist whose remarkable story can be read in full on this (remarkable) blog. For more Valadon cats see Katzenworld. For a Trans-D article featuring Valadon, see here.

(Continued below the break...)

Dreams of Dead Malls

Dead Mall in Thailand. Photo Credit: 2026, Naruto Memer.
(Note: Full color photos have been modified for this post.)
My apologies to the individual photographers.)

Saturday, May 06, 2006

"I had one of my Giant Shopping Mall of the Future dreams last night. "Blade Runner" meets "Mad Max" as directed by Romero, with me as the unwitting star. (I was searching for my cats.)

Epic mounds of detritus, cannibalized machinery, meandering hordes of suburban nomads in search of an obscure fix. As always, a feeling of detachment and loss; a whole millennium dashed upon unfriendly concrete shores as the population cowers from a sky it's never seen, oddly content among the crowded memories of a derelict century.

I'm watching from the meticulously stripped-down carriage of an elevator, camera in hand, filming the spectacle floor by floor. Strangers pass like silhouettes consigned to Celluloid purgatory, just out of reach. And I descend into the hive's very guts, enamored of the darkness."

- Mac Tonnies via this Posthuman Blues post.

•

The deceased Randall Park Mall (and a dangling conversation). Photo credit: Seph Lawless.

Friday, November 05, 2004

This reinvented world is hushed, stagnant; the excesses of today's fast-forward commercial ecology keep the population in virtual submission. It's not necessarily that there are fewer people; it's simply that humans will find themselves dwarfed by structures whose function seems to balance on the razor's edge of obsolescence. Ever seen a deserted shopping mall slated for demolition? Imagine a whole country with that same sad, desiccated atmosphere; a world thrown rudely upon the concrete shores of its own past.

A man sits on the jetee, bracketed by clammy concrete walls, and sips rice tea. He watches the tide -- warm and strangely odorless -- rush in, crashing against the fortified seawall with a peculiarly electric sound. Lukewarm spray beads the asphalt between his feet.

I am watching.

- Mac Tonnies via this Posthuman Blues post.

•

May 21, 2008

"But the locations in my dreams are far from what I’d expect of wish-fulfillment fantasies. As familiar as they’ve become, there’s nothing overtly pleasant about them. Rather, they seem more than slightly ominous: jaundiced psychic postcards from the near-future landscapes of Philip K. Dick and J.G. Ballard. My very identity is relegated to that of a confused tourist; my itinerary, if there is one, seems limited to so much queasy sight-seeing. I can’t plot a meaningful course of action, so I merely watch — and awake with my mind’s eye awash in fragments."

- Mac Tonnies via his Futuristic article: Dreams of the Future. Inset right is a photo Mac would love: a scene from a mannequin slaughter at a dead Macy's (found here) by Alaina.

***

(Continued below the break...)

Hidden Synchronicities (of the Memetic Kind)

From the sketchbook of Franz Kafka,  Untitled - pen & ink - circa 1901.
(Note: The orientation of this drawing which seems slightly askew is the way it appears on the page of Kafka's sketchpad.) 

"The year 2019 brought a sensational discovery: hundreds of drawings by the writer Franz Kafka (1883–1924) were found in a private collection that for decades had been kept under lock and key. Until now, only a few of Kafka’s drawings were widely known. Although Kafka is renowned for his written work, his drawings are evidence of what his literary executor Max Brod termed his 'double talent'."

- From a page devoted to a recent Yale University publication: Franz Kafka, The Drawings. The precise vision evident in Kafka's drawings gives us a window to his remarkable mind. His shapes are so clean and uncluttered they are almost like graphic symbols snapping to our attention by his keen usage of unique symmetries, perspective, and playful angles. And, noting the humor in his linework may be a key to understanding Kafka's approach to his work overall.*

•

"By way of example, I shall mention an incident from my own observation. A young woman I was treating had, at a critical moment, a dream in which she was given a golden scarab. While she was telling me this dream I sat with my back to the closed window. Suddenly I heard a noise behind me, like a gentle tapping. I turned round and saw a flying insect knocking against the window pane from outside. I opened the window and caught the creature in the air as it flew in. It was the nearest analogy to a golden scarab that one finds in our latitudes, a scarabaeid beetle, the common rose-chafer (Cetonia aurata), which contrary to its usual habits had evidently felt an urge to get into a dark room at this particular moment."

