Pot Rant 2011

Benjamin Bernier

Maine, USA

The Right to Breathe

 

One thing that the US government can not argue that it owns my lungs. Using this as a basis, it cannot reasonably own the receptors put in my lungs genetically to receive THC and cannabinoids. How can they create an argument with persuasiveness to tell me what I can and cannot inhale, especially if it causes no harm to anyone else?

As I see it, there is a massive moral difference between smoking pot in the infant ward of the hospital and with my other adult friends in my house on my couch watching my TV. One thing is public, and potentially harmful to developing bodies and minds, but the second of these two scenarios poses the question of how far can the government control what I do, and who gives them the right to say that it is wrong?

As recently witnessed in Denver, even when people work together toward a shared goal, and it passes as a legal law of the town or city, it is threatening to the government and they continue to uphold laws of a different citizenry and a completely different jurisdiction.

I am far from saying that universal legality is the correct answer, or even what I would ask for, but there must be a point where the government backs up and says “This is on you now.” As functioning adults we all take responsibility for our actions whether we want to or not, and whether we plan on it or not. My actions have consequences too; I spend more on junk food than the “average American” whoever that may really be (I have never met this person). Who I have met are adults, both young and old, who appreciate the therapeutic nature of this powerful herb. Too often classified with the opiates and the uppers the general public rightly calls pot a gateway drug. It isn’t so much that pot opens ones eyes to other drugs, because it doesn’t take away your ability to say “no,” but it rather makes us ask, “If marijuana is illegal and I cant morally see anything wrong with it, then what can be wrong with these other drugs that we are taught about in the same way?”

To change the common misconceptions about pot would also change the misconceptions about hard drugs, clear to anyone who has ever experimented they are vastly different worlds. Have you ever seen a functional crack-head? Probably not, but chances are that at least one boss you’ve had in your life was a functional stoner. Were they a terrible person, or could you not tell them apart from the other bosses you’ve had? Or was it simply that they handled stress more advanced and having the chance to alleviate those stresses makes them a kinder, more reasonable boss in touch with themselves and with the people who make up the worlds around them.

I believe that people hold themselves back, and drug use whether over the counter, prescription, therapeutic or dangerous drugs are an easy scapegoat for the mistakes that we make in our lives. No one expects perfection out of other people, including themselves, but if not dangerous and not rubbed in faces, why can’t pot use be looked at as a habit no less offensive than biting ones nails? There are times to bite your nails and there are certainly times when it is not appropriate: I wouldn’t bite my nails the first time I meet a girls parents or during a presentation.

It’s about the right to decide what’s good for me. It’s about the right to be an independent person, and mostly it’s about the right to make mistakes and be our own judge.

Smoking pot is a right that no one can ever take away from me. Simply because the law does not protect people who share this view does not make us wrong. We are a powerful and thoughtful part of society, with a large obligation to ourselves and to others to preserve these rights. It is the responsibility of the people to correct an unjust society, to smooth it’s edges, to refine it’s views.

This is why I smile when I ask you, “How will you improve your own life?” Because I know that prohibition will not stand.

poem 5/9/2014

where has the spark in me gone
somewhere
inside the calm
churning and turning
and carrying on

lost in my head, lust in my heart
somewhere
two worlds drift apart
blossoms and bosoms
the beginnings of art

can you find in you a brightness
somewhere
between the tightness
released and at peace
feeling a lightness

and the trickle of water sounds
somewhere
love abounds
with curves and smooth words
in sky, and on ground

but all is not lost
here
whats the cost
passion or poison
or souls on a cross

What Does Open Source Mean to Our World Community?

Open source is more than software. It’s more than a license choice. It’s more than one person or company or entity or idea, but rather it is the collection of ideas and concepts, whether sounds, feelings, images or words, that encourage shared knowledge, shared contribution, shared benefit.

If two minds are better than one, than 7 billion minds are better than any other combination possible.

Embracing open source as an ideology means to embrace community, to give and to receive, to yield the power of the collective conscious and collective unconscious of every individual, together, at once. At the core of the open source ideal is the idea that information should be free, and that by having information we all are empowered. In a time where curiosity and creativity are handcuffed by the Digital Millennium Copyrights Act (DMCA) and it’s not even legal to take apart your coffee machine to see whats inside, I find it refreshing and rewarding to participate in something bigger than myself where information can be shared and is encouraged to be shared across borders and languages and political affiliations.

