Go the Breaking News!
Anti-whaling activists are using a small, space-age-like vessel to scare off Japan's whaling fleet from Antarctic waters - with a ghostly tune as its main weapon.
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Thursday, December 3, 2009
WHALE IN A FIGHT FOR HIS LIFE
See Breaking News about a juvenile humpback whale entangled in hundreds of feet of heavy rope off Hawaii's coast. The situation is "life-threatening.''
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
NEW TWIST IN JAPAN'S WHALING DUPLICITY
It has been widely acknowledged that Japan carries two types of minke whale stocks:
1) the O-stock, which is hunted under the IWC loophole of "scientifc and research" whaling;
2) the J-stock, which is substantially depleted and has been protected since 1986 but continues to be killed as "bycatch."
A new study now finds that Japan slaughters just as many J-stock whales as they do the O-stock. Much of this bycatch is unregulated and goes unreported. Using DNA testing, green activists have also matched meat from the hunts with that sold and served in markets and restaurants, even though Japan has consistently maintained it does not hunt whales for commercial purposes.
1) the O-stock, which is hunted under the IWC loophole of "scientifc and research" whaling;
2) the J-stock, which is substantially depleted and has been protected since 1986 but continues to be killed as "bycatch."
A new study now finds that Japan slaughters just as many J-stock whales as they do the O-stock. Much of this bycatch is unregulated and goes unreported. Using DNA testing, green activists have also matched meat from the hunts with that sold and served in markets and restaurants, even though Japan has consistently maintained it does not hunt whales for commercial purposes.
ICELAND RECORDS LARGEST COMMERCIAL WHALE HUNT
According to the the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society, Iceland killed at least 93 endangered fin whales this summer. Fin whales are second to blues in size and are still only now slowly recovering from the unregulated yester-years of whaling. Along with the 63 minke whales that Iceland slaughtered during the same period, this total represents the biggest commercial whale hunt the North Atlantic has seen in several decades.
Sunday, August 9, 2009
VIDEO OF JAPAN'S LATEST WHALE HUNT
The Environmental Investigation Agency released footage of a whale hunt by Japan. The pro-slaughter nation, which has been successful at finding loopholes to continue hunting despite a ban on commercial whaling, is seen killing rare Baird Beaked Whales. Considered "small cetaceans" they are exempt from the worldwide ban. The Japanese take about 60 beaked whales every year. The meat is sold in supermarkets even though they contain toxic level so mercury.
Go to BREAKING NEWS for the video link.
Go to BREAKING NEWS for the video link.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
STATS SUPPORT WHALE WATCHING OVER HUNTING
In a report published by the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), revenues from whale watching in 2oo8 reached 1.3 billion pounds, double what it was a decade ago. This suggests that whale watching is far more profitable than killing them. Globally, whale watching has grown by 3.7% each year in the last decade. Last year alone, 13 million tourists in 119 countries went whale watching amd created almost 13,000 jobs.
On the other hand, A World Wildlife Fund analysis studied the range of direct and indirect costs associated with whaling, processing and marketing of whale products, combined that data with declining demand for whale meat and negative impacts trade and tourism boycotts. The analysis suggested that commercial whaling has little or no return for either the country’s economy or the taxpayers subsidizing hunting.
Citing Norway as an example, the government there has spent about US$5 million on public information, public relations and lobbying campaigns to garner support for whaling since 1992. Norway spent another US$10.5 million to cover the costs but scrapped it due to losses to the whalers. Japan, another nation actively continuing to hunt whales, needed US$12 million in taxpayer bailout to just break even last year. Overall, Japanese subsidies for whaling amounted to US$164 million since 1988. Wholesale prices of whale meat have plummeted since 1994.
"It’s clearly the most sustainable use of whales', said Patrick Ramage of the IFAW. 'You can watch the same whales dozens of times, but you can kill a whale only once."
On the other hand, A World Wildlife Fund analysis studied the range of direct and indirect costs associated with whaling, processing and marketing of whale products, combined that data with declining demand for whale meat and negative impacts trade and tourism boycotts. The analysis suggested that commercial whaling has little or no return for either the country’s economy or the taxpayers subsidizing hunting.
Citing Norway as an example, the government there has spent about US$5 million on public information, public relations and lobbying campaigns to garner support for whaling since 1992. Norway spent another US$10.5 million to cover the costs but scrapped it due to losses to the whalers. Japan, another nation actively continuing to hunt whales, needed US$12 million in taxpayer bailout to just break even last year. Overall, Japanese subsidies for whaling amounted to US$164 million since 1988. Wholesale prices of whale meat have plummeted since 1994.
"It’s clearly the most sustainable use of whales', said Patrick Ramage of the IFAW. 'You can watch the same whales dozens of times, but you can kill a whale only once."
Friday, June 19, 2009
FUTURE & FATE OF WHALES HANGS IN THE BALANCE
New controversy brewed ahead of the International Whaling Commission meeting next week in Maderia that is already contentious. Greenland wants IWC approval to slaughter 50 humpback whales in a semi-autonomous Danish territory and has sought the support of Sweden to garner European support.
Adding to the animosity today was confirmation that, between 1943 and 1976, Russia—then the Soviet Union—had killed 200,000 more whales than they reported, including calves, pregnant females and severely endangered species. It is believed that this flagrant and indiscriminate slaughter likely doomed the Right Whale in the Southern hemisphere to extinction.
The upcoming IWC session, set to begin on Monday, could be historic. Earlier this year, pro-slaughter allies met in Tokyo to vote in a bloc to win a key vote that could see the resumption of commercial whaling later this summer. Ever since the 1985 moratorium on all slaughter for commercial purposes, Japan has been consistently taking 1000 whales a year under a loophole called “scientific and research” whaling. In response to the Tokyo meeting, the European Union quickly organized an anti-whaling bloc of votes. Green activists also exposed a secret back room deal (dubbed Whalergate) which would have allowed Japan unlimited quota along its coast in exchange for reduced hunts in the Antarctic. IWC Commissioner Bill Hogarth from the US, who led these secret negotiations, stepped down leaving the matter unresolved and the IWC deeply divided.
Adding to the animosity today was confirmation that, between 1943 and 1976, Russia—then the Soviet Union—had killed 200,000 more whales than they reported, including calves, pregnant females and severely endangered species. It is believed that this flagrant and indiscriminate slaughter likely doomed the Right Whale in the Southern hemisphere to extinction.
The upcoming IWC session, set to begin on Monday, could be historic. Earlier this year, pro-slaughter allies met in Tokyo to vote in a bloc to win a key vote that could see the resumption of commercial whaling later this summer. Ever since the 1985 moratorium on all slaughter for commercial purposes, Japan has been consistently taking 1000 whales a year under a loophole called “scientific and research” whaling. In response to the Tokyo meeting, the European Union quickly organized an anti-whaling bloc of votes. Green activists also exposed a secret back room deal (dubbed Whalergate) which would have allowed Japan unlimited quota along its coast in exchange for reduced hunts in the Antarctic. IWC Commissioner Bill Hogarth from the US, who led these secret negotiations, stepped down leaving the matter unresolved and the IWC deeply divided.
Monday, June 8, 2009
BREAKING NEWS! IWC PAPERS CONFIRM "WHALERGATE"
The International Whaling Commission (IWC) released documents which confirmed that the US (under the Bush Administration) led the talks to relax the global moratorium on whaling and grant Japan the right to kill whales along its coastline. Exposed earlier this year as "Whalergate", this secret deal has nevertheless emboldened other pro-slaughter nations to take an aggressive stance at the upcoming IWC meetings in June. A victory could see the resumption of commercial whaling later this summer.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
IWC CHIEF STEPS DOWN AS WHALE HUNTS RESUME
William Hogarth, the outgoing head of the International Whaling Commission, stepped down. Appointed byGeorge W. Bush, this biologist leaves the IWC deeply divided and in a state of crisis.The scandal known as "Whalergate" broke under his watch, when activists exposed a clandestine deal that would allow Japan to kill more whales along its coast for reduced "research and scientific" hunts in the Antarctic. He also failed to negotiate an agreement with Japan, Korea and of other pro-slaughter nations ahead of this summer's IWC meeting, when key votes could see the resumption of commercial whaling this year.
News also broke yesterday that Iceland's whalers were heading to sea to hunt and kill 250 whales despite protests and letters of opposition from all around the world. Following the collapse of the nation's banks, Iceland's government had been taking out full page ads promoting whale slaughters as a way to ease the financial crisis. Meanwhile, with children observing 'to learn,' natives of the Faroe Islands killed 150 pilot whales. Inhabitants here claim the slaughter of pilot whales is a tradition that allegedly dates back 1200 years and point to the discovery of bone fragments found in Gøta to justify the hunt.
News also broke yesterday that Iceland's whalers were heading to sea to hunt and kill 250 whales despite protests and letters of opposition from all around the world. Following the collapse of the nation's banks, Iceland's government had been taking out full page ads promoting whale slaughters as a way to ease the financial crisis. Meanwhile, with children observing 'to learn,' natives of the Faroe Islands killed 150 pilot whales. Inhabitants here claim the slaughter of pilot whales is a tradition that allegedly dates back 1200 years and point to the discovery of bone fragments found in Gøta to justify the hunt.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
SUMMER OF SLAUGHTER GETS CLOSER
In Geneva, Japan and her pro-slaughter allies continued to disagree on the number of whales they want to kill. These talks were a part of continued negotiations to dissuade Japan from returning to commercial whaling as early as this summer. Japan wants permission for boats from its whaling ports in Abashiri, Ayukawa, Wada and Taiji to kill minkes along its coast in exchange for reducing the number of whales she takes under the IWC loophole called "research and scientific whaling" in the Antarctic.
Meanwhile, in Washington DC, Pierce Brosnan, the former James Bond star, visited the White House to lobby the Obama administration on the urgency to take the lead in the negotiations with Iceland, Japan and Norway. "Most people think they’ve been saved but they haven’t," said Brosnan. "The slaughter still goes on'.
If the talks fail, commercial whaling could begin this summer with our without the blessing of the IWC.
Meanwhile, in Washington DC, Pierce Brosnan, the former James Bond star, visited the White House to lobby the Obama administration on the urgency to take the lead in the negotiations with Iceland, Japan and Norway. "Most people think they’ve been saved but they haven’t," said Brosnan. "The slaughter still goes on'.
If the talks fail, commercial whaling could begin this summer with our without the blessing of the IWC.
Monday, May 18, 2009
SHOT OF FICTION #7: I’m Coming Home, Via Chicago
Final Posting by Eugene Lee
Re: Save the Whales Please
Every time I fly, no matter what mood I’m in and what I have been thinking of, my mind will inevitably tick off the different ways the plane would crash. I don’t have a fear of flying… I think everyone has a fear of crashing… and I don’t believe I’m particularly morbid, but as soon as the clunky, lumbering, clumsy plane lurches forward with real thrust, I’m reminded of how much damn energy it takes to get this hunk of metal in the sky, but moreover how hard it fall if something went wrong. I think of explosions ripping open the cabin too quick to process how yet everything would remit to slow motion. About one set of wheels being stuck at the landing causeing the plane to ricochet across the runway slamming into to other aircraft. OR the plane cart-wheeling across the concrete sea like when plane hit water on “Airforce One.” And sometimes, when I look out the window at the wing, I start to imagine the little bolts and screws on the wing wiggling out one by one… I can’t believe things the size of my pinky are holding this plane together.
But I’m here now in Minnesota, heading back to LA via Chicago (a fantastic song) and back for a shift at a job I use to love but now feel it has become a relationship of convenience, one that has threatened to make tepid the waters of inspiration in the internal pools of the brilliant people I work with. Bit dramatic. I think poets, authors have written that making love is the death of oneself (though there is such a thing as selfish sex) and that the when a guy “goes”, so thus does a little piece of his soul. So as each pour of steam milk makes a beautiful rosetta, heart, fern leaf, or abstract art, into the latte of every entitled, rude, and bullshit person in LA, a little death of ones spirit is happening, an ebbing away of the soul of… okay this definitely is hyperbole and dramatic…. It’s 7:32 in the AM.
Advice: Pay the extra 20 bucks and get direct flights.
I finished “the Whale Book” last week before I left for Minnesota so I’ve had nothing to read at the airport. This book that read with Danny Boyle pacing flew by the last 50 pages. It’s like reading a book is a marathon and after all the ups and downs you see the end is in sight and a mixture of determination of a strong finish and the wanting to be nostalgic and soak in every last freckle of impression collide into a last gasp fit of purpose. And then it’s done. The last text, half a page, couple of sentences and a new paragraph that is small and tidy… and then nothing, You search for more but the next page is blank, the finality cascades down in parchment white.
When it’s over, it’s over. You can search for more, read the authors bio, read the back, read the preface but what you have is a perfect journey with an end. So now what? DO I give the book back? Save the Whales Please, the book that read like a movie, the book that made me think books should have trailers, inspired me to make one of my own, my directorial debut. The book that reminded me of Sigur Ros bowed guitars and the fact that whaling continues today under the guise of scientific research. That cultural relativity not withstanding, it is even worse to use humane and open-minded sensibility to shield the real intent of profit and sport. I believe in every culture’s right to their traditions and cuisine, but certainly as we forge towards our future, in this shared experience we call “Life on Earth”, we have a responsibility to respect our ecosystems as we do our own home, our record collection, our relationships.
There are relationships of all stripes. Books, family, “the regulars” in our lives, our passions, our love, and a city. I leave Minneapolis, Minnesota having only flirted with her treasures. I enjoyed the missing traffic and the explosions of green. There are over 10,000 lakes here! Everyone talks like Bobby’s mom (or Sarah Palin). The plane is taking off, I’m staring at the wings…
I’m gonna climb the Grand Canyon’s South rim in to 3 days and I am out of shape. I’m gonna play my first public show in 2 weeks and I don’t even know whose gonna play with me… or what we’ll play. I don’t know when I’ll see her again... And now that I’m done with Save the Whales Please I don’t know what I’m gonna read. What I do know… this red apple is delicious, I’m gonna listen to Via Chicago by Wilco (from the Live in Chicago album) and I’m definitely going to be late to work…
“I’m searching for a home, I’m searching for a home… via Chicago.”