- Carl Jung, from Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle, 1960. Possibly one of the most famous synchronicities is Jung's own eureka experience regarding the beetle which tapped on his window just in time to go down in history. Inset right is a photo of the scarabaeid Jung logically saw, the European Rose-Chafer.

But, had he lived in Peru, he might have seen the truly golden scarab in the photo inset left, Chrysina Resplendens.

It is said that the ancient Egyptians from all social classes carried a scarab emblem throughout their lives and then were buried with one after death.

•

"Friday, December 17, 2004

Your soul is bound to the Solitary Rose: The Alone.

'When I wake up alone, the shades are still drawn on the cold window pane so they cast 

their lines on my bed and lines on my face.'

The Solitary Rose is associated with loneliness, melancholy, and patience. It is governed by the goddess Merope and its sign is The Sword, or Unrequited Love.

As a Solitary Rose, you may be summed up as a hopeless romantic. You desire love and have so much love to give, but things just never seem to work out the way you want them to. In life, you can be very optimistic, even when things are gray and nothing works out to your expectations."

(What Rose Is Your Soul Bound To?
brought to you by Quizilla)

___________________

I can't say I didn't see this one coming. On the subject of doomed romance, I finally got around to starting Kathi Diamant's Kafka's Last Love."

- From Posthuman Blues, Mac Tonnies reporting his most recent encounter with romantic irony via a weird little personality "oracle" he fell for at the end of 2004. I must confess that (for all reasons) I found this post a little strange when it mysteriously popped up on the screen.

But, considering that Quizilla specialized in quizzes of a similar nature, and, keeping in mind that Quizilla thrived for 12 years (2002-2014), Mac was not the only one attracted to psycho-magical babble when searching for insight into the mystery of his own nature. Today there are many (allegedly) mystical cyber-oracles out there offering similar insights into our mysterious realms. For more regarding the psychology of quizzes, try this article.

(Continued below the jump.)

Star Wars: Disclosure 2026 Update

Source: The Hill.

"The Department of War is in lockstep with President Trump to bring unprecedented transparency regarding our government's understanding of Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena. These files, hidden behind classifications, have long fueled justified speculation — and it's time the American people see it for themselves. This release of declassified documents demonstrates the Trump Administration's earnest commitment to unprecedented transparency."

- Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth

•

A look at the government's 'never-before-seen' UFO files

The new Pentagon website includes 162 declassified files on UFOs, or unidentified aerial phenomena. Some experts wonder if they contain anything new

•

Nearly a century of wondering:

The American 

UFO saga, in reality and in fiction

***

Today's distraction is brought to you LIVE from the Pentagon: the new "transparent" disclosure website (see 1st article for link) with only "slightly redacted" declassified documents of the UAP activity the feds have been holding hostage for up to 80 years.

Are we being enlightened? You tell me.

The Mar-a-lago Messiah - reverse engineering a hazardous meme (Updated: 4/29/2026)

 

Stained Legacy of the Church of MAGA, editorial cartoon, April 2, 2024 by primo Canadian cartoonist Graeme MacKay, found in his article: A Blasphemous Exploitation of Faith for Personal Gain.

"Woe to those who manipulate religion and the very name of God for their own military, economic and political gain, dragging that which is sacred into darkness and filth,” Leo told a gathering at Saint Joseph Cathedral in the western city of Bamenda.

“They turn a blind eye to the fact that billions of dollars are spent on killing and devastation, yet the resources needed for healing, education and restoration are nowhere to be found.

“The world is being ravaged by a handful of tyrants, yet it is held together by a multitude of supportive brothers and sisters.”

