On Mon, 19 May 2003 19:06:22 +1000, David Strike
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:

A long post even by Strike-standard, and it has a SCUBA related subject,
both of which chummed daNewFeeesh out for a short "harro", and a long
Sermon, having just returned from Hell (GCM)

A quickie trip report <G>:  12th trip on the CA; skipped Stingray City
for the first time in favor of a nap;  only one air-dive (the first)
hence no dive deeper than 173 fsw;  saw a skinny bullshark, at 25 fsw
and 25 ft away  :-)   -- most divers who claimed to have seen a bullshark
are only bullSHITTING because they couldn't tell a "bull" from a
healthy "Caribbean Reef" and that's the bullSHIT what the shark-feeding
outfits in the Bahamas do -- 99 times out of a 100, a shark claimed
as "bull" is nothing but a Caribbean Reef.  Nah, no time to lecture on
bullshark ID.

But the one I saw was BULL and no-bull only cuz Capt Tom (CA-IV) said
that was the first he (had been Captain of the CA-IV for several years)
had seen in the Cayman Is.  He convinced me it was a REAL bull only
after a very careful review/scrutiny/slow-mo replay of the close-up
video of the various features of that beast at various angles, and
carefully sizing all the locations and relative locations of its fins.



My-my.  Scuba-SE is looking more and more like rec.scuba!  So much so
that I must freely admit I SKIPPED at least 95% of the posts (I skip
about 99% of those in rec.scuba now), even those in this thread. :)



But Strike's chum was too irresistable not to chomp!

> - most of us fall into one of two categories: either wage slaves
> driven by consumerism; or the severely impoverished and disadvantaged
> who want nothing more than to be'wage slaves'! :-)

Even the resident Bullshitter recognized THAT to be bollocks!  :-)


Now it's Strike's turn to do his (uncharacteristic, but apparently
newly acquired) skill of Mouth Dancing.  :-))

>Mate!  The wealthy are - in the main - as much 'slaves' to their wealth
>as the rest of us.

Pardonez moi -- Bullschitt!

1.  Wealth and wealthy are undefined, nebulous, relative, and most
    importantly, meaningless terms -- which of course fit the
    prerequisites for bullshitting.  :-)

2.  One of the Hunt brothers who was ALMOST wealthy by cornering
    the silver market and drove the price of silver to $50 an oz,
    said it best, "it you know how much you're worth, you're not
    rich (wealthy)" -- hence, none of the Fortune Top 500 folks
    like Bill Gates are wealthy.  Only Donald Trump knows the
    thin line between 'wealth' and 'a bankrupt pauper'.

3.  As one of our esteemed, and long moribund, senator had uttered
    this immortal quote in Congress, "A billion here, and a billion
    there, and soon we'll be talking about real money."

Remember:  NOBODY is wealthy (monetarily speaking).  The truly wealthy
individuals are those endowed (not by monetary inheritance, as born
with a silverspoon in the mouth), but endowed with Sagans (billions
and billions = 1 Sagan) of brain cells, honed by years and years of
EDUCATION and HARD W*RK ("a genius is 99% perspiration" -- ask Mozart
and Paganini about it.  :-)  to attain the kharma of self-sufficiency
and independence of thought, to be able to sniff out bullshit even if
it's only one part in a Sagan (as sharks can sniff out blood) to
achieve a respectable level of iconoclasticity and anarchism, not to
mention antidisestablishmentarianism!  :-))


>Indeed, if they take their wealth and accompanying
>responsibilites seriously enough, they're less 'free' than those of
>us with too little of the stuff!

Bollocking Bullshit.  :-))  They are more 'free' to think for
themselves, examing all 'adage' and 'sayings' with a critical eye as
they would pieces of myths and bullshits that are EVERYWHERE, UW and
above.  :-)))


>There's that lovely old saying, "Money can't buy happiness - it just
>ensures that you can afford to do more while being miserable!"   I
>wouldn't mind being given the opportunity to compare! :-)))

Bah Humburger!  You too, Mika.  :-)  This is how the saying SHOULD
have been -- choose any or ALL parts:

MONEY CAN'T BUY HAPPINESS (the "H" word), but

(a) it can buy anything and everything that can be construed as "H".

(b) given all other things being equal (which is a myth itself <G>),
    money will get you as close to "H" as Zeno gets to his "H" by
    going half the distance at each step but never gets thar.

(c) It can buy you the Presidency (if you have ENOUGH money, you can
    even chance the rules <G>); a QBE, MBE, and other shit for Andy's
    pals; and can even buy your own Kingdom and declare yourself King!

(d) it WILL buy you so many "friends" and so much "love" that you'll
    have to be a true 'genius' to be able to tell whether it's because
    of your natural intelligence, or magnetic, irresistible, exquisite
    charm or personality, or just your money.  Anna Nicole Smith, or
    Liz Taylor, or Monica will make a good team to lecture on this.

(e) it WILL also buy you ________, ________, ... ad infinitum.


>> >Regrettably there's no simple solution.

There's hope for you Strike, afterall, to break away even if momentarily,
from false adages, sayings, cliches, alphabet-soups, and other flavors
of bollocks, to something that points to "VERITAS".


Strike concluded his treatise with more false 'sayings' <BWG>

>... and the fact that,(probably misquoted 'cause I can't be bothered
>to look it up<bwg>) "no man is an island entire of itself ....  send
>not to know for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee."
>
>Strike

Try this:

You not only can be an island, but you can be an entire archipelago,
or a colony of archipelagos.  You can also buy up all the bells you
want, and toll them for whomever, whenever and wherever you want!  :-)))

Just make sure none of those 'Bells' are the defective kind with a
semi-famous jean-label (not quite as famous as Calvin Klein, Jordache,
Blass, and the like), but one of the world's most UNWEALTHY souls,
of the OZtrich kind who seem to have a fixation and affinity for
calling others "assholes" while sanctimoneously mouth-dancing against
"name calling".    :-)))))


Sorry I am a day late in delivering this Sunday Sermon.

DaNewFeeesh.

P.S.  I purchased (with money) one of the (HOT HOT HOT) CD collections
of "The Barefoot Man", while in Hell (I swear it's true), which included
the REASONS I bought it -- the song titles which intriged me more than
the reggie rhytum and musik -- the "Ballad of Jimmy Swaggard", and
"I wish I was your bicycle seat" (you'll get true Happiness by listening
to this while fantasizing over your favorite idols of the opposite sex
(okay, the same sex for some).  Now I have to listen more carefully to
the lytics of "MONEY, MONEY, MONEY".