******
Re: Save the Whales Please
Every time I fly, no matter what mood I’m in and what I have been thinking of, my mind will inevitably tick off the different ways the plane would crash. I don’t have a fear of flying… I think everyone has a fear of crashing… and I don’t believe I’m particularly morbid, but as soon as the clunky, lumbering, clumsy plane lurches forward with real thrust, I’m reminded of how much damn energy it takes to get this hunk of metal in the sky, but moreover how hard it fall if something went wrong. I think of explosions ripping open the cabin too quick to process how yet everything would remit to slow motion. About one set of wheels being stuck at the landing causeing the plane to ricochet across the runway slamming into to other aircraft. OR the plane cart-wheeling across the concrete sea like when plane hit water on “Airforce One.” And sometimes, when I look out the window at the wing, I start to imagine the little bolts and screws on the wing wiggling out one by one… I can’t believe things the size of my pinky are holding this plane together.
But I’m here now in Minnesota, heading back to LA via Chicago (a fantastic song) and back for a shift at a job I use to love but now feel it has become a relationship of convenience, one that has threatened to make tepid the waters of inspiration in the internal pools of the brilliant people I work with. Bit dramatic. I think poets, authors have written that making love is the death of oneself (though there is such a thing as selfish sex) and that the when a guy “goes”, so thus does a little piece of his soul. So as each pour of steam milk makes a beautiful rosetta, heart, fern leaf, or abstract art, into the latte of every entitled, rude, and bullshit person in LA, a little death of ones spirit is happening, an ebbing away of the soul of… okay this definitely is hyperbole and dramatic…. It’s 7:32 in the AM.
Advice: Pay the extra 20 bucks and get direct flights.
I finished “the Whale Book” last week before I left for Minnesota so I’ve had nothing to read at the airport. This book that read with Danny Boyle pacing flew by the last 50 pages. It’s like reading a book is a marathon and after all the ups and downs you see the end is in sight and a mixture of determination of a strong finish and the wanting to be nostalgic and soak in every last freckle of impression collide into a last gasp fit of purpose. And then it’s done. The last text, half a page, couple of sentences and a new paragraph that is small and tidy… and then nothing, You search for more but the next page is blank, the finality cascades down in parchment white.
When it’s over, it’s over. You can search for more, read the authors bio, read the back, read the preface but what you have is a perfect journey with an end. So now what? DO I give the book back? Save the Whales Please, the book that read like a movie, the book that made me think books should have trailers, inspired me to make one of my own, my directorial debut. The book that reminded me of Sigur Ros bowed guitars and the fact that whaling continues today under the guise of scientific research. That cultural relativity not withstanding, it is even worse to use humane and open-minded sensibility to shield the real intent of profit and sport. I believe in every culture’s right to their traditions and cuisine, but certainly as we forge towards our future, in this shared experience we call “Life on Earth”, we have a responsibility to respect our ecosystems as we do our own home, our record collection, our relationships.
There are relationships of all stripes. Books, family, “the regulars” in our lives, our passions, our love, and a city. I leave Minneapolis, Minnesota having only flirted with her treasures. I enjoyed the missing traffic and the explosions of green. There are over 10,000 lakes here! Everyone talks like Bobby’s mom (or Sarah Palin). The plane is taking off, I’m staring at the wings…
I’m gonna climb the Grand Canyon’s South rim in to 3 days and I am out of shape. I’m gonna play my first public show in 2 weeks and I don’t even know whose gonna play with me… or what we’ll play. I don’t know when I’ll see her again... And now that I’m done with Save the Whales Please I don’t know what I’m gonna read. What I do know… this red apple is delicious, I’m gonna listen to Via Chicago by Wilco (from the Live in Chicago album) and I’m definitely going to be late to work…
“I’m searching for a home, I’m searching for a home… via Chicago.”
******
Friday, May 15, 2009
STWP IS NOW IN THE TROJAN BOOK STORE!
As University Southern California alumni who belive in the unquestioned greatnes of Troy, we are pleased to announce "Save the Whales Please" is now on sale at the Trojan bookstore on campus!
Copy and paste this link to chekc it out: http://www.booksite.com/texis/scripts/oop/click_ord/showdetail.html?sid=1821&isbn=1601641656&music=&buyable=1&assoc_id=&spring=
Copy and paste this link to chekc it out: http://www.booksite.com/texis/scripts/oop/click_ord/showdetail.html?sid=1821&isbn=1601641656&music=&buyable=1&assoc_id=&spring=
Thursday, May 14, 2009
JAPAN WANTS TO KILL, BLOCKS AGREEMENT
BBC is reporting that Japan has forced a stalemate in the ongoing negotiations between between pro-slaughter and anti-whaling nations. Both sides wanted to come to an agreement before this year’s International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting. Apparently, Japan is adamantly refusing to make little concession in how many whales the nation wants to kill. According to a source, Japan offered to take only 29 fewer minke whales, far short of the number anti-whaling nations want.
Japan has steadfastly maintained its intention to return to commercial whaling, which activists fear might happen as early as this summer.
Japan has steadfastly maintained its intention to return to commercial whaling, which activists fear might happen as early as this summer.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Saturday, May 9, 2009
ANOTHER NICE REVIEW! That's #5!
Link to Kristin Merrihew's full review in BREAKING NEWS!
Save the Whales Please mixes high-stakes whaling drama with quite sophisticated international plotting by players in Tokyo, Washington, the North Pacific, and Europe. The novel takes us into boardrooms and back rooms, onto ship bridges and bloody slaughter platforms, and into the midst of maneuvering politicians and vicious pirates (ripped from the headlines, no?). In fact, a number of events that have either already happened or could very possibly occur in the not too distant real world also sharpen this novel’s suspenseful edge. The difference between our reality and the novel’s though is that nearly everything in Save the Whales Please links to novel’s centerpieces: whaling…and its uncompromising opponents.
The novel whisks cinematically from one short scene to another like the action blockbuster prose “movie” it is. Its nail biting opening scenes make one wonder if the authors haven’t shot their biggest wad very prematurely. But not to worry. Konrad Karl Gatien and Sreescanda (who also write for the big and little screens) skillfully pepper the story with limited victories on the various sides, only to then pose new obstacles and dangers. The culmination crescendos, pulling numerous plot threads together and piling peril upon peril to surprise even the jaded reader with its audacity.
Save the Whales Please mixes high-stakes whaling drama with quite sophisticated international plotting by players in Tokyo, Washington, the North Pacific, and Europe. The novel takes us into boardrooms and back rooms, onto ship bridges and bloody slaughter platforms, and into the midst of maneuvering politicians and vicious pirates (ripped from the headlines, no?). In fact, a number of events that have either already happened or could very possibly occur in the not too distant real world also sharpen this novel’s suspenseful edge. The difference between our reality and the novel’s though is that nearly everything in Save the Whales Please links to novel’s centerpieces: whaling…and its uncompromising opponents.
The novel whisks cinematically from one short scene to another like the action blockbuster prose “movie” it is. Its nail biting opening scenes make one wonder if the authors haven’t shot their biggest wad very prematurely. But not to worry. Konrad Karl Gatien and Sreescanda (who also write for the big and little screens) skillfully pepper the story with limited victories on the various sides, only to then pose new obstacles and dangers. The culmination crescendos, pulling numerous plot threads together and piling peril upon peril to surprise even the jaded reader with its audacity.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
ANOTHER POSITIVE READER REVIEW
I picked up this book because I love whales and the plot seemed quite intriguing, but it surpassed all my expectations. Frankly, I could not put it down. The short chapters with their cliff-hanger endings were excellent. It's clearly written by staunch conservationists, but the authors are not heavy handed with the message. Another plus for me was the strong female heroine. I would be shocked if this did not show up as a movie. A good buy and an even better read.
LC, California.
More reviews: http://www.amazon.com/Save-Whales-Please-Sreescanda/dp/1601641656/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1241727641&sr=8-1
LC, California.
More reviews: http://www.amazon.com/Save-Whales-Please-Sreescanda/dp/1601641656/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1241727641&sr=8-1
WHO SAYS AMERICA DOES NOT KILL WHALES?
Two crews from a small community off the Chukchi Sea hunted and killed a bowhead whale after the Alaska Eskimo Whaling Commission lifted a restriction in 2oo8 to allow the village to catch one Whale each year at Point Lay. The 200-plus residents celebrated the bloody harvest. While this is the first successful hunt at Point Lay, Savoonga whalers of Alaska have had three successful seasons of slaughtering bowheads, which are one of the most severely endangered of all whales and the population is teetering on the brink of extinction. Beyond these aboriginal hunts, activists blame the United for whale strandings and deaths caused by a joint military exercise with the Philippines. A huge of mod melon-headed whales found themselves trapped in shallow waters off Bataan in February. The Defense Department has defended its exercises, blaming overfishing as the cause.
Saturday, May 2, 2009
ALICIA DOYLE on SAVE THE WHALES PLEASE
Look in BREAKING NEWS! Hear Alicia Doyle write-up on SAVE THE THE WHALES PLEASE in the Ventura County Star!
Friday, May 1, 2009
(Whaling) GAME ON!
Pro-whaling countries, led by Japan, made it known they are determined to win a crucial vote at the upcoming International Whaling Commission meeting in Portugal in June. Thirty-two countries who support the resumption of commercial whaling as early as this summer took a vote in a meeting at Tokyo to stand united at the IWC vote. This sets up a confrontation with the European Union which took a similar bloc vote to oppose Japan and its pro-slaughter allies. Since neither side has a majority, the international deadlock on the issue could continue indefinitely. Earlier, the British Parliament reiterated it opposed all whaling, including Japan’s “scientific and research” hunts.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
SHOT OF FICTION #5:Up and To the Right
I hope I don’t have it. Yo No La Tengo. Wait…. Is that right?
It’s been so long since I’ve taken Spanish (twice). Taking a language course in high school is as useless as the D.A.R.E. program to a college aged kid, but in college, I really enjoyed it. Finally, a class that was basic, simple, but still challenging… a curriculum with succinct answers as opposed to the myriad of questions that bloom as you go deeper in the subject. Well, the only question I have now is: do I have it? I hope I don’t.
I have been SOOO damn interrupted in my “whale-age”, my time to me, myself, and kinetic journey that is Save the Whales Please. I have been boy, interrupted, and it’s been annoying. Work, sleep, hunger, lethargy, Coachella, divine music making, meetings for Sutasi, it’s all been great, except that little corner in my head I reserve for myself and whale adventures. The perhaps that is my managing the relationship… afterall I hate it when I know the end is coming. The once fat book with all the pages in world is slowing coming to an end and maybe I have delayed, read in small bites, because I know it will be over soon. Shows like “24” are awesome/terrible because you have that damn ticking clock that’s winding down and the multiple screen of different scenarios playing out like a choose-your-own-adventure before they focus on one of those cells and its this horrible cliffhanger that leaves you screaming at the TV. I hate 24. (Sorry 24, it’s just that you drive me crazy with your ways… I love you 24.)
So in this world where things are out of your control, slow reading is at least something I can exercise. Gosh, I almost wish there was more of a line in this Urgent Care. I am now the only one in the waiting room (I really gotta submit my insurance papers to SAG…grrrr…) and it is quiet and sterile like … well, an empty hospital with only the cool sound of the air conditioner as my companion… my keystrokes sound like drunk elephants in a curio shop.
I been seeing the author of Save the Whales Please posting these whaling related links on Twitter and I wonder… the book does have an environmentalist/ecological viewpoint, sure, but I feel more over it is the backdrop to good old fashion actin packed story telling. Yet, those links being posted offer a view that the authors (at least one of them) really is keeping a watchful eye on all things whales… I guess I just thought he was more storyteller and the subject matter was just a device… so in a way, writer, this is a compliment to you that this reader believed you were “story first”, which if you think about the boring heavy handed, un-sexy pap that is out there for causes, it’s better serve to have the art/style at a high level to better deliver the message. (Speaking of ‘causes’, I found this great website that does exactly that: make causes [for lack of a better word] …cool: www.causecast.org]).
Oh, the Doctor will see me now….
It’s been so long since I’ve taken Spanish (twice). Taking a language course in high school is as useless as the D.A.R.E. program to a college aged kid, but in college, I really enjoyed it. Finally, a class that was basic, simple, but still challenging… a curriculum with succinct answers as opposed to the myriad of questions that bloom as you go deeper in the subject. Well, the only question I have now is: do I have it? I hope I don’t.
I have been SOOO damn interrupted in my “whale-age”, my time to me, myself, and kinetic journey that is Save the Whales Please. I have been boy, interrupted, and it’s been annoying. Work, sleep, hunger, lethargy, Coachella, divine music making, meetings for Sutasi, it’s all been great, except that little corner in my head I reserve for myself and whale adventures. The perhaps that is my managing the relationship… afterall I hate it when I know the end is coming. The once fat book with all the pages in world is slowing coming to an end and maybe I have delayed, read in small bites, because I know it will be over soon. Shows like “24” are awesome/terrible because you have that damn ticking clock that’s winding down and the multiple screen of different scenarios playing out like a choose-your-own-adventure before they focus on one of those cells and its this horrible cliffhanger that leaves you screaming at the TV. I hate 24. (Sorry 24, it’s just that you drive me crazy with your ways… I love you 24.)