- Words of wisdom expressed by Catholic Pope Leo XIV during a recent trip to Africa... possibly in response to lunatic ravings posted against him on "Truth Social." Apparently, the Pope disagreed with Trump's decision to enter Israel's war with Iran. As did a majority of Americans.

Jesus Trump - editorial cartoon - April 14, 2026, Michael de Adder. 

•

(New: 5/7/2026) "When Trump was elected president of the United States, his now infamous alt-right supporters celebrated the victory in what they considered the ‘Great Meme War’. They made Trump the object of a memetic cult of personality, exalting him as their ‘God Emperor’ for which they fought."

- This quote (sourced here) illuminates our general discussion. Obviously, the Great Meme War of 2016 never really ended. And imagine how much more effective Memetic Warfare was for the alt-right in 2024 with tech-wizard Elon Musk on board.

"Memetic warfare on the part of 4chan and r/The_Donald subreddit is widely credited with assisting Donald Trump in winning the election in an event they call 'The Great Meme War'. According to Ben Schreckinger, 'a group of anonymous keyboard commandos conquered the internet for Donald Trump—and plans to deliver Europe to the far right'."

•

"Memetic is frequently used to describe digital artifacts (images, videos, jokes) that go viral online, sharing common characteristics and evolving as they are shared.

In fictional contexts, "memetic hazards" are ideas or information that, when perceived, cause significant, often dangerous, mental effects (cognitohazards).

Memetic Engineering: The deliberate design and deployment of memes to alter social discourse or achieve specific goals, such as in marketing or political campaigns."

- Via Wiki, describing the meme, a unit of cultural transmission. But, then again, there are the hazardous memes. Outside of "fictional contexts," political propaganda can weaponize hazardous memes.

The highlighted text is the central theme of this post.*

* Happily, meme warfare works both ways. Tit for tat, this for that. And, there is no better way to counteract a malignant meme than the illuminating, mental stimulation of satirical humor. It's like squeezing dirty water from a household sponge. You have to do it to get the job done, so, you can finally relax. Laughter is relaxation.

•

The MAGA Messiah - editorial cartoon - 2024, Darrin Bell. "Move aside, loser."

"Nick Adams posted the image of Donald Trump as Jesus Christ.

Since moving to the United States, Adams has become a prominent Trump backer and commentator.

Adams, born Nicholas Adamopoulos, was nominated by Trump to be America's ambassador to Malaysia.

But that nomination was later withdrawn and he was named Special Presidential Envoy for American Tourism, Exceptionalism, and Values, a role that was created for him."

- While we are not told that Nick Adams created the AI-generated Trump/Christ images trending across the WWW this past week (see article), we do know that he posted a few. Moreover, Adams is employed by the present far-right regime in "a role that was created for him." And, what a mouthful that "role" is: Special Presidential Envoy for American Tourism, Exceptionalism, and Values. Sounds like something cooked up by the Wizard of Oz. Maybe it was. But, who is the wizard?

Perhaps, there is more than one silhouette behind that curtain. We now know of another (see below). As for the others, read on...

(Continued below the jump...)

Just Found: Comic Relief

 

"President Donald Trump announced a two-week ceasefire with Iran on Tuesday night — hours after he'd threatened "a whole civilization will die tonight" and about 90 minutes before a deadline he set for Tehran to reach an agreement with the U.S."

Fresh from the Donnie Demento files, we have the news above regarding a suddenly deescalated war which, only moments before, may have potentially led to The End.

Talk about playing with our emotions!

Happily, we also have another satirical gem from the illustrious Jeremy Newberger, who nailed our collective angst during the very early days of this nightmare with Le Bouffon Orange. Newberger has struck again and for this we collectively applaud him. Bravo!

Question: what can be done when a man, who currently holds the highest executive office in the USA, believes that he, in fact, rules the entire world and threatens to "destroy a civilization" if it dares disobey him? (Note: link repaired.)

In bygone days he would've been discreetly plucked from public office and delivered (with little ado) to one of those quiet, hidden places all madmen go to retire (good-bye Mar-a-Lago, hello Sunny Pastures). Alas.

