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A: Yes, this ring is closed, but you can still join it. Just go to my homelist, tell me that you'd like to join this ring, and tell me what the url is for your site. When I have time, I'll take a look at it, mull the decision over, and if I like what I see, I'll open up the ring for you and invite you to join. This is a more practical approach for a few reasons. This is a rather esoteric interest, so applications will be coming in infrequently, if at all. (I'm hoping that some will come in). Checking daily for applications that, if I'm lucky, will be coming in yearly, would just be aggravating, as would be waiting forever for me to get around to logging in and acting on your application. This approach minimizes frustration for both of us, and since I am vetting for quality, I can't really make this as a snap decision, anyway. What is good, in a creative work, is what grows on the reader, and some fixed brief time frame doesn't allow one to make that judgement; I'll be reading your entire site before approving it, and that takes time.
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A: Ah, grasshopper, wisdom is not to be found in the answer, but in its pursuit. You should not, therefore, seek my meaning, but the meaning for this phrase which is to be found within you.
OK, actually the title doesn't mean anything, but doesn't it sound like it should? I jotted down the first meaningless thing that popped into my head as I looked at a list of rings, the name of one of which started with the word "about", coincidentally enough, and the meaninglessness is part of the joke. What I'm mocking is Postmodernism, its rejection of meaning, and the foolish embrace of the arbitrary implied by this. If there are no meanings, then why not just jot down any random bit of gibberish that pops into one's head? The very fact that almost everybody will be left going "huh?" at this point makes my point: that Postmodernism isn't a serious philosophy, however fashionable paying lip service to it may be at the time of this writing. It is so much timewasting posturing, an argument best replied to with silence, because in the absence of real controversy, no other response is warranted.
It is amazing to me how such a vacuous failure to philosophize can be taken so seriously as a philosophy, that so many have so much trouble seeing out of the conceptual box it leaves them in. Believe it or not, My Postmodern Art Gallery, the first site I put on this ring, when it was first show to people was reacted to as if it were a serious online exhibition. "Are the images just fading out, symbolising the transitoriness of nature" somebody asked, about something that should clearly be taken as mockery. The person writing this seemed like a nice enough guy, so I couldn't feel good about laughing at him, but privately I was certainly rolling my eyes. I just couldn't help it.
That's what this ring is about - those moments in which somebody who claims to be a philosopher (and in some cases, perhaps claims this with some measure of justification) gets so carried away with himself that your eyes can not help but roll. Share with us your moment of unreality by taking those ideas and pushing them to their absurd logical conclusion. You know you want to, and now there's a ring for you to do so on.
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A: Not sure of how many devil worshipping Moslems there are out there, but, um, no, not really.
While it is true that culturally speaking, I'm almost always on a "Middle Eastern kick", as somebody once put it, I'm hardly scheming to put explosives under anybody's bed, and as for the 666 being an affirmation of devil worship, not really. One of the points that I've tried to drive home, in this cluster of sites that I've set up, is the way in which arguing in favor of simple common sense and common decency can result in one being demonized, making one into the devil in somebody's local mythology. One can get angry about such things, and certainly on a few occasions I have, but when it is possible, laughing about the absurdity of the situation is a lot more fun that screaming about it. Oh, and in case anybody was wondering, yes, as simple a thing as preparing a simple tagine has been enough for me to encounter some of the kind of cultural paranoia I'm mocking here. Yes, you'll be seeing some Middle Eastern recipes on one of the sister sites for this page, and I can already anticipate some of the response, but as I've pointed out elsewhere, giving up some of one's freedom just to make peace with the crazies is a futile gesture. Somebody who is looking for an excuse for a fight will always find one.About all that you can do is shrug and move on.
The site that this page is part of is, for the most part, a rather innocuous place called "Joseph Dunphy's Cowboy Wannabee Site", a semi-sarcastically named site for Southwestern photography, travel and cookery, perpetually under construction. At the time of this writing (Dec.8, 2005), I have a partially completed account of a trip I took to Northern New Mexico in place, and little else. The photos are up, but the text discussing the geology and culture of some of the places visited is still being written, as are some of the recipes. More to come, as the bitter Chicago winter has now descended, and staying indoors to work on such things will not seem to be such a great loss. Watching the Lake freeze might allow one to enjoy some beautiful imagery, but when we drop below -10 and the winds start kicking over 30 mph, it won't be imagery that many would like to casually linger over, even from inside a parka. Time to get working.
I hope that answers all questions. Have fun.