So in this world where things are out of your control, slow reading is at least something I can exercise. Gosh, I almost wish there was more of a line in this Urgent Care. I am now the only one in the waiting room (I really gotta submit my insurance papers to SAG…grrrr…) and it is quiet and sterile like … well, an empty hospital with only the cool sound of the air conditioner as my companion… my keystrokes sound like drunk elephants in a curio shop.
I been seeing the author of Save the Whales Please posting these whaling related links on Twitter and I wonder… the book does have an environmentalist/ecological viewpoint, sure, but I feel more over it is the backdrop to good old fashion actin packed story telling. Yet, those links being posted offer a view that the authors (at least one of them) really is keeping a watchful eye on all things whales… I guess I just thought he was more storyteller and the subject matter was just a device… so in a way, writer, this is a compliment to you that this reader believed you were “story first”, which if you think about the boring heavy handed, un-sexy pap that is out there for causes, it’s better serve to have the art/style at a high level to better deliver the message. (Speaking of ‘causes’, I found this great website that does exactly that: make causes [for lack of a better word] …cool: www.causecast.org]).
Oh, the Doctor will see me now….
Sunday, April 26, 2009
ICELAND LAUNCHES "BLOODY" ADS
Iceland, another country in a deep economic crisis, has launched a “pro-slaughter” ad campaign on radio, TV and in newspapers. Interweaving patriotic imagery of the national flag, historical pictures of whaling, the PR campaign touts that whaling will generate up to 300 jobs—which represents 1% of the country’s population. If Iceland returns to whaling, the hunters would likely face confrontations with militant green groups. Earlier this year, the Sea Shepherd group harassed Japan’s “scientific” hunt in the Antarctic. Just a few days ago, Agenda 21, another ecowarrior group , sabotaged the Norwegian whaling ship Skarbakk near the Norwegian Lofoten Islands by flooding the engine room. Considering Iceland’s currency is worthless and the banking system has collapsed, it is hard to imagine Iceland’s whalers will be able to sustain losses like the Japanese and Norwegians and keep killing.
Friday, April 24, 2009
EARTH DAY BE DAMNED, JAPAN TO KILL AGAIN
Japan's government announced it plans to kill 60 minke whales off its northeastern coast. Four vessels from the northern Miyagi prefecture will leave Ayukawa Port, with one ship is being designated a "research" ship. Japan continues to hunt whales despite international pressure using a loophole in the International Whaling Commission called hunting for "scientific and reseach," though it is widely believed the meat from these slaughters are sold in restaurants. This new hunt is set to continue until the end of May.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
AMAZON REVIEW: WHALING & POLITICS COLLIDE
Jan is the most famous eco-warrior in the world--not only is she beautful and smart and daring, she also happens to be the First Lady of the United States. Her husband, Casten Everett, is the first independent to ever be elected to the highest office and nearing the end of his term, his re-election numbers aren't looking so hot. The couple are soon put at odds with one another when Jan discovers that Carsten has made a quiet deal with the Japanese that allows the country to harvest a huge, stranded herd of blue whales. Determined to save the whales herself, Jan sets off on an impossible mission--to drive the whales across the globe and protest them from the Japanese hunters. From the East Coast to the West, Alaska to Norway to Japan and back again, we see the story play out in politics and conservatism. The war between the two is unimaginable.
I thought this book was absolutely great. I've always liked whales and been against the hunting of the endangered species (yeah, I've never bought that "scientific research" bit, either). But it wasn't until I read the grisly descriptions of the whales being peeled apart (a few of the passages made my stomach turn a bit) that I really found my opposition. Some of the story is a bit over-the-top and you definitely have to suspend all notion of reality in regards to most of Jan's activities (the First Lady would NEVER have the kind of freedom that she enjoyed--and no matter what her marital problems, the Secret Service wouldn't stop surveillance of her). But the book reads like a movie (understandably, since the authors have a history in screenwriting)--the short chapters immerse one in the book, and the fast pace keeps you hooked. A good read with a great message at the core of it.
I thought this book was absolutely great. I've always liked whales and been against the hunting of the endangered species (yeah, I've never bought that "scientific research" bit, either). But it wasn't until I read the grisly descriptions of the whales being peeled apart (a few of the passages made my stomach turn a bit) that I really found my opposition. Some of the story is a bit over-the-top and you definitely have to suspend all notion of reality in regards to most of Jan's activities (the First Lady would NEVER have the kind of freedom that she enjoyed--and no matter what her marital problems, the Secret Service wouldn't stop surveillance of her). But the book reads like a movie (understandably, since the authors have a history in screenwriting)--the short chapters immerse one in the book, and the fast pace keeps you hooked. A good read with a great message at the core of it.
Friday, April 17, 2009
REAL WHALE WAR BREWING
Keeping up the pressure on six Japanese whaling vessels, which returned to Shimonosek after a five-month Antarctic hunting expedition marred by standoffs and confrontations with activists like Sea Shepherd, Greenpeace activists held up signs that read: “SOMEBODY HAS TO BE ON SHORE TOO!” and “SOUTHERN OCEAN WHALING: COVERUPS, LIES, 1.2 BILLION YEN IN TAXES!”
Japan is already embroiled in “Whalergate,” which are back room negotiations being conducted under the auspices of the US and Australia that could resume commercial whaling as early this summer if a crucial vote goes the pro-whaling nations’ way at the May meeting of the International Whaling Commission. But anti-whaling forces received a boost when Mr. Pete Bethune, skipper of Earthrace, promised to join Paul Watson and his Sea Shepherd group of militants. Bethune would use his faster bio-diesel powered vessel like a strike weapon around the Sea Shepherd’s slower Steve Irwin.
The next whaling season could see a real “whale war.”
Japan is already embroiled in “Whalergate,” which are back room negotiations being conducted under the auspices of the US and Australia that could resume commercial whaling as early this summer if a crucial vote goes the pro-whaling nations’ way at the May meeting of the International Whaling Commission. But anti-whaling forces received a boost when Mr. Pete Bethune, skipper of Earthrace, promised to join Paul Watson and his Sea Shepherd group of militants. Bethune would use his faster bio-diesel powered vessel like a strike weapon around the Sea Shepherd’s slower Steve Irwin.
The next whaling season could see a real “whale war.”
ANONYMOUS READER REVIEW #2
"Hundreds of carcasses of minke whales floated in the choppy waves.", April 15, 2009
By K. M. "literary devotee" (California) (TOP 500 REVIEWER/AMAZON)
Jan Everett is First Lady of the United States. She is also a fiercely dedicated Save the Whales activist. She brings the same total commitment to testifying before the International Whaling Commission on behalf of a complete ban on whale hunts as she does to personally sailing with and even leading crews that confront, harry, and seek to sink the pelagic whaling fleets.
In Washington, her husband, President Carsten Everett, contends with an uphill reelection bid, the controlling schemes of his ruthless chief of staff, a fifteen trillion dollar U.S. debt to other countries that could tank the economy, and the consequences of Jan's radical daring-do sea exploits (which have far-reaching consequences).
Meanwhile, reenergized powerhouse Japan, which holds a large percentage of the U.S. Treasury bonds and is also an unrepentant whaling nation, has plans for both the Everetts. And a Norwegian whaling tycoon concocts his own means of neutralizing Jan....
Oh, and in the swirl of battling the bad guys, Jan encounters pirate captain Arlov Vesprhein, and these two tough, extreme people posture and clash, bound by somewhat stereotyped sexual tension as SAVE THE WHALES PLEASE launches an amazing, techno-herded leviathan drive.
Save the Whales Please mixes whaling drama with quite sophisticated international maneuvering by players in Tokyo, Washington, the North Pacific, and Europe. The novel whisks cinematically from one short scene to another like the action blockbuster prose "movie" it is. Its nail biting opening scenes make one wonder if the authors haven't shot their biggest wad very prematurely. But not to worry. Konrad Karl Gatien and Sreescanda (who do also write for the big and little screens) skillfully pepper the story with limited victories on the various sides, only to then pose new obstacles and dangers. The culmination crescendos, pulling numerous plot threads together and piling peril upon peril to surprise even the jaded reader with its audacity.
Of course, no real First Lady would have the latitude Jan Everett does. Her handlers and protection detail would preempt the suicidal chances Jan takes, no matter how urgent the crusade. But one adapts agreeably to this creative license.
The novel's myriad facts about whales enrich the reader's knowledge. Did you know, for instance, that underwater sonar blasts are suspected for causing deafness, brain bleeding, and beaching in whales and dolphins? Did you know whales shed their skins much as lizards do? Did you know a whale is hunted and killed every ninety minutes? SAVE THE WHALES PLEASE acutely reminds us that these creatures could still be hunted to extinction.
SAVE THE WHALES PLEASE is formulaic, but in a brash, exhilarating, Clive Cusslerian manner. Especially for those who are intrigued by whales and the human struggle over them, this is an opportunity to be both educated and breathlessly entertained.
By K. M. "literary devotee" (California) (TOP 500 REVIEWER/AMAZON)
Jan Everett is First Lady of the United States. She is also a fiercely dedicated Save the Whales activist. She brings the same total commitment to testifying before the International Whaling Commission on behalf of a complete ban on whale hunts as she does to personally sailing with and even leading crews that confront, harry, and seek to sink the pelagic whaling fleets.
In Washington, her husband, President Carsten Everett, contends with an uphill reelection bid, the controlling schemes of his ruthless chief of staff, a fifteen trillion dollar U.S. debt to other countries that could tank the economy, and the consequences of Jan's radical daring-do sea exploits (which have far-reaching consequences).
Meanwhile, reenergized powerhouse Japan, which holds a large percentage of the U.S. Treasury bonds and is also an unrepentant whaling nation, has plans for both the Everetts. And a Norwegian whaling tycoon concocts his own means of neutralizing Jan....
Oh, and in the swirl of battling the bad guys, Jan encounters pirate captain Arlov Vesprhein, and these two tough, extreme people posture and clash, bound by somewhat stereotyped sexual tension as SAVE THE WHALES PLEASE launches an amazing, techno-herded leviathan drive.
Save the Whales Please mixes whaling drama with quite sophisticated international maneuvering by players in Tokyo, Washington, the North Pacific, and Europe. The novel whisks cinematically from one short scene to another like the action blockbuster prose "movie" it is. Its nail biting opening scenes make one wonder if the authors haven't shot their biggest wad very prematurely. But not to worry. Konrad Karl Gatien and Sreescanda (who do also write for the big and little screens) skillfully pepper the story with limited victories on the various sides, only to then pose new obstacles and dangers. The culmination crescendos, pulling numerous plot threads together and piling peril upon peril to surprise even the jaded reader with its audacity.
Of course, no real First Lady would have the latitude Jan Everett does. Her handlers and protection detail would preempt the suicidal chances Jan takes, no matter how urgent the crusade. But one adapts agreeably to this creative license.
The novel's myriad facts about whales enrich the reader's knowledge. Did you know, for instance, that underwater sonar blasts are suspected for causing deafness, brain bleeding, and beaching in whales and dolphins? Did you know whales shed their skins much as lizards do? Did you know a whale is hunted and killed every ninety minutes? SAVE THE WHALES PLEASE acutely reminds us that these creatures could still be hunted to extinction.
SAVE THE WHALES PLEASE is formulaic, but in a brash, exhilarating, Clive Cusslerian manner. Especially for those who are intrigued by whales and the human struggle over them, this is an opportunity to be both educated and breathlessly entertained.
ANONYMOUS READER REVIEW #1
We did not expect to receive feedback quite this quickly. But finally we hearing from anonymous readers--not friends and family who are obligated to be polite and complimentary. Here's an unabridged review from a Mr. Gary Ono. We'll post 'em as we get 'em. Good or bad.
Wow! I must admit it was a gripping, pulsating, action-packed, couldn't -put-down novel. At first, I thought Jan the world's leading Save the Whale activist is the First Lady? Isn't this going to be an unbelievable story? But, there was a lot of substance to make her out to be a real character.
Anyway, Gatien & Sreesscanda have very graphically described everything:in colorful and easy to imagine detail: the weather, the ships, the technology, the whales, and the characters.The plot was wonderfully woven. There are a lot of stretching of the imagination to some of the near-death struggles, but it works. I can imagine a movie. I even saw some clever product placements, you clever devils you.
Thanks also for the recipe. I'll have to place my order to Kaiyou soon before they sell-out their stock. When you do the movie can I audition for the role of Yamamura? That way you can get someone who's a real whale eater and can passionately get into character. Just kidding, guys.
Well, what I was fearing the most, a real anti-Japanese bashing diatribe turned out fairly well-balanced. At least you had Isamu Tomita be a "good-guy" to show the compassionate caring side of our Nikkei friends.
All in all, I would recommend "Save the Whales Pease" to family and friends.
Gary Ono. Los Angeles.
Wow! I must admit it was a gripping, pulsating, action-packed, couldn't -put-down novel. At first, I thought Jan the world's leading Save the Whale activist is the First Lady? Isn't this going to be an unbelievable story? But, there was a lot of substance to make her out to be a real character.
Anyway, Gatien & Sreesscanda have very graphically described everything:in colorful and easy to imagine detail: the weather, the ships, the technology, the whales, and the characters.The plot was wonderfully woven. There are a lot of stretching of the imagination to some of the near-death struggles, but it works. I can imagine a movie. I even saw some clever product placements, you clever devils you.
Thanks also for the recipe. I'll have to place my order to Kaiyou soon before they sell-out their stock. When you do the movie can I audition for the role of Yamamura? That way you can get someone who's a real whale eater and can passionately get into character. Just kidding, guys.
Well, what I was fearing the most, a real anti-Japanese bashing diatribe turned out fairly well-balanced. At least you had Isamu Tomita be a "good-guy" to show the compassionate caring side of our Nikkei friends.
All in all, I would recommend "Save the Whales Pease" to family and friends.
Gary Ono. Los Angeles.