There might, yet, be hope. Three words currently trending: The 25th Amendment.

Disclosure, 2026

 

(Source: Pinto Creations)

Trump orders UFO files release after slamming Obama over alien comments

"The big picture: Trump's comments on Truth Social came hours after he accused former President Obama of disclosing classified information for saying aliens are "real" in a podcast last week."

After Obama says they're real, Trump orders release of government files on UFOs

"Pressed on whether he was confirming the existence of aliens in saying Obama's comments disclosed classified information, Trump continued to criticize the former president.

'I don't know if they're real or not, I can tell you he gave classified information," Trump said. "He's not supposed to be doing that. He made a big mistake. He took it out of classified information.'"

As Epstein Scandal Tightens, Trump Announces That He’s Releasing All Government Files About Alien Life 

"In short, it remains entirely unclear what other documents government agencies may still be holding on to or whether we’ll actually learn anything new.

What’s far more likely is that Trump continues to desperately try to control the narrative — as even Republicans are getting tired of his antics.

'They’ve deployed the ultimate weapon of mass distraction, but the Epstein files aren’t going away… even for aliens,' representative Thomas Massie (R-KY) tweeted."

***

Wow, just in time for the movie, there's news in the official world that here, in the United States of Anxiety, an actual UAP Disclosure is about to be enforced... by executive order!

Well, this news was all the rage the other day anyway, but, in the official world, the story has already begun to fade... and this is pretty much the case with most UFO/UAP headlines for the past 20 years. Here today, gone tomorrow. It's weird. So, just in case you missed it...

Bottom line: this, too shall pass... with no one the wiser. What we can expect: redaction... the present official term for censorship, subterfuge... and blatant attempts to withhold information. The Epstein files, the UAP files... whatever information we are given will not be all the information there is to give.

Meanwhile, I thought I might consult Posthuman Blues for some input; Mac had a knack for putting these kinds of things into perspective...

(More below the jump...)

The Fool's Heroic Journey (w/ Addendum )

The Fool, the unnumbered card of the Tarot deck's Major Arcanum - AI generated - by TyliJura.
Related images can be found here.

 

"the hero receives a call to adventure

•

they refuse the call

•

they meet an inspiring mentor

•

they decide to “cross the threshold” and accept the call

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they leave their home and face obstacles, enemies, and allies

•

they fail to achieve the goal

•

they try again and succeed

•

they come home with a reward"

 - A list of the chronological order of events present in an archetypal heroic tale compiled by Joseph Campbell for his 1949 book The Hero with a Thousand Faces found in this Substack article. 

"The Fool is not foolish — he is brave. He reminds us to begin again with openness, to trust the journey even when we can’t see the destination, and to listen to our instincts and higher self. He is the hero before the story begins, the spark of curiosity and freedom that initiates transformation.

Whether you’re starting a new venture, moving through change, or seeking deeper wisdom, The Fool invites you to embrace the unknown with a light heart and a willing soul."

- Interpretation of The Fool of the Tarot found here.

"In Europe, the divinatory meanings of the Fool tend to be darker than in the Anglo-American world. These meanings include illusion, confusion, passive drifting, irresponsibility, and impulsive actions leading to chaos. At best, the card symbolizes radical freedom and a detachment from societal restrictions, allowing for a kind of creative genius."

- Another reading of The Fool card (Le Mat), alluding  to its negative, or inverted meaning in divination.

"And perhaps most fittingly for our reading of Tarot cards, William Blake says 'If the fool would persist in his folly he would become wise.' 

When dealt this card, we are given a call to adventure, the beginning of a grand new journey, or we are being shown our own silliness, the missteps that we have taken. In truth, these are the same thing, a chance to start again."

- Excerpt from an article featuring Fool archetypes from the classical tarot decks. 

For, yet, another (tarot) Fool offering on this blog, see this post.

Interestingly, the Fool is also interpreted as a "madman." Arthur E. Waite, on the other hand, refers the Fool as an alchemist, although in a derogatory way:

"The conventional explanations say that the Fool signifies the flesh, the sensitive life, and by a peculiar satire its subsidiary name was at one time the alchemist, as depicting folly at the most insensate stage." (See Sacred Texts.)

***

It will be the 12th day of Christmas when this post goes up, and the 5th day of the official New Year. Weirdly enough, at least in my experience, that official juncture - or portal - between 2025 and 2026 which we have so recently experienced has held true. For me, it's as if I walked into a different dimension of reality - and/or human experience - I had never (exactly) visited before; overwhelmingly similar to my general perspective but turned up a notch... like an increment on a dial. Then again, space-time might be (metaphorically) represented by a dial... but, possibly, in ways the Vitruvian dialers (Chapter 8)* could not have foreseen...

(More below the jump...)

Spielberg's "Disclosure Day"

 

"The trailer opens with the question, 'If you found out we weren't alone, if someone showed you, proved it to you, would that frighten you?' Emily Blunt is then shown doing a weather report on television before she begins to stammer and make strange, alien-like clicking sounds."

-  From the USA Today article (December 16): Steven Spielberg finally lifts curtain on mysterious new sci-fi film.

***

Say what you will, but Steven Spielberg's science fiction extravaganzas are always something to look forward to, and his latest, Disclosure Day - due to be released in the summer of next year - looks like loads of fun. But, is it destined to become a blockbuster classic like Close Encounters... or E.T.?

I hope so. My only concern is that, by the summer of 2026, Americans might not find television newscasters stammering and making "strange, alien-like clicking sounds" all that remarkable. In fact, considering the sort of toxic garbage sliding out of too many mouths these days, alien-like clicking sounds might be preferable! ;-)

(NEW!) Cryptic billboard posters appear for Spielberg’s ‘Disclosure.’

The Altered States of Halloween

(Source: CowGow AI World.  Another nice one.)

Halloween may come but once a year for some of us, but, for the rest of us, a subtle sense of horror runs through our daily lives like background noise; the essence of Halloween is on our menu 365 days a year.

But, this is not always a bad thing. Think of the Essence of Halloween as an aerosol that comes in a can, a sort of air freshener. But, it's odor is not one of dead mammalian flesh as much as it the smell of dying leaves and burning candles in the cool night air. It has hints of sugar & spices mixed with church incense and the odd scent of a funeral parlor.

Halloween then bleeds into the Day of the Dead. Everyone knows, at least, one of those people. But, none of us can comprehend that most altered state of all... death itself.

And, so, we threw a party! 👻

Halloween, which likely originated from the old Celtic holiday of Samhain , is the culmination of a year of spookiness we can finally give a name to. "Oh, that explains it, it's officially Halloween!" Witches, demons, gremlins, ghouls, phantoms, zombies, psychopaths, haunted houses, memes of death, magic, fascination & horror - officially have free reign on this day... provided there is that certain element of humor... or satire. The irony of death is all around us. Let's dance!

For instance, my day was considerably brightened recently by a .gif starring the one and only Death Fairy (inset right), a wonderful, satirical character found here. Invented by the artist, Kiszkiloszki, the Death Fairy is quite possibly the best Halloween character ever!

But, all this talk of apparitions, fortune-telling, hallucinations, premonitions, trances, spell-casting and dreams of the living dead can be interpreted as being elements of our collective unconsciousness which have recently fallen under more serious scientific scrutiny: the altered states of consciousness (ACS).

"Although classical psychoanalysis has tended to regard altered states of consciousness (ASCs) as symptoms of regressive states, other schools of thought, such as Jungian, humanistic, and transpersonal psychology, regard them as higher states of consciousness and, often, as indicative of a more profound level of personal and spiritual evolution."

- A quote sourced from the APA Dictionary entry for altered state of consciousness.

"According to the Wiley-Blackwell Handbook of Transpersonal Psychology, excessive dancing, meditation, and mind-altering plants were used in ancient civilizations to modulate the activity of the mind. Terence McKenna, an American ethnobotanist, even thought that the use of psychedelic mushrooms had led to the 'evolution of human language and symbol use.'