VENTURA COUNTY STAR REVIEWS OUR NOVEL
AREA WRITER COLLABORATES ON ANTI-WHALING THRILLER
By Alicia Doyle
A Western on the high seas that combines the intrigue, technology and politics of whaling is the crux of a debut novel co-written by a local freelance writer and an entertainment attorney in Beverly Hills who attended USC film school together.
Listed on Amazon’s Top 20 Hot New Releases in its genre, “Save the Whales Please” is about a firebrand first lady, a notorious whaling pirate and their unthinkable partnership that launches an epic high-tech, high-seas rescue: a whale drive from the Arctic to the Antarctic of the last 1,872 blues, according to author Konrad Karl Gatien and an Agoura writer who goes solely by the name Sreescanda.
“From the outset of our writing partnership, we committed ourselves to seek out settings and issues that are unique, unusual and rarely visited,” said Sreescanda, who has been writing with Gatien, a resident of the San Fernando Valley, since they graduated in 1992 from USC.
“Concerned with what appears to be the looming extinction of one of the last great peaceful creatures on the planet, we set out to expose the plight of whales and bring it to the public eye. In doing so, we also wanted to open the door to the world’s biggest, most exploited, yet least known resource — the oceans.”
Published by Kunati, the book garnered positive feedback in the April issue of Foreword, which called it “a movie between book covers” with “amazingly realistic politics and technology that will inspire both green fanatics and conspiracy theorists to take action.”
The story unfolds with a world-famous U.S. first lady — an “ecoterrorist” determined to stop the overhunting of whales.
She leads a daring plan to drive a stranded herd of blue whales from the Arctic all the way to the Antarctic, pursued the whole way by Japanese whalers.
Meanwhile, her husband, the president, has promised the whalers the blues in a backroom deal meant to win him a second term in office.
On board a hijacked whaling factory ship, the first lady defies her husband and, with the help of the ship’s captain — until recently a whaling pirate — she confronts the Japanese fleet and threatens to sink it.
“The plot is a case of fact following fiction because it envisages the exact scenario that recent headlines have been playing out: a looming threat of a return to commercial whaling by Japan,” said Sreescanda, further emphasizing that the book is not for the faint of heart. “Whaling is big business and a pressure point in global politics and finance. Fact intersects fiction for an eye-opening journey into a pitiless world of unnecessary savagery.”
The book is suddenly current and topical, Gatien said. “The novel is now a case of fiction following fact: Our plot line of a secret deal between the U.S. and Japan turned real with the Whalergate expose earlier this year,” he said. “This real-life backroom deal would allow Japan to kill more whales for reduced hunts in the Antarctic. The return to commercial whaling, envisaged in the novel, is now frighteningly close to becoming reality as early as this summer.”
From global warming to deforestation to saving endangered species, green issues are constantly marginalized, Sreescanda said. “We wanted to mainstream the message and educate readers of the politics, economics and other factors that continue to allow more whales to be killed today than ever before.”
By Alicia Doyle
A Western on the high seas that combines the intrigue, technology and politics of whaling is the crux of a debut novel co-written by a local freelance writer and an entertainment attorney in Beverly Hills who attended USC film school together.
Listed on Amazon’s Top 20 Hot New Releases in its genre, “Save the Whales Please” is about a firebrand first lady, a notorious whaling pirate and their unthinkable partnership that launches an epic high-tech, high-seas rescue: a whale drive from the Arctic to the Antarctic of the last 1,872 blues, according to author Konrad Karl Gatien and an Agoura writer who goes solely by the name Sreescanda.
“From the outset of our writing partnership, we committed ourselves to seek out settings and issues that are unique, unusual and rarely visited,” said Sreescanda, who has been writing with Gatien, a resident of the San Fernando Valley, since they graduated in 1992 from USC.
“Concerned with what appears to be the looming extinction of one of the last great peaceful creatures on the planet, we set out to expose the plight of whales and bring it to the public eye. In doing so, we also wanted to open the door to the world’s biggest, most exploited, yet least known resource — the oceans.”
Published by Kunati, the book garnered positive feedback in the April issue of Foreword, which called it “a movie between book covers” with “amazingly realistic politics and technology that will inspire both green fanatics and conspiracy theorists to take action.”
The story unfolds with a world-famous U.S. first lady — an “ecoterrorist” determined to stop the overhunting of whales.
She leads a daring plan to drive a stranded herd of blue whales from the Arctic all the way to the Antarctic, pursued the whole way by Japanese whalers.
Meanwhile, her husband, the president, has promised the whalers the blues in a backroom deal meant to win him a second term in office.
On board a hijacked whaling factory ship, the first lady defies her husband and, with the help of the ship’s captain — until recently a whaling pirate — she confronts the Japanese fleet and threatens to sink it.
“The plot is a case of fact following fiction because it envisages the exact scenario that recent headlines have been playing out: a looming threat of a return to commercial whaling by Japan,” said Sreescanda, further emphasizing that the book is not for the faint of heart. “Whaling is big business and a pressure point in global politics and finance. Fact intersects fiction for an eye-opening journey into a pitiless world of unnecessary savagery.”
The book is suddenly current and topical, Gatien said. “The novel is now a case of fiction following fact: Our plot line of a secret deal between the U.S. and Japan turned real with the Whalergate expose earlier this year,” he said. “This real-life backroom deal would allow Japan to kill more whales for reduced hunts in the Antarctic. The return to commercial whaling, envisaged in the novel, is now frighteningly close to becoming reality as early as this summer.”
From global warming to deforestation to saving endangered species, green issues are constantly marginalized, Sreescanda said. “We wanted to mainstream the message and educate readers of the politics, economics and other factors that continue to allow more whales to be killed today than ever before.”
Sunday, April 12, 2009
FOR THE LOVE WHALES, JASON STATHAM, PIRATES AND STAVENGERS
For Love and Whales, Jason Statham, Pirates, and Stavangers
Share
Today at 12:40am
So I have taken some time off to decompress from making of the trailer. Went back to normalcy, working, drinking, walking, epic-ly jamming with friends, eating fancy pizza. I always think it’s important to have an instituted “No-Fly Zone” following a large creative undertaking, y’know a way to refill the taken that has been so efficiently spent. Taking the time to listen to all those albums that “Dude, [I] have to fuckin’ check this out…. It will change your life”… you know the kind.
For those of you whop don’t know what the hell I’m talking about, well, I have spent this last month blogging about “the Whale Book” (Save the Whales Please) an eco-thriller I have acquired (thank you authors of) and decided to make a trailer for the release. I love trailers, books are cool, and my creative partner Lilan and I decided it’s time to stop talking about shooting something and finally just do it. It’s been well received and we are still amazed by the compliments.
Here’s the link if you haven’t seen it yet: www.tinyurl.com/whaletrail-er
And I know I already thanked them in the credits, but can I just say Sigur Ros - ( ) and in particular track #8 is an absolute must have for your record collection. That is if you like music that… dares.
And now that the triale ris on Youtube, “Hello!” to my screen neighbors “Hayden Panettiere PSA for Save the Whales Again” and “Choose Your Own Crank”. Neighbors, we share this cul de sac of Internet space, I look forward to a fruitful and communal living situation. Hayden, your video is heartbreaking and when I see you on your surfboard with the other ecologist trying to save the dolphins, I am genuinely moved. I never really watched Heroes, but I think it’s great to have a cause. And Lionsgate with “Choose Your Own Crank”: you know, Jason Statham joints and I have crossed paths in so many unlikely times. It seems whenever I am abroad, be it on an airplane, in a bar, or at someone’s house, you (JS) are always on. I think the last film you were in that I saw in the States was… “Snatch?” And that was mostly because it was a Guy Ritchie, post “Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels” (must see!), joint. But JS, before you get your neatly pressed black and white suit with skinny tie in a rumple, I gotta say, I have never left a Statham flick disappointed, you’re batting a thous. And it was my English Professor friend who passed me a copy of “Crank” to watch on the flight to China. Aside from hiding my laptop screen from the old lady sitting next to me, the film was fan-fucking-tastic. 7 thumbs way up! Bowed guitars my friend, bowed guitars. “So yeah, Jason, we should hang out, go see “I Love You Man” or something. Oh you’re busy? That’s cool…… ok…. Um… well definitely, let’s do something next weekend….. cool…. ok….. or whatever… just text me…. I’m usually free these…. ok… yeah, no I get it, totally… just whenever your free, heh heh heh, you know what to do… “What the hell is with all these pirate attacks of late? The US helmed Dutch ship Maersk and all the hostage stuff has been headlines of late, but this morning I also read about British and German ships being seized and…. an Italian tugboat!? Really? No offense, but aren’t tugboats the booby prize of boats? Besides, I’ll be first to cry “Too Soon! Too Soon!” since those devastating Italian quakes just happened. But hey, I doubt A.) Any Somali Pirates read this blog B.) Even if they did they’d give two shits; they’re out on the high seas because it beats starving in a failed Somali state, the ransom money they’re getting is absurd by Somali standards, and the second installment of Pirates of the Caribbean just hit the movie theaters there… can we say “pirate fever”!? That and I hear women are teeming about at the Somali ports, looking to get land a rich husband. Joking aside, I’m not joking, things are that bad over there, and alternatives are few. Aside from sending fleets of warships to the Gulf of Aden and blowing every pirate out of the water, it’s fair to say the whole area needs some alternative/hope to these options… poor socioeconomics is a bitch.
In the news article I read on the pirate/hostage situation I saw a bit about a German ship Hansa Stavanger being used as the pirates mothership, by which to launch off shore attacks. “Stavanger” is also the name of the pirate whaling boat being used by Jan (the first lady) in Save the Whales Please , which I am 2/3 of the way through. It got me curious as to what the significance of the name is in relation to pirates. So I Wiki-ed it and here’s what I found:
• It’s the 4th largest city in Norway
• It’s a combination of the new and old.
• There’s a NATO Warfare Center there
• The Norse pronunciation of the name is Stafangr which stafr means stick of staff, and may refer to an inlet or mountain range in Norway.
• It holds an International Jazz Festival.
Ok, so no cool meaning like “ Hammer of God” or “Oceanic Sword” or “Tritan of Poseidan in a bad mood.”But no, Stavanger means stick.And I am not s[t]ick of this book, not one bit, in large part because it reminds me of great episodic TV. Now, it’s no secret that I am a huge devotee to “24” and “Lost”, and the way the book reads, I have yet to hit that “back story/plot explanation/development” episode which is important to the whole season, but kind of the disappointing one where nothing happens. I am 2/3 and there are plenty of opportunities for great moments and boring plot devices. This reader will stay vigilant.
Love and Whale Sounds (via ondes martinet),
E!
Share
Today at 12:40am
So I have taken some time off to decompress from making of the trailer. Went back to normalcy, working, drinking, walking, epic-ly jamming with friends, eating fancy pizza. I always think it’s important to have an instituted “No-Fly Zone” following a large creative undertaking, y’know a way to refill the taken that has been so efficiently spent. Taking the time to listen to all those albums that “Dude, [I] have to fuckin’ check this out…. It will change your life”… you know the kind.
For those of you whop don’t know what the hell I’m talking about, well, I have spent this last month blogging about “the Whale Book” (Save the Whales Please) an eco-thriller I have acquired (thank you authors of) and decided to make a trailer for the release. I love trailers, books are cool, and my creative partner Lilan and I decided it’s time to stop talking about shooting something and finally just do it. It’s been well received and we are still amazed by the compliments.
Here’s the link if you haven’t seen it yet: www.tinyurl.com/whaletrail-er
And I know I already thanked them in the credits, but can I just say Sigur Ros - ( ) and in particular track #8 is an absolute must have for your record collection. That is if you like music that… dares.
And now that the triale ris on Youtube, “Hello!” to my screen neighbors “Hayden Panettiere PSA for Save the Whales Again” and “Choose Your Own Crank”. Neighbors, we share this cul de sac of Internet space, I look forward to a fruitful and communal living situation. Hayden, your video is heartbreaking and when I see you on your surfboard with the other ecologist trying to save the dolphins, I am genuinely moved. I never really watched Heroes, but I think it’s great to have a cause. And Lionsgate with “Choose Your Own Crank”: you know, Jason Statham joints and I have crossed paths in so many unlikely times. It seems whenever I am abroad, be it on an airplane, in a bar, or at someone’s house, you (JS) are always on. I think the last film you were in that I saw in the States was… “Snatch?” And that was mostly because it was a Guy Ritchie, post “Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels” (must see!), joint. But JS, before you get your neatly pressed black and white suit with skinny tie in a rumple, I gotta say, I have never left a Statham flick disappointed, you’re batting a thous. And it was my English Professor friend who passed me a copy of “Crank” to watch on the flight to China. Aside from hiding my laptop screen from the old lady sitting next to me, the film was fan-fucking-tastic. 7 thumbs way up! Bowed guitars my friend, bowed guitars. “So yeah, Jason, we should hang out, go see “I Love You Man” or something. Oh you’re busy? That’s cool…… ok…. Um… well definitely, let’s do something next weekend….. cool…. ok….. or whatever… just text me…. I’m usually free these…. ok… yeah, no I get it, totally… just whenever your free, heh heh heh, you know what to do… “What the hell is with all these pirate attacks of late? The US helmed Dutch ship Maersk and all the hostage stuff has been headlines of late, but this morning I also read about British and German ships being seized and…. an Italian tugboat!? Really? No offense, but aren’t tugboats the booby prize of boats? Besides, I’ll be first to cry “Too Soon! Too Soon!” since those devastating Italian quakes just happened. But hey, I doubt A.) Any Somali Pirates read this blog B.) Even if they did they’d give two shits; they’re out on the high seas because it beats starving in a failed Somali state, the ransom money they’re getting is absurd by Somali standards, and the second installment of Pirates of the Caribbean just hit the movie theaters there… can we say “pirate fever”!? That and I hear women are teeming about at the Somali ports, looking to get land a rich husband. Joking aside, I’m not joking, things are that bad over there, and alternatives are few. Aside from sending fleets of warships to the Gulf of Aden and blowing every pirate out of the water, it’s fair to say the whole area needs some alternative/hope to these options… poor socioeconomics is a bitch.