The  production and use of substances that alter perception, change consciousness, and create illusion and hallucination seems to be embedded throughout the natural world, as a thread somehow woven into the fabric of life itself,' writes Dr Peter Brace from Swinburne University."

- Via the article: Altered states of consciousness: the elusiveness of the mind. 

“I’m being greeted by these beings, they’rle not human but they’re oddly familiar. I know them as if they are family. They’re telling me how happy they are to see me, and that I’ve found this technology to communicate with them again.”

“Yesterday, I finally broke through and met a male and female entity in the place where we exist before birth, and after death. I was in complete shock about what happened, it seemed so real, and it honestly felt like a very familiar place. They were welcoming me and it felt like I was home.”

- Quotes from participants in a DMT study via the Big Think article: “I’ve been here before”: DMT study explores a strange memory phenomenon.

DMT is a chemical naturally found in numerous plants and some mammals, including humans. It is the hallucinogenic ingredient in Ayahuasca.

I was particularly impressed by the line: "They’re telling me how happy they are to see me, and that I’ve found this technology to communicate with them again.” Technology is an odd word to describe what is essentially the effects of a plant product.

As it happens, humans have been deliberately attempting to alter and enhance their conscious states - for quite some time... somewhere around 30,000 years, if not more! While psychotropic plants have often played a part in this process, the true altered state is not dependent upon them. Alcohol (another plant product) consumption, meditation, orgasm, music, dancing, ceremonial rituals, lucid dreaming - and, to this I add, the processes used to create many forms of art - are among the many activities that may produce an altered state. *

(Inset left above is an example of the Geometry of DMT.)

(More below the jump...)

Cause for Pause: the Rot at the Core

Hitler - oil painting - 1934, Victor Brauner.

"Each painting that I make is projected from the deepest sources of my anxiety..."

- Romanian-French Surrealist artist, Victor Brauner, (1903-1966). Although not always as well-known in the States as he was in Europe, recognition of his importance in Surrealism is more evident now than it was when I first featured him in an old TD post, The Magic of Art & The Art of Magic. In the post I included a link to the Hitler image (above), referring to it as "Brauner's voodoo doll." Nowadays I would use the word Vodou, but I would still interpret it the same. I imagine André Breton did, too, when he added it to his eccentric art collection. (Brauner's haunting portrait of Breton) Hitler would be dead 11 years later... No, not soon enough for an authentic correlation, but, in this case, it's the thought (and the passion) that counts. From this excellent online source we have:

" One of the most significant symbolic aspects of voodoo dolls is their role as a conduit for energy and intention. In many traditions, the doll is believed to act as a vessel, allowing the practitioner to channel their desires, whether for healing, protection, or even retribution, into the physical form of the doll."

But, can weaponized art fulfill the requirements of aesthetic beauty? Apparently, it depends upon who you ask. For some members of the Young Republican National Federation here in the States, Hitler had an "aesthetic." (See quotes below.)

'I love Hitler’: Leaked messages expose Young Republicans’ racist chat

"Peter Giunta, who at the time was chair of the same organization, wrote in a message sent in June that 'everyone that votes no is going to the gas chamber.'

Giunta was referring to an upcoming vote o@n whether he should become chair of the Young Republican National Federation, the GOP’s 15,000-member political organization for Republicans between 18 and 40 years old.

'Im going to create some of the greatest physiological torture methods known to man. We only want true believers,' he continued.

'Can we fix the showers? Gas chambers don’t fit the Hitler aesthetic,' Joe Maligno, who previously identified himself as the general counsel for the New York State Young Republicans, wrote back.

'I’m ready to watch people burn now,' Annie Kaykaty, New York’s national committee member, said."

For most of us, this latest Republican gaff is old news. But, I must admit, of all the nightmares presented to us in the past year, this one made my blood run cold. While it's possible that the words may have been taken out of context, the message is clear. The "Hitler aesthetic" is the cherry on this shit-sundae. I can find no element of grace or beauty in Hitler's pathological hate tale.