In the news article I read on the pirate/hostage situation I saw a bit about a German ship Hansa Stavanger being used as the pirates mothership, by which to launch off shore attacks. “Stavanger” is also the name of the pirate whaling boat being used by Jan (the first lady) in Save the Whales Please , which I am 2/3 of the way through. It got me curious as to what the significance of the name is in relation to pirates. So I Wiki-ed it and here’s what I found:
• It’s the 4th largest city in Norway
• It’s a combination of the new and old.
• There’s a NATO Warfare Center there
• The Norse pronunciation of the name is Stafangr which stafr means stick of staff, and may refer to an inlet or mountain range in Norway.
• It holds an International Jazz Festival.
Ok, so no cool meaning like “ Hammer of God” or “Oceanic Sword” or “Tritan of Poseidan in a bad mood.”But no, Stavanger means stick.And I am not s[t]ick of this book, not one bit, in large part because it reminds me of great episodic TV. Now, it’s no secret that I am a huge devotee to “24” and “Lost”, and the way the book reads, I have yet to hit that “back story/plot explanation/development” episode which is important to the whole season, but kind of the disappointing one where nothing happens. I am 2/3 and there are plenty of opportunities for great moments and boring plot devices. This reader will stay vigilant.
Love and Whale Sounds (via ondes martinet),
E!
Thursday, April 9, 2009
DYING WHALES MAY BE A 12-YEAR CURSE
Almost 90 pilot whales and dolphins beached and died along the Australian west coast last week. Experts warned there could be more such mass deaths because the event follows a 12-year cycle of cooler south-bound nutrient rich currents that swell fish stock. This was the second mass stranding, bringing the total number of mortalities to 500. Recently, 200 cetaceans stranded and died on King Island in a single incident.
Meanwhile, another tragedy saw US scientists begin aerial surveillance off South Carolina. They are searching for a 40-foot right whale struck by a boat off Hilton Head Island during calving season which runs from November through April. Only 325 adult right whales are currently alive. So NOAA keeps a close eye as they migrate to the southeast United States to calve.
Meanwhile, another tragedy saw US scientists begin aerial surveillance off South Carolina. They are searching for a 40-foot right whale struck by a boat off Hilton Head Island during calving season which runs from November through April. Only 325 adult right whales are currently alive. So NOAA keeps a close eye as they migrate to the southeast United States to calve.
Saturday, April 4, 2009
WHALES PAYING FOR "BUSH" ATROCITIES
Before he left office, President Bush signed a series of regulations threatening environmental harm on a staggering scale. One of them was military sonar training up and down the US coastline from North Carolina to the Bahamas, Hawaii to Washington State and Alaska. The Navy claims that these sonar experiments (recently upheld by the predominantly right wing US Supreme Court) just annoy whales and dolphins. In actuality, the injuries extend beyond just hearing damage and mass stranding and death into adversely affecting their feeding, breeding, migrating, communicating and finding mates.
One bright development in an otherwise tragic and uncertain future for whales was the recent report that a record 39 new North Atlantic right whales were born this year off the coast of Florida and Georgia. But unless President Obama reverses the Bush atrocities, the number of mass whale and dolphin deaths will continue to grow, and that includes the North Atlantic right whales. Only 400 remain, making them one of the most severely endangered.
One bright development in an otherwise tragic and uncertain future for whales was the recent report that a record 39 new North Atlantic right whales were born this year off the coast of Florida and Georgia. But unless President Obama reverses the Bush atrocities, the number of mass whale and dolphin deaths will continue to grow, and that includes the North Atlantic right whales. Only 400 remain, making them one of the most severely endangered.
Thursday, April 2, 2009
THE BOOK IS #80 ON AMAZON
SAVE THE WHALES PLEASE broke into Amazon's top 100 today. It's #80! To everybody who bought the book, thank you! However long or briefly we are in the top 100, it's a moment to relish and rejoice! Yippeeee!
Monday, March 30, 2009
SLAUGHTER INEVITABLE
Pro-whaling nations are gaining ground in their effort to break the deadlock and resume slaughtering whales. The IWC indicated it will will continue to explore a plan to allow Japan to carry out '‘commercial whaling' in exchange for reduced hunting for 'scientific research' purposes. Anti-whaling activists did enjoy one victory, when the prime minister of Dominica announced at the "International Ocean Life Symposium" that his government would not support Japan's whale-killing position at the IWC.
Sunday, March 29, 2009
JAPANESE WHALERS THWARTED...FOR NOW
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society's boat, Steve Irwin, arrived in Hobart on February 2o 2oo9, after a series of violent clashes with Japanese whalers in the Southern Ocean. The activists located the whaling fleet earlier than they expected and prevented the slaughter of whales for over 27 days. However, upon arrival, Australian Federal Police, responding to Japanese complaints, raided the ship and confiscated the log and video footage of whale-killing.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
WHOLE FOODS TAKES A STAND
Popular organic supermarket chain, Whole Foods, has warned Iceland of a complete boycott on Icelandic products if the nation continues commercial whaling.
"Whole Foods Market is a mission-driven company committed to environmental sustainability and stewardship of our planet, with a wide customer base with like-minded values," A.C. Gallo, the assistant president of the chain, said in his statement to the Minister of Fisheries. "We are deeply disturbed by the former Minister of Fisheries and Agriculture’s decision to authorize the hunting of Sei and Minke Whales over the next five years, along with a dramatic increase in Iceland’s whaling quota...Our customer stakeholders are highly educated and environmentally aware, and we believe that if Iceland continues its current stance on whaling that the demand for Icelandic products in our stores will decline forcing us to seek out alternative product sources from other countries."
"Whole Foods Market is a mission-driven company committed to environmental sustainability and stewardship of our planet, with a wide customer base with like-minded values," A.C. Gallo, the assistant president of the chain, said in his statement to the Minister of Fisheries. "We are deeply disturbed by the former Minister of Fisheries and Agriculture’s decision to authorize the hunting of Sei and Minke Whales over the next five years, along with a dramatic increase in Iceland’s whaling quota...Our customer stakeholders are highly educated and environmentally aware, and we believe that if Iceland continues its current stance on whaling that the demand for Icelandic products in our stores will decline forcing us to seek out alternative product sources from other countries."
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
STRANDED WHALES RETURNED TO SEA
Eleven long-finned pilot whales were returned to sea Tuesday after surviving a mass stranding on a remote southwest Australian beach...
WHOLE STORY ON BREAKING NEWS!
WHOLE STORY ON BREAKING NEWS!
Monday, March 23, 2009
Whales, Dioramas, and Dramas
New wallpaper for someone's bathroom. ------------->
On brown carpeted floor, MY NEW ROOM, Los Feliz, CA, USA, the WORLD:
I’m now down the middle of the book and I’ve come up with an idea…
When I was in grade school, I was a pretty good student in that I loved new things. Really, all things but math. Math was like a genre of music… or film that I just innately didn’t like… umm, like spaghetti westerns or Romantic Dramadies geared toward a women exclusive audience. So getting into math was like sitting through a crap-tastic movie like the “Jane Austen Book Club” and trying to convince myself that it’s “ok”, and I different world/perspective that would somehow make me a more well rounded person by trying to understand it. Well, I understand that crap is crap… that’s too harsh… maybe that some perspectives are incompatible with one’s intrinsic self, tastes. BUT, I do taste art. Mmm mmm good. When it came ‘round to project time, this boy was all about making shoe box dioramas.
Now I’ve always thought books deserved the kind of publicity that movie and TV shows got. I remembering after reading Herman Hesse’s Narcissus and Goldmund, or Tom Robbin’s Still Life with Woodpecker, I would be designing posters in my head to be displayed on marquees, bus stops, and nowadays on Hulu every 15 minutes during a episode of “Lost” or something. All great works of art deserve pervasive and effective marketing. But alas, books get the shaft like most non visual media, most commercial for books are lame… just the book spinning into frame with a deep throated man synopsizing why it’s a sexy read… usually these books are suspense thrillers. Blech.
The more I read “the Whale” book, the more I get drawn to the action packed read rather than a heavy handed message about ecology. Sure, the elements are there, but they are woven in concert and compliment with some real fun characters. SO yeah, I like this book. Make no mistake, it’s not War and Peace or a Moveable Feast, but it would be tedious and laborious if all books were. If I could place a filmic genre to it, it’d be closer to action/adventure and I really truly love it for this. When it comes to mediums in art, books tend to be the haven for easy, unchecked snobbery. However no genre of story telling has hegemony over the whole art does it? There is a time and place for “Schindler’s List” and “Requiem for a Dream”, for “Dumb and Dumber” and “Die Hard”, for “Love Actually” and “Hedwig and the Angry Inch”. There is never time for: “Roger Dodger”, “Mama Mia!”… and yes, “The Jane Austen Book Club”… even Mr. Darcy would rather watch “Jackass” then that contrived crap fest.
SO: I’m making a diorama-ed, film trailer of this book, this mystery book I found in a brown bag weeks ago, which the authors begrudgingly let me keep till I finished reading, whom now seem supportive of my exploration with it. And why not, I like it. Well, I’m gonna get back to reading it, then work some more on the trailer. So far so good…. I can’t wait to show you all!
Love and Kogi Koreann BBQ Taco Trucks,
Eugene
PS: Save the Whales Please. And while you’re at it, the rest of the planet.
Friday, March 20, 2009
SAVE THE WHALES PLEASE! A Movie Between Book Covers
Written by two men who hold Master’s degrees from the University of Southern California film school, Save the Whales Please is a movie between book covers with short scenes that end where the director—Quentin Tarantino?—might say, “Cut.” It’s a political action thriller in which Uma Thurman or Angelina Jolie might star as Jan Everett, the drop-dead gorgeous first lady of the United States and committed environmental activist whose passion is saving whales. Her husband, Carston Everett, is running for reelection for his second term. He’s an independent, and his poll numbers, like the poll numbers of his Democratic and Republican rivals, are all under thirty percent. Everett is young, glamorous, and ambitious. But a Jeb Bartlett he’s not. In fact, he’s surrounded by a chief of staff and advisors that make Dick Cheney and officials of the former administration look like Peter Pan and the Lost Boys. Early on, George Pleasance, Everett’s chief of staff, sees a reflection of himself with the president and another advisor in a mirror in the Oval Office. He “felt a chill. In that moment, they could’ve been the White House of Nixon, Haldeman and Ehrlichman at the height of their power, pre-Watergate.”
It’s an action-adventure story of dirty politics all around the world. The International Whaling Commission (IWC) allows Japan to kill whales “for scientific study,” which really means for public consumption. Pirates slaughter whales and sell them to Japan. When Jan Everett and her team, which includes a videographer and a submarine captain, capture both a notorious pirate and a ship owned by a Japanese family with enormous political influence, Japan threatens the U.S. with a trade war. At the same time, nearly two thousand blue whales have somehow been trapped between the Arctic ice and the U.S. Navy’s sonar experiments. If the whales remain trapped, they’ll all die and the species is likely to become extinct. The White House has offered these whales to Japan to forestall the threatened trade war. Jan Everett and her cohort take over the captured pirate ship and set out to save the whales.
The authors, one of whom is an entertainment lawyer, have created amazingly realistic politics and technology. Well … either they’re making it up, or it’s nonfiction that will inspire both green fanatics and conspiracy theorists to take action. Either way, it’s an exciting read.
(April) Barbara Ardinger, Foreword
(Foreword, one of the five big trades, reviews only .04% of the books it receives)
It’s an action-adventure story of dirty politics all around the world. The International Whaling Commission (IWC) allows Japan to kill whales “for scientific study,” which really means for public consumption. Pirates slaughter whales and sell them to Japan. When Jan Everett and her team, which includes a videographer and a submarine captain, capture both a notorious pirate and a ship owned by a Japanese family with enormous political influence, Japan threatens the U.S. with a trade war. At the same time, nearly two thousand blue whales have somehow been trapped between the Arctic ice and the U.S. Navy’s sonar experiments. If the whales remain trapped, they’ll all die and the species is likely to become extinct. The White House has offered these whales to Japan to forestall the threatened trade war. Jan Everett and her cohort take over the captured pirate ship and set out to save the whales.
The authors, one of whom is an entertainment lawyer, have created amazingly realistic politics and technology. Well … either they’re making it up, or it’s nonfiction that will inspire both green fanatics and conspiracy theorists to take action. Either way, it’s an exciting read.
(April) Barbara Ardinger, Foreword
(Foreword, one of the five big trades, reviews only .04% of the books it receives)
WHAT IS JAPAN TRYING TO HIDE?
The Fisheries Agency of Japan blacked out large sections of its whale stock, contradicting a pledge keep the contracts and sales of the government-funded whaling industry open, transparent and public. Greenpeace has lodged a complaint and anti-whaling activists around the world are pressuring Japan's embassies for full disclosure on whale meat stocks.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
S.KOREA LEADS RETURN TO COMMERCIAL WHALING
South Korea announced that it is going to resume commercial whaling and is seeking a permit from the International Whaling Commission. The request will be considered at the IWC's annual meeting in Portugal this June. Activists had feared the deal to allow Japan to commercially slaughter whales along its coast in exchange for reduced hunts in the Antarctic would open the door to more hunting. It now seems only a matter of time before other whaling countries follow suit.