What is particularly scary is that most of the members quoted actually worked for the government, up to and including a Senator!

Yes, this chat was immediately condemned by the Republican base, but it was too late to get the cat back into the bag. The rot at the MAGA core was exposed.

Bravo, Politico, this story makes for a "charming" Halloween horror vignette!

It is, after all, the witching season; Halloween is arriving soon, along with the Day when the Dead shall rise. But, while Halloween is a great time for confronting ones deepest fears, in the modern world, we do so almost as a form of play. The vintage animation below is an example of this. Created by Disney studios in the late 1920s, Skeleton Dance was the first of the Silly Symphonies. Ah, maybe this fits the "Hitler aesthetic"...

... along with another seasonal title, Mel Brook's Springtime for Hitler.

(Source: the Laughing Place.)

***

UPDATE - October 18, 2025

LIVE - NO KINGS Protests, USA

PBS - Live coverage in DC

•

CNBC-TV 18 Live Nationwide Coverage

•

The Daily Discourse - Live National Coverage

⭐ NEW!!!

When That Man is Dead & Gone

Here's a tune you might enjoy... written by Irving Berlin in 1941 as an anti-Hitler anthem and performed by the modern band, Lizzy & the Triggermen - it has suddenly achieved new popularity.

File under: Ways in Which Art Removes Tyrants.

They Live (Updated 11/5/2025)

 

"Nada retrieves one of the boxes from the church and takes a pair of sunglasses from it, concealing the box in a trash pile. He finds out that they make the world appear monochrome and reveal subliminal messages in the media to consume and conform. They also disclose that many people are ghoulish, bug-eyed aliens hiding under human façades."

- Via the Wiki article for They Live, a sci-fi film from 1988 directed by John Carpenter, a master of the horror genre. Interestingly, it was written in response to Ronald Reagan, the US president at the time. The article goes on to say:

"...Carpenter decided to use the pseudonym "Frank Armitage", an allusion to one of the filmmaker's favorite writers, H. P. Lovecraft (Henry Armitage is a character in Lovecraft's Dunwich Horror) Carpenter has always felt a close kinship with Lovecraft's worldview, and according to the director "Lovecraft wrote about the hidden world, the 'world ally'. His stories were about gods who are repressed, who were once on Earth and are now coming back. The world underneath has a great deal to do with They Live."

And, so it does. But, John Carpenter is no smug evangelist and there's an element of high camp present in They Live which prevents it from being taken too morbidly, thereby taking the fatal sting from it's central motif: the horror of losing control over ones autonomy, ones own anatomy and existence, while relinquishing all existential freedom to an alien foe, an unrelenting monster whose agenda is to destroy the world upon which you and your loved ones must exist. Carpenter foresaw the immediate future.

Can't beat that for an introduction to the witching season... although discussions of evil technocracies also has its sinister appeal.

Stay tuned for more Halloween merriment! ;-)

(For more They Live and numerous other cool clips visit the YouTube channel, Fonoptikon.)

NEW! (11/5/2025)

Just found: a vintage clip from the YouTube channel Mind Matters Most.

The mid-20th century brought young television viewers in the States a number of science fictional treats, but shows like the Twilight Zone - hosted by the darkly debonair Rod Sirling - and it's competitor, Outer Limits, represented a more sophisticated, existentialist World of the Weird that influenced its viewers in a more subliminal way... possibly opening the door for further experimentation regarding the altered states that would follow soon thereafter. There was always a kind of moral to these fantastical stories, very evident in the little vignette above... very evident, and very prescient! 🦉👻💀

Vale to an Extraordinary Scientist, Jane Goodall

The cover of Jane Goodall's The Book of Hope.

"Sentient beings are numberless; I vow to free them."

- In Tibetan Buddhism, the first vow of the enlightened Bodhisattva.

"Sometimes people would ask her, which do you like better, chimps or people? She'd say well, it depends.

'Chimps are so like us," Goodall said, "that I like some people much more than some chimps and some chimps much more than some people.'"

- Via the NPR's tribute to Jane Goodall who passed away October 1st.