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
COVERUP: GOVT. SUPPRESSES WHALING VIDEO
The Australian government has permitted the viewing of only a fraction of a video showing Japanese slaughtering whales in the Antarctic this past summer, fueling suspicion of a growing collusion between the two countries. The footage was obtained by a Customs vessel. Even Greens Senator Bob Brown was thwarted from viewing the entire footage under the Freedom of Information laws. The Rudd government has been accused of brokering a secret deal that would allow Japan to harvest more whales along its coast for reduced kills in the Antarctic. Release of the video, activists suspect, would annoy the Japanese and threaten the back room deal.
Monday, March 16, 2009
SOUTH KOREA THREATENS TO KILL WHALES
South Korea has indicated it wants to resume whaling if the IWC permits Japan to increased coastal whaling in exchange for scaling down its Antarctic hunt.
“This would open the floodgates for commercial whaling,” a manager from the Marine Science Program told Reuters in Rome. Korean whaling used to supply Japan with whale meat before the 1986 moratorium, after which Korea received a “scientific” quota of 69 whales but has since complied with the global ban. If South Korea follows through on its threat to resume hunting, particularly threatened would be minke whales which are accidentally caught in fishing nets and then sold as food.
“We should be closing the loopholes that permit whaling rather than creating new loopholes,” said Nicolas Entrup, spokesman for the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society.
“This would open the floodgates for commercial whaling,” a manager from the Marine Science Program told Reuters in Rome. Korean whaling used to supply Japan with whale meat before the 1986 moratorium, after which Korea received a “scientific” quota of 69 whales but has since complied with the global ban. If South Korea follows through on its threat to resume hunting, particularly threatened would be minke whales which are accidentally caught in fishing nets and then sold as food.
“We should be closing the loopholes that permit whaling rather than creating new loopholes,” said Nicolas Entrup, spokesman for the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
JAPAN FINDS NEW WHALING ALLY IN AUSTRALIA
Following an allegation by the Japanese ambassador to Canberra, Takaaki Kojima, that Sea Shepherd violated maritime laws when the anti-whaling group challenged the Japanese whaling fleet, the Australian Federal Police raided Sea Shepherd's vessel Steve Irwin. Australia was exposed recently for secretly trying to broker a deal between the US and Japan--one that would allow Japan to slaughter more whales along its coast for reducing hunting in the Antarctic. But the Australian Federal Police action against Sea Shepherd suggests a growing collusion with Japan and a stunning about face by Australia, until now anti-whaling cause's strongest ally.
Thursday, March 12, 2009
COMING THIS JUNE: COMMERCIAL WHALING
After a three days of meetings in Rome, the International Whaling Commission emerged with a change in direction that could threaten the safety of whales forever. A Small Working Group of member countries is proposing a resumption of commercial whaling. This deal could be approved by the full IWC at its annual meeting on the Portuguese island of Madeira as early this June.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
AN UNPRECEDENTED RESCUE!
Scientists used sedatives to calm and then free a North Atlantic right whale entangled in rope off Florida's Atlantic Coast — the first time a large whale was ever sedated in the wild, according to the federal fisheries agency.
This whale was first spotted entangled in ropes off Georgia on Jan. 14, the National Marine Fisheries Service said in a statement. Georgia officials took a boat out to remove 560 feet of trailing rope and attach a tracking buoy, and teams made four more attempts over the next six weeks to remove the remaining rope, which appeared to be from commercial fishing operations.
GO TO BREAKING NEWS TO READ THE WHOLE STORY!
This whale was first spotted entangled in ropes off Georgia on Jan. 14, the National Marine Fisheries Service said in a statement. Georgia officials took a boat out to remove 560 feet of trailing rope and attach a tracking buoy, and teams made four more attempts over the next six weeks to remove the remaining rope, which appeared to be from commercial fishing operations.
GO TO BREAKING NEWS TO READ THE WHOLE STORY!
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Blue Whales are Big
Tuesday 7:27pm
Truth: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YtC-VagE4Y
A confession: when I was a kid... from ages 3-7, I seriously considered the career of being a dolphin trainer.... and it was probably in large part because of Sea World. Which is hard. If not for Sea World my love for the ocean and all these wonderful creatures would never be as potent and vibrant as it is today. I remember after my first visit, complete with miniatures, stuffed animal dolphin, getting splashed by Shamu, I started devouring any and all literature on these massive beauts (pronounced bee-you-ts). Pop-up books, coloring books, interactive ones (those were amazing... they should have pop and interactive-y books for a range of subjects... for adults... from the Sonic Youth story to the dramatic retelling of the Summer of Sam murders to... I dunno, urban legends about tumors in chicken sanwiches at popular fast food chains?) and then on to National Geographic's and text books.
...I remember this one book... I think it was called "ENDANGERED!" and on the cover was a beached Sperm Whale with a bloody front. The cover was so dramatic... seeing an animal of that immensity, so completely out of it's element... powerful in its sheer size and powerless its it's gaped mouth despair. I borrowed that book from the Huntington Beach Public Library probably 8 times, each time hiding it behind boring subject like "The Industrial Revolution: Cotton Gin Power Player" so I can get it again when my mom could take me to the library. It horrified and intrigued me, leaving an indelible burn of images it so dramatically captured in it's pages... I was emboldened by it then, but as a kid, the most I could do was read everything on the ocean, swim in the sea, and cut the 6-pack rings out of the Sunkist we bought from Alpha Beta.
The blue whale is the largest animal on Earth, though humans probably have the largest egos. And the most potential/compassion????
***BOM***
(Percussion hit sound from Lost)
-Mystery Brown Bag Blogger Bloke
Truth: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YtC-VagE4Y
A confession: when I was a kid... from ages 3-7, I seriously considered the career of being a dolphin trainer.... and it was probably in large part because of Sea World. Which is hard. If not for Sea World my love for the ocean and all these wonderful creatures would never be as potent and vibrant as it is today. I remember after my first visit, complete with miniatures, stuffed animal dolphin, getting splashed by Shamu, I started devouring any and all literature on these massive beauts (pronounced bee-you-ts). Pop-up books, coloring books, interactive ones (those were amazing... they should have pop and interactive-y books for a range of subjects... for adults... from the Sonic Youth story to the dramatic retelling of the Summer of Sam murders to... I dunno, urban legends about tumors in chicken sanwiches at popular fast food chains?) and then on to National Geographic's and text books.
...I remember this one book... I think it was called "ENDANGERED!" and on the cover was a beached Sperm Whale with a bloody front. The cover was so dramatic... seeing an animal of that immensity, so completely out of it's element... powerful in its sheer size and powerless its it's gaped mouth despair. I borrowed that book from the Huntington Beach Public Library probably 8 times, each time hiding it behind boring subject like "The Industrial Revolution: Cotton Gin Power Player" so I can get it again when my mom could take me to the library. It horrified and intrigued me, leaving an indelible burn of images it so dramatically captured in it's pages... I was emboldened by it then, but as a kid, the most I could do was read everything on the ocean, swim in the sea, and cut the 6-pack rings out of the Sunkist we bought from Alpha Beta.
The blue whale is the largest animal on Earth, though humans probably have the largest egos. And the most potential/compassion????
***BOM***
(Percussion hit sound from Lost)
-Mystery Brown Bag Blogger Bloke
RELOCATING CRUELTY WON'T SAVE WHALES!
Since its formation at last year's International Whaling Commission meeting, the small working group on the future of the IWC, of which New Zealand is a member, has held a number of closed-door meetings.
In an attempt to find a solution to the polarised deadlock between the pro- and anti-whaling camps, the group's two chairs have suggested a possible compromise deal.
This deal would see Japan hunting endangered whales in its coastal waters in exchange for a "scaling back" of bogus "scientific" hunts in the Southern Ocean whale sanctuary. The commission's intersessional meeting opens in Rome on Monday to discuss such a deal.
READ THE WHOLE STORY ON BREAKING NEWS!
In an attempt to find a solution to the polarised deadlock between the pro- and anti-whaling camps, the group's two chairs have suggested a possible compromise deal.
This deal would see Japan hunting endangered whales in its coastal waters in exchange for a "scaling back" of bogus "scientific" hunts in the Southern Ocean whale sanctuary. The commission's intersessional meeting opens in Rome on Monday to discuss such a deal.
READ THE WHOLE STORY ON BREAKING NEWS!
Monday, March 9, 2009
IWC ON THE BRINK OF COLLAPSE!
There are fears the body that oversees the protection of the world's whale stocks is on the brink of collapse. As members of the International Whaling Commission gather in Rome for a key meeting, its chairman warns that whaling nations are set to qhit countries unless they receive concessions on hunting. Dr Bill Hogarth, appointed by the US to head the organisation, has hinted minke whales should be hunted in the Southern Ocean as part of a compromise. "Dysfunctional," Dr Hogarth said on ABC Radio, a US AM station, and went to add the IWC is "bogged down."
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Reload, Shoot. MBinaBBB pt. 2
Wednesday 10:04 pm
I’m trying to write about all that I’ve read. I’m getting pretty into it. The scenes where they talk about how the whalers wound the baby Sperm whales so they come to the surface thus luring the mother to the surface to console/protect them only to be shot with a harpoon grenade is really… grim. The first lady of the United States (Jan) is on a submarine now about to sink the ship… things are getting intense. I don’t wanna write anymore. I gotta read. Plus…. crap, I’m starving, I gotta eat something.
Friday 9:15pm
Here is where I am sore: triceps, quads, forearms, where my pecs meet my rotator, the pad of skin that precedes the thumbs… such a weird place to be sore….
Back track, I got one of those 3 day guest passes at LA Fitness with my buddy Tyler, so I felt I should really take advantage of it, going all three days and spending hours figuring out when I got so out of shape… or really knowing how far out of shape I have become. Ughhh.
I go to look for “the Whale Book” and it is no where to be found! Oh shit. And I had just been exchanging emails back and forth with one of the authors who is worried I’m gonna, I dunno, sell his book on eBay? I mean, I’m reading the galley’s which is stuff that not necessarily the final draft so he is worried it’s gonna get out unfinished somehow. I guess it’s the equivalent of having MP3’s leaked online before the release of an album. Some artist are bummed by it because it may not be the most perfect version or they are not getting money for there hard work. Well, I can safely say that ne’er have I not gone and bought an album I really loved that I got the MP3 of first… there is something about having that archiveable, physical copy. I respect the artist. So with that I offer this to the authors of Save the Whales Please (who I know are reading this): I have already pre-ordered your book online, I will not leak this copy out, but all the same, I’m halfway through the book, I’d really like to finish reading it. You both should be glad being that I have 5 books unfinished books I’m still reading (The Rest is Noise, Women, Tropic of Cancer, Man’s Search for Meaning, Last Leg) and I have put them all aside to read yours. Now if I could only find it…
Sunday 10:30am
Phew. It was in my car.
Really, this was a message from a few hours after my last posting, I just got busy and didn’t have time to login. This book is interesting in that I keep returning to how much it reminds of the show “24.” Maybe its because of the dual intersecting plotlines of the political intrigue in Washington with the action/adventure bit in the field. It’s more action packed and surprisingly not so “bleeding heart-y.” And the pacing, I dig it, Danny Boyle pacing, I can hear a soundtrack going with the book. There’s an idea…. what if there was a reading of the book... someone with good voicing, actors playing each part and a narrator like James Earl Jones… or Obama, and a DJ spinning to match the tone of the paragraph! It would be a hell of a more interesting reading then I’ve seen n the pass. That would be cool. Hmm….
I gotta think about that some more.
Sunday, A little while later…
OK. Here are my top 5 songs to be in the soundtrack if there was ever a dramatic reading or film to be made out of this book. You hear it hear first:
1.) Radiohead – How to Disappear Completely
2.) Sigur Ros – Sven G Englar (sp?)
3.) Dirty Three – Deep Waters
4.) Astreal – Xumisitia
5.) Bjork – Oceania
Tuesday 9:07am
Okay, it’s pretty much settled now. If this were ever made into a film, the guy who plays FBI Director Larry Moss on “24” and Agent Renee Walker should totally play the President and First Lady, respectively. Maybe it’s cause I started reading the book just as I really got into the new season of the show…I dunno, I can’t NOT picture them now when I read it. Does that ever happen to you all? People in your lives are persons you just saw on TV remain permanently imprinted with fictional characters you’re reading about, that casting has already been done in your memory and the players are fixed? I can’t remember, for instance what the Amory Blaine looked like when I was reading F.Scott Fitzgeralds This Side of Paradise but I definitely know that the character Goldmund in Hesse’s Narcissus and Goldmund was a combination of the guy who gave me the book and a another dude we hung out with that met the description by the author. I wonder if we always cast characters while we are reading… Anyways.
Friday 1:15pm
The great about reading a Bukowski novel is that the chapters are so damn short that interest is kept and you can read little slivers, 5 minutes at a time and always have a good stopping point. Same with this book… it’s as if they have been retrofitted for a reduce attention span of the current generation. Works for me, it saves from a lot of rereading to “get” the flow of a conflict or conversation. I like the book in that it’s a good thriller-y read and not too preachy or generic given the opportunity to with the subject matter (saving whales etc…). I wonder how intense conflicts between Green Peace boats and giant whaling ships really do get on the high seas? I mean, really, whats to keep a ship from running over a raft and just say that they didn’t have enough time to maneuver around it? I dunno… I mean people kill each other over money all the time, whats keeping the activist in the little skiffs safe at sea? A noble cause, but not a position I’d want to be in.
Saturday 1:15pm
Oh look, the same time as last. After seeing my friend Rishi spinning yesterday, I wanna DJ again. My friend Ginette in Singapore sent me a mix she had blended and made into a single track. I started messing around with the idea of premixing music on Garage band and playing it on a MP3 player live, and having fake cartoon-y turn tables (ala Michel Gondry) and pretend scratching, swapping, fades per remembering the moments from the pre made mix. Well, that sounds convoluted and started doing it yesterday night. Ummm, yeah, it’s hard.