"Instead, let's assume for adventure's sake that we're sharing the planet with a flesh-and-blood offshoot of the human species. As I've tried to demonstrate, the prospect isn't as absurd as it initially seems; indeed, I expect it will seem much less so when we've learned more about our world and our relatively brief tenure here. (It bears mention that eminent primatologist Jane Goodall has defended the scientific search for "Bigfoot," a cryptohominid commonly described as enormous. Assuming a gigantic and purportedly foul-smelling primate can successfully lay low, it may be substantially easier for an intelligent technical society, with a tested capacity for stealth and a full repertoire of disinformation tricks, to dodge our radar.)"

- Mac Tonnies, from a Posthuman Blues post from March 31, 2006. In it, he begins to describe his Cryptoterrestrial Hypothesis in its infancy, citing Jane Goodall as one of his influences.

***

I was saddened when I came upon the news that Jane Goodall had slipped the mortal coil yesterday. If anyone was influential in establishing the truth regarding the sentience of animals in the 20th Century, surely it was she. At a time when many scientists were still on the fence about the true nature of animal cognizance, Goodall proved that primates could invent and use simple tools... a game-changer that totally blew away all preexisting theories regarding animal behavior, and opened the door for new definitions of the word "sentience." Interestingly, the "new" definitions mirrored observations of philosophers from an earlier century:

"In the 17th century Thomas Tryon, a self-identified Pythagorean, raised the issue of non-human suffering. Soon thereafter, many philosophers used the anatomical discoveries of the Enlightenment as a reason to include animals in what philosophers call "sympatheia," the principle of who or what deserves sympathy."

When I study Jane Goodall's uniquely beautiful face, it really appears to me as if she was illuminated from within, with the unspoiled grace of a true Bodhisattva. I don't think I'm imagining things.

Midnight Update!

I spent some time tonight trying to find the perfect video of Dame Goodall to post here, and I finally found it. Sadly, it's too long to view here, but, Jane Goodall's First Time on the Subway is must-see, in part or whole.

No, she doesn't come across as a Bodhisattva as much as she does a charmer; an artist's scientist with a child's curious nature, a cat's amazing ability to always land on its feet, and a mind like a steel trap! Then again, maybe that does describe the nature of a Bodhisattva. 🏵️

"Illumined Black" Back in Print (updated: 9/27)

 

Wormhole - photograph of a local KC, MO sculpture - 2000, Mac Tonnies.

"What does the mind experience when severed from the body?

What are the ultimate limits of artistic expression in a post-human age?

These intriguing questions and more are answered in Mac Tonnies' macabre, mind-expanding collection of science-fiction short stories... 

Originally published in 1995, Illumined Black was a sensation among the science-fiction community. Mac Tonnies was a radical new voice in the genre, and his storytelling — combining JG Ballard, Philip K Dick, and internet-age verve — was a breath of fresh air"

This new Solar Press edition of Illumined Black greatly expands on the long out-of-print first-edition, containing both the original 9 story 'Illumined Black' collection, and 9 new stories collected from magazines, ezines, and the Mac Tonnies archive — including 'One-Hundred Years,' Mac's apocalyptic magnum opus, originally published in Flurb #3 (edited by cyberpunk godfather Rudy Rucker)."

- Several quotes from the Solar Press "Illuminated Black" page announcing its new edition of what was the first publication of Mac's fiction. (The original edition is inset left, above, and is discussed in this post.) Mac was all of 20 years old at the time, but, already his aesthetic sentience was boiling over with new forms.

***

Black is back!

Think of it as a belated gift for Mac's 50th birthday, projected forward in time: the republication of Illumined Black in a new package (inset right).

Aesthetically, I feel that Mac would've preferred one of his own illuminations gracing it's cover... like his photograph "Wormhole" circa 2000, (cropped and rotated). But, well, I was not in the loop on this one.

Regardless, this is good news, and long overdue! The addition of new material is a special treat. My thanks go out to all involved, and, as ever, to Dana Tonnies, who enabled the news to appear here.

(More good news below the jump)