In other news: I think the threat of legal action has evaporated, the authors have stopped emailing and leaving me message… maybe they realized that a.) I like the book therefore want to keep it, b.) this is a kind of marketing/awareness for the book. Everyone wins. I did tell them that if the book began to suck, I’m gonna write about it. They didn’t seem to take that too well.
Look: I champion the artist. Many people have the luxury of simply being a critic: of food, of music, of things that are hyped, clothing, appearance, mom’s boyfriend, blogs, lifestyles. It’s easy to take apart, sometimes it’s fun. Sometimes it’s affirming of one’s identity, some people love being critical assholes. But I do believe there is a different between discernment and the kind of criticism that is fueled entirely by the ego. Have you ever read that Oscar Wilde piece on criticism as an artform?
aqui: http://www.readbookonline.net/readOnLine/480/
-mr.E
I’m trying to write about all that I’ve read. I’m getting pretty into it. The scenes where they talk about how the whalers wound the baby Sperm whales so they come to the surface thus luring the mother to the surface to console/protect them only to be shot with a harpoon grenade is really… grim. The first lady of the United States (Jan) is on a submarine now about to sink the ship… things are getting intense. I don’t wanna write anymore. I gotta read. Plus…. crap, I’m starving, I gotta eat something.
Friday 9:15pm
Here is where I am sore: triceps, quads, forearms, where my pecs meet my rotator, the pad of skin that precedes the thumbs… such a weird place to be sore….
Back track, I got one of those 3 day guest passes at LA Fitness with my buddy Tyler, so I felt I should really take advantage of it, going all three days and spending hours figuring out when I got so out of shape… or really knowing how far out of shape I have become. Ughhh.
I go to look for “the Whale Book” and it is no where to be found! Oh shit. And I had just been exchanging emails back and forth with one of the authors who is worried I’m gonna, I dunno, sell his book on eBay? I mean, I’m reading the galley’s which is stuff that not necessarily the final draft so he is worried it’s gonna get out unfinished somehow. I guess it’s the equivalent of having MP3’s leaked online before the release of an album. Some artist are bummed by it because it may not be the most perfect version or they are not getting money for there hard work. Well, I can safely say that ne’er have I not gone and bought an album I really loved that I got the MP3 of first… there is something about having that archiveable, physical copy. I respect the artist. So with that I offer this to the authors of Save the Whales Please (who I know are reading this): I have already pre-ordered your book online, I will not leak this copy out, but all the same, I’m halfway through the book, I’d really like to finish reading it. You both should be glad being that I have 5 books unfinished books I’m still reading (The Rest is Noise, Women, Tropic of Cancer, Man’s Search for Meaning, Last Leg) and I have put them all aside to read yours. Now if I could only find it…
Sunday 10:30am
Phew. It was in my car.
Really, this was a message from a few hours after my last posting, I just got busy and didn’t have time to login. This book is interesting in that I keep returning to how much it reminds of the show “24.” Maybe its because of the dual intersecting plotlines of the political intrigue in Washington with the action/adventure bit in the field. It’s more action packed and surprisingly not so “bleeding heart-y.” And the pacing, I dig it, Danny Boyle pacing, I can hear a soundtrack going with the book. There’s an idea…. what if there was a reading of the book... someone with good voicing, actors playing each part and a narrator like James Earl Jones… or Obama, and a DJ spinning to match the tone of the paragraph! It would be a hell of a more interesting reading then I’ve seen n the pass. That would be cool. Hmm….
I gotta think about that some more.
Sunday, A little while later…
OK. Here are my top 5 songs to be in the soundtrack if there was ever a dramatic reading or film to be made out of this book. You hear it hear first:
1.) Radiohead – How to Disappear Completely
2.) Sigur Ros – Sven G Englar (sp?)
3.) Dirty Three – Deep Waters
4.) Astreal – Xumisitia
5.) Bjork – Oceania
Tuesday 9:07am
Okay, it’s pretty much settled now. If this were ever made into a film, the guy who plays FBI Director Larry Moss on “24” and Agent Renee Walker should totally play the President and First Lady, respectively. Maybe it’s cause I started reading the book just as I really got into the new season of the show…I dunno, I can’t NOT picture them now when I read it. Does that ever happen to you all? People in your lives are persons you just saw on TV remain permanently imprinted with fictional characters you’re reading about, that casting has already been done in your memory and the players are fixed? I can’t remember, for instance what the Amory Blaine looked like when I was reading F.Scott Fitzgeralds This Side of Paradise but I definitely know that the character Goldmund in Hesse’s Narcissus and Goldmund was a combination of the guy who gave me the book and a another dude we hung out with that met the description by the author. I wonder if we always cast characters while we are reading… Anyways.
Friday 1:15pm
The great about reading a Bukowski novel is that the chapters are so damn short that interest is kept and you can read little slivers, 5 minutes at a time and always have a good stopping point. Same with this book… it’s as if they have been retrofitted for a reduce attention span of the current generation. Works for me, it saves from a lot of rereading to “get” the flow of a conflict or conversation. I like the book in that it’s a good thriller-y read and not too preachy or generic given the opportunity to with the subject matter (saving whales etc…). I wonder how intense conflicts between Green Peace boats and giant whaling ships really do get on the high seas? I mean, really, whats to keep a ship from running over a raft and just say that they didn’t have enough time to maneuver around it? I dunno… I mean people kill each other over money all the time, whats keeping the activist in the little skiffs safe at sea? A noble cause, but not a position I’d want to be in.
Saturday 1:15pm
Oh look, the same time as last. After seeing my friend Rishi spinning yesterday, I wanna DJ again. My friend Ginette in Singapore sent me a mix she had blended and made into a single track. I started messing around with the idea of premixing music on Garage band and playing it on a MP3 player live, and having fake cartoon-y turn tables (ala Michel Gondry) and pretend scratching, swapping, fades per remembering the moments from the pre made mix. Well, that sounds convoluted and started doing it yesterday night. Ummm, yeah, it’s hard.
In other news: I think the threat of legal action has evaporated, the authors have stopped emailing and leaving me message… maybe they realized that a.) I like the book therefore want to keep it, b.) this is a kind of marketing/awareness for the book. Everyone wins. I did tell them that if the book began to suck, I’m gonna write about it. They didn’t seem to take that too well.
Look: I champion the artist. Many people have the luxury of simply being a critic: of food, of music, of things that are hyped, clothing, appearance, mom’s boyfriend, blogs, lifestyles. It’s easy to take apart, sometimes it’s fun. Sometimes it’s affirming of one’s identity, some people love being critical assholes. But I do believe there is a different between discernment and the kind of criticism that is fueled entirely by the ego. Have you ever read that Oscar Wilde piece on criticism as an artform?
aqui: http://www.readbookonline.net/readOnLine/480/
-mr.E
Mystery Book in a Brown Bag: A Shot of Fiction, Multiple Entry Wounds
A Busy Saturday 4:37pm
Let me preface. I just got off a shift at the JOB-THAT-WON'T-BE-NAMED, and sat on a chair outside of Robek's Juice debating whether I should have eaten that burrito with the chicken substitute for the applewood smoked bacon and kept the black beans, are have gone with the my usual subs of ham for bacon, spinach for beans... look, it doesn't really matter. So I saw the most haggard looking dude... kinda hobo looking but somehow dignified, professional looking... I dunno... there was just something really striking about him. And you know, there are a finite amount of weirdos, in this town full of freaks and randoms, that deserve a second look.
He was sitting there with a coffee from THE-PLACE-ETC... (funny thing is, I don't remember him ever coming in) and he was glaring my way as if I was wearing a Michael Buble' Live in Concert shirt.
I get weirded out and turn around to finish my phone call with my friend the pole vaulter turn accountant. I'd be getting some money back this year, but damn you Californian I.O.U!!!
By the time I turn back to see if he was there, he was gone. I don' t think shit of it and go looking for my car. It was an early morning when I parked and I swear I can’t remember the ride over. (Last time that happened was New Years Eve, and I got towed for blocking some asshole’s driveway. And yes, he IS an asshole, I don’t care about the logic, towing sucks and I hope someone padlocks his garage or a bird shits on him seconds before he walks into the most important meeting of his life, this is a my belligerence in full bloom.)
I don’t mean it.
I walk for 47 minutes looking and cursing, searching for the busted tail light that has been taped up, listening for the beep of my car alarm, whishing I hadn’t quit smoking. I walk across where “Captain Hobo” was sitting and noticed a brown paper bag. I would have left it alone except for the big black letter written across it:
GOOD, READ.
What?
I open it carefully, fearing dog crap in a bag, barf, bombs, week old bologne (how do you spell that?) and inside was a book:
Save the Whales Please
Saturday 8:15pm
The cover looks cool. It’s like a dramatic shot of a whale breaching amidst sea spray and profundity, a large boat looms in the background and a tiny skiff is approaching it… must be the Green Peace-ers. Which reminds me: I opted to donate a cool $21.00 to Greenpeace because the girl with the clipboard outside of the Border’s was rejected by like 10 people, rudely and despite that she was ridiculously optimistic. I listened to her spiel, asked her a bunch of hard questions, challenged her to produce proof that my credit card was being stolen etc… She was good, extremely well informed, and earnest. And cute. I signed up for $21.00 and ever since that day, every month Green Peace takes 21 bucks out of my account. Sometimes I lament this because I think, “Damnit, I’m poor. The orangutan’s in Borneo can wait till gas prices go down (Summer 2008 joke, remember those days, yeah, suck-sicle dribbling down your clean white sleeves). That I didn’t completely agree with banning whaling. I love whales, I respect life, but I hate outside/Western/extra governmental agencies dictating culture. Even so, I am aware there is a black market, profiteers hide behind the guise of culture to get rich, not every whaler is an Eskimo that has been doing for generations. And those big lugs are endangered. Still gas prices…)
The cover. I should read this…. mystery book. Do you… have you ever found a CD on the ground and picked up and put it on? I mean 9 times outta 10 its terrible hip hop or ska or jammy stuff that is 78 minutes long and reeeeeally deep. And this book, it could be a preachy book about whales. But I’m curious. I’m gonna read ten pages and if it gets all Robert Redford “I Love Earth”-y, I’m putting it in a brown bag and writing:
Kindling
Saturday 9:01pm
Not bad…
Monday 11:10am
I didn’t get a chance to read “Whale Book” due to work and birthday parties, but I thought about something: I’m gonna Twitter/Facebook status, excerpts from pages from the book. Casue honestly, most peoples Facebook status updates and Tweets are banal/uninspiring/”who-gives-a-shit-y”. Then again… those 25 note things are amazing. I can’t stop reading it. I did one. They should have one where you write 25 things about another person, that way you get a counter balance to all the shit that people want you to know who they are. I’m listening to My Bloody Valentines “Soft as Snow (But Warm Inside) right now. What an amazing mess! Well, maybe my idea is no better, but heck, I’m gonna do it. Every day. It will get me to read. Cause I always say I should read more.
Monday 12:17pm
This book is not what I thought it would be. It read like an action adventure… first lady as some kind of eco crusader the first couple… gosh, I just keep drawing comparisons somewhere between the Obamas and the FBI boss Larry Moss from 24, with the first lady played by that delicious Annie Wersching… HOT. The booked is paced really well, the chapters (if you can call them that) are more like location changes, like Law and Order.
Monday 1:30pm
Grenade tipped harpoons. Jeez… and I only hope it’s fiction. It’s probably not.
Tuesday 2:03pm
I really gotta read more. So I looked up this book online and it turns out there’s a website. I send what I presume the staff or the two authors an email saying, “Yo, I got your book, if you wanna see it again I want a brown tube sock filled grape flavored Big League Chew a roll of quarters (never a bad thing to have in LA).” Really, they were happy the book was recovered as it was the uncorrected galley of it, which for the rest of us non-book industry people, means the almost-ready-for-the-public copy (it comes out April 1st… I think on Amazon?) Anyways, I ask if they need it back right away cause I was really into it. They said it’s alright just not to sell it. I say, or leave it in a bag that says: Good, Read. They say, “What?” I say (see entry #1). They say, “No way…” I say “Quite ‘Way’.” They say, “That’s so odd.” I say, “Hey, I’m an online marketer I can pitch this book for you.”
Conversations happen, I convince that I am (ummm… aren’t we all?) and they say ok, you can hold onto it.
Hey, anything for a “good, read”.
Wednesday 10:04 pm
I’m trying to write about all that I’ve read. I’m getting pretty into it. The scenes where they talk about how the whalers wound the baby Sperm whales so they come to the surface thus luring the mother to the surface to console/protect them only to be shot with a harpoon grenade is really… grim. The first lady of the United States (Jan) is on a submarine now about to sink the ship… things are getting intense. I don’t wanna write anymore. I gotta read. Plus…. crap, I’m starving, I gotta eat something.
-Guy who likes to read.
PS: You might not want to make your username and password so easy to figure out.
PPS: I'll give you your book back as soon as I finish it. Don't worry, I'm half way.
PPPS: I have been screening your calls, sorry, it's just that you seem really upset. Relax, I'm not going to do anything to your book, I just want to read it. Nice webpage btw.
Let me preface. I just got off a shift at the JOB-THAT-WON'T-BE-NAMED, and sat on a chair outside of Robek's Juice debating whether I should have eaten that burrito with the chicken substitute for the applewood smoked bacon and kept the black beans, are have gone with the my usual subs of ham for bacon, spinach for beans... look, it doesn't really matter. So I saw the most haggard looking dude... kinda hobo looking but somehow dignified, professional looking... I dunno... there was just something really striking about him. And you know, there are a finite amount of weirdos, in this town full of freaks and randoms, that deserve a second look.
He was sitting there with a coffee from THE-PLACE-ETC... (funny thing is, I don't remember him ever coming in) and he was glaring my way as if I was wearing a Michael Buble' Live in Concert shirt.
I get weirded out and turn around to finish my phone call with my friend the pole vaulter turn accountant. I'd be getting some money back this year, but damn you Californian I.O.U!!!
By the time I turn back to see if he was there, he was gone. I don' t think shit of it and go looking for my car. It was an early morning when I parked and I swear I can’t remember the ride over. (Last time that happened was New Years Eve, and I got towed for blocking some asshole’s driveway. And yes, he IS an asshole, I don’t care about the logic, towing sucks and I hope someone padlocks his garage or a bird shits on him seconds before he walks into the most important meeting of his life, this is a my belligerence in full bloom.)
I don’t mean it.
I walk for 47 minutes looking and cursing, searching for the busted tail light that has been taped up, listening for the beep of my car alarm, whishing I hadn’t quit smoking. I walk across where “Captain Hobo” was sitting and noticed a brown paper bag. I would have left it alone except for the big black letter written across it:
GOOD, READ.
What?
I open it carefully, fearing dog crap in a bag, barf, bombs, week old bologne (how do you spell that?) and inside was a book:
Save the Whales Please
Saturday 8:15pm
The cover looks cool. It’s like a dramatic shot of a whale breaching amidst sea spray and profundity, a large boat looms in the background and a tiny skiff is approaching it… must be the Green Peace-ers. Which reminds me: I opted to donate a cool $21.00 to Greenpeace because the girl with the clipboard outside of the Border’s was rejected by like 10 people, rudely and despite that she was ridiculously optimistic. I listened to her spiel, asked her a bunch of hard questions, challenged her to produce proof that my credit card was being stolen etc… She was good, extremely well informed, and earnest. And cute. I signed up for $21.00 and ever since that day, every month Green Peace takes 21 bucks out of my account. Sometimes I lament this because I think, “Damnit, I’m poor. The orangutan’s in Borneo can wait till gas prices go down (Summer 2008 joke, remember those days, yeah, suck-sicle dribbling down your clean white sleeves). That I didn’t completely agree with banning whaling. I love whales, I respect life, but I hate outside/Western/extra governmental agencies dictating culture. Even so, I am aware there is a black market, profiteers hide behind the guise of culture to get rich, not every whaler is an Eskimo that has been doing for generations. And those big lugs are endangered. Still gas prices…)
The cover. I should read this…. mystery book. Do you… have you ever found a CD on the ground and picked up and put it on? I mean 9 times outta 10 its terrible hip hop or ska or jammy stuff that is 78 minutes long and reeeeeally deep. And this book, it could be a preachy book about whales. But I’m curious. I’m gonna read ten pages and if it gets all Robert Redford “I Love Earth”-y, I’m putting it in a brown bag and writing:
Kindling
Saturday 9:01pm
Not bad…
Monday 11:10am
I didn’t get a chance to read “Whale Book” due to work and birthday parties, but I thought about something: I’m gonna Twitter/Facebook status, excerpts from pages from the book. Casue honestly, most peoples Facebook status updates and Tweets are banal/uninspiring/”who-gives-a-shit-y”. Then again… those 25 note things are amazing. I can’t stop reading it. I did one. They should have one where you write 25 things about another person, that way you get a counter balance to all the shit that people want you to know who they are. I’m listening to My Bloody Valentines “Soft as Snow (But Warm Inside) right now. What an amazing mess! Well, maybe my idea is no better, but heck, I’m gonna do it. Every day. It will get me to read. Cause I always say I should read more.
Monday 12:17pm
This book is not what I thought it would be. It read like an action adventure… first lady as some kind of eco crusader the first couple… gosh, I just keep drawing comparisons somewhere between the Obamas and the FBI boss Larry Moss from 24, with the first lady played by that delicious Annie Wersching… HOT. The booked is paced really well, the chapters (if you can call them that) are more like location changes, like Law and Order.
Monday 1:30pm
Grenade tipped harpoons. Jeez… and I only hope it’s fiction. It’s probably not.
Tuesday 2:03pm
I really gotta read more. So I looked up this book online and it turns out there’s a website. I send what I presume the staff or the two authors an email saying, “Yo, I got your book, if you wanna see it again I want a brown tube sock filled grape flavored Big League Chew a roll of quarters (never a bad thing to have in LA).” Really, they were happy the book was recovered as it was the uncorrected galley of it, which for the rest of us non-book industry people, means the almost-ready-for-the-public copy (it comes out April 1st… I think on Amazon?) Anyways, I ask if they need it back right away cause I was really into it. They said it’s alright just not to sell it. I say, or leave it in a bag that says: Good, Read. They say, “What?” I say (see entry #1). They say, “No way…” I say “Quite ‘Way’.” They say, “That’s so odd.” I say, “Hey, I’m an online marketer I can pitch this book for you.”
Conversations happen, I convince that I am (ummm… aren’t we all?) and they say ok, you can hold onto it.
Hey, anything for a “good, read”.
Wednesday 10:04 pm
I’m trying to write about all that I’ve read. I’m getting pretty into it. The scenes where they talk about how the whalers wound the baby Sperm whales so they come to the surface thus luring the mother to the surface to console/protect them only to be shot with a harpoon grenade is really… grim. The first lady of the United States (Jan) is on a submarine now about to sink the ship… things are getting intense. I don’t wanna write anymore. I gotta read. Plus…. crap, I’m starving, I gotta eat something.
-Guy who likes to read.
PS: You might not want to make your username and password so easy to figure out.
PPS: I'll give you your book back as soon as I finish it. Don't worry, I'm half way.
PPPS: I have been screening your calls, sorry, it's just that you seem really upset. Relax, I'm not going to do anything to your book, I just want to read it. Nice webpage btw.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Secret Japan Deal To Trade Whale Kills
Secret Japan Deal To Trade Whale Kills
Andrew Darby, Hobart
January 27, 2009
THE Federal Government has secretly helped to draw up a potential deal to break the whaling deadlock that would let Japan expand North Pacific kills in return for Antarctic cuts.- More whale kills for Antarctic cuts- Australia helps draw up secret deal- 'This is Whalergate,' says IFAW
Japanese whalers could hunt a regulated number of minke whales in their own coastal waters under the plan, as well as take many more whales in the high seas of the North Pacific.In exchange Japan would agree to one of two offers: either to phase out whaling under self-awarded scientific permits in the Antarctic entirely, or to impose an annual Southern Ocean limit.The package was hammered out in confidence by an International Whaling Commission drafting group of six nations, including Australia and Japan, at a meeting in Cambridge, England, last month. It was obtained by The Age yesterday.The International Fund for Animal Welfare said it appeared that Australia had become part of a dangerous drift towards commercial whaling in the 21st century."This is Whalergate," Patrick Ramage, global director of IFAW's whale program, said from the US yesterday."We have had growing concerns about the talks under way behind closed doors in the IWC. Those concerns are increased by the leaking of this secret plan."We would hope and expect Australia to take the lead in ending scientific whaling. What we're looking at here is not a creative and sustained effort to make Japan step away. It's a cobbling together of ingredients."A spokesman for Environment Minister Peter Garrett said Australia remained strongly opposed to commercial whaling in all its forms, including so-called scientific whaling."While Australia is actively participating in these deliberations, the process at this stage is one of discussion," the spokesman said."We do not expect that every view or option put forward, whether by other IWC members or by the IWC chair, will reflect the Australian Government's position."The IWC, under the chairmanship of Bush administration-appointee Bill Hogarth, has held a series of meetings over the past two years to try to repair the global schism over whaling.The Federal Government signed on to the Hogarth process as offering the best chance of ending Japanese Antarctic whaling through diplomacy. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said last week that Australia and other countries were directly engaging with Japan on the issue.Japan is continuing to warn that the IWC is so polarised there remains a high possibility of the process collapsing."This year is a moment of truth for the IWC," Joji Morishita, a counsellor with Japan's Fisheries Agency, said last week."This is almost a final try. If we fail, we will need a cooling-off period."But the six nations in IWC's drafting group — Australia, Japan, the United States, Sweden, Brazil, and New Zealand — seem to have gone much further down the track towards agreement than was thought.Mr Hogarth was to unveil this document at an inter-sessional meeting of the IWC in Rome in early March, ahead of a possible vote at the organisation's annual meeting in Madeira, Portugal, in June.It sketches out a five-year plan for the resolution of many contentious IWC issues. But at its heart is what the drafters said was a "direct link" between scientific whaling and Japanese coastal whaling."For example, if an option to phase out scientific whaling in the Southern Ocean was agreed, a larger quota could be assigned for coastal whaling provided that all annual quotas are consistent with the advice of the Scientific Committee," the document says.An "interim quota" of minke whales off the Japanese coast would last for five years, and be regulated tightly, including by genetic sampling to protect whales from the endangered "J" stock, which swims in the Sea of Japan.On scientific whaling, the first option provides for no kill of humpback or fin whales in the Southern Ocean, and a phase-out of scientific whaling for minkes, reducing by 20 per cent each year to zero after five years.The second option provides for an unspecified "sustainable" limit on minke and fin whales still hunted in the Antarctic, countered by whales taken in the Western North Pacific.At the same time, the documents claim that the IWC's global moratorium on commercial whaling "will remain in effect"."That seems to rank alongside 'there is no recession' and 'there are WMDs' as an Orwellian approach beyond belief," said IFAW's Patrick Ramage.Federal shadow environment minister Greg Hunt said it was a gross betrayal of the Australian public for Mr Garrett to be working secretly on a proposal to recommence Japanese commercial whaling."This is completely unacceptable," Mr Hunt said. "Australia's position must be: no way, no whaling, whatever."Speaking from the ship Steve Irwin, anti-whaling Sea Shepherd leader Paul Watson said his group would continue its zero-tolerance approach to whaling in the Southern Ocean."Japan has no right to kill whales in these waters and we considered their activities to be blatantly illegal and intolerable," he said.
Andrew Darby, Hobart
January 27, 2009
THE Federal Government has secretly helped to draw up a potential deal to break the whaling deadlock that would let Japan expand North Pacific kills in return for Antarctic cuts.- More whale kills for Antarctic cuts- Australia helps draw up secret deal- 'This is Whalergate,' says IFAW
Japanese whalers could hunt a regulated number of minke whales in their own coastal waters under the plan, as well as take many more whales in the high seas of the North Pacific.In exchange Japan would agree to one of two offers: either to phase out whaling under self-awarded scientific permits in the Antarctic entirely, or to impose an annual Southern Ocean limit.The package was hammered out in confidence by an International Whaling Commission drafting group of six nations, including Australia and Japan, at a meeting in Cambridge, England, last month. It was obtained by The Age yesterday.The International Fund for Animal Welfare said it appeared that Australia had become part of a dangerous drift towards commercial whaling in the 21st century."This is Whalergate," Patrick Ramage, global director of IFAW's whale program, said from the US yesterday."We have had growing concerns about the talks under way behind closed doors in the IWC. Those concerns are increased by the leaking of this secret plan."We would hope and expect Australia to take the lead in ending scientific whaling. What we're looking at here is not a creative and sustained effort to make Japan step away. It's a cobbling together of ingredients."A spokesman for Environment Minister Peter Garrett said Australia remained strongly opposed to commercial whaling in all its forms, including so-called scientific whaling."While Australia is actively participating in these deliberations, the process at this stage is one of discussion," the spokesman said."We do not expect that every view or option put forward, whether by other IWC members or by the IWC chair, will reflect the Australian Government's position."The IWC, under the chairmanship of Bush administration-appointee Bill Hogarth, has held a series of meetings over the past two years to try to repair the global schism over whaling.The Federal Government signed on to the Hogarth process as offering the best chance of ending Japanese Antarctic whaling through diplomacy. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said last week that Australia and other countries were directly engaging with Japan on the issue.Japan is continuing to warn that the IWC is so polarised there remains a high possibility of the process collapsing."This year is a moment of truth for the IWC," Joji Morishita, a counsellor with Japan's Fisheries Agency, said last week."This is almost a final try. If we fail, we will need a cooling-off period."But the six nations in IWC's drafting group — Australia, Japan, the United States, Sweden, Brazil, and New Zealand — seem to have gone much further down the track towards agreement than was thought.Mr Hogarth was to unveil this document at an inter-sessional meeting of the IWC in Rome in early March, ahead of a possible vote at the organisation's annual meeting in Madeira, Portugal, in June.It sketches out a five-year plan for the resolution of many contentious IWC issues. But at its heart is what the drafters said was a "direct link" between scientific whaling and Japanese coastal whaling."For example, if an option to phase out scientific whaling in the Southern Ocean was agreed, a larger quota could be assigned for coastal whaling provided that all annual quotas are consistent with the advice of the Scientific Committee," the document says.An "interim quota" of minke whales off the Japanese coast would last for five years, and be regulated tightly, including by genetic sampling to protect whales from the endangered "J" stock, which swims in the Sea of Japan.On scientific whaling, the first option provides for no kill of humpback or fin whales in the Southern Ocean, and a phase-out of scientific whaling for minkes, reducing by 20 per cent each year to zero after five years.The second option provides for an unspecified "sustainable" limit on minke and fin whales still hunted in the Antarctic, countered by whales taken in the Western North Pacific.At the same time, the documents claim that the IWC's global moratorium on commercial whaling "will remain in effect"."That seems to rank alongside 'there is no recession' and 'there are WMDs' as an Orwellian approach beyond belief," said IFAW's Patrick Ramage.Federal shadow environment minister Greg Hunt said it was a gross betrayal of the Australian public for Mr Garrett to be working secretly on a proposal to recommence Japanese commercial whaling."This is completely unacceptable," Mr Hunt said. "Australia's position must be: no way, no whaling, whatever."Speaking from the ship Steve Irwin, anti-whaling Sea Shepherd leader Paul Watson said his group would continue its zero-tolerance approach to whaling in the Southern Ocean."Japan has no right to kill whales in these waters and we considered their activities to be blatantly illegal and intolerable," he said.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