A common misconception about open source is that money cannot be made by using open concepts as the foundation for business; but I disagree. Open source 3D printing has evolved rapidly and becomes more affordable every day by not having a licensed or proprietary overhead (thank you RepRap and the other pioneers). Microcontroller layouts and circuit board designs also have harnessed the same benefits through projects like Arduino, resulting in a 90% cost reduction versus traditional, closed controllers. Open source programming languages like PHP grow more rapidly with increasingly increasing stability versus their closed source competitors. Blog management software from WordPress took the web by storm, easily becoming the most dominant, versatile content management system in just a matter of five years, accomplishing a task the giant corporations could not have. In the days of for-profit open source, the code is no longer the product and the consumer wins by having options as to who and how their systems get serviced. It’s hard to talk about open source and not mention Linux, and through Linux our small company has tools that compete with the big boys for which I am grateful, but the prime example of for-profit, open source success is Red Hat, who broke the billion dollar mark in recent history, not through direct sales of software, but through enhancements, support, consulting and system design among many other streams of income.

At this day and age, where vendor lock is a scary yet real problem, one of the few ways to avoid it to to implement systems that can be managed by any number of worldwide experts. Open source offers a real solution here through competitive technologies, stable platforms, opportunities to re-invent, improve, enhance around the individuals and back upstream around the world.

Is the strength based in the thousands of minds focused on solving one problem?

Is the advantage of open source the ease of access to the product? Or to the documentation? Or to a competent community, willing to help each other tackle the impossible?

I don’t know what the most exciting and promising part of open source is for you, but I know that my reasons are ever changing and evolving, liquid to the problems we face, morphing to our needs, and benefiting our customers for each of their unique applications and needs.

So people of the world, as you open your code and open your patents, I hope you too find peace in the reward of your opening hearts and minds. And as you go into your lives and you are faced with challenges, remember that you have a community, maybe I’d even say a family, ready to help you, ready to empower you to help yourselves, ready to say no to the status quo and demand the excellence we all deserve, together, moving forward through time and space as all of our individual challenges and goals somehow unite into a destination of fascination, connectedness, trust and monetary savings.

The Grouch – Some People

I used to have love and now I can’t stand this fool
This couldn’t have happened even if I planned it to
Friends for life on a spectrum so wide
Nobody works perfect believe me, I tried
But when two worlds collide you gotta give somethin’
Take a step back and learn to live humble
You know pride, it’ll eat you up inside
And all that self-pity will turn your whole world shitty
I’m on old girl’s titty tryin’ to hang on, dearly
Live days sincerely and see both sides clearly
There’s no room to build enemy ships
Especially out of old friends, when’ll we quit?
Went from penalty kicks to it don’t mean shit
Ridiculousness actin’ like bitches at this age
Being. Turn the page pout quit actin’ like a child
Are are you wild up and ready to be petty? that’s a heart breaker
Well i’ll be the charge taker and make sure it don’t happen in the future
Extend my hand while you cryin’ like a rooster
Damn, dig up the root and be a man

Some people get better with time
And some people have a hard time (yeah)
Some people, they age like wine
And other people, they can’t find themselves, man
Some people get better with time
And some people have a hard time (y’know?)
Some people, they age like wine
And other people, they can’t find themselves
You gotta move on, move on, move on, move on
Move on, move on, move on, move on
Man move on, move on, move on, move on
Woman move on, move on, move on

With every stroke of the clock it’s more precious
Who could fully understand the growth of a child
More or less this innocence exposed free form
No mold, to experience livin’ in possibilities
I hold, visions in my head I wanna spread to these children
Before they get sidetracked, what sport are you wieldin’?
And im not talkin’ about shieldin’
What’s in the glass? or comin’ half ass?
Me I don’t really want the last laugh
Just to be lapped and on my last leg
Because somebody else is passin’ up the mark that I made
Turnin’ dark to light or bark to bite
Blindfolded client and all without a fight
Im all about in the night tryin to kick down the demons
With my big sound screamin like he-man
Fuck the power of grace go to my skull is great
Everyday all day I’m a never fall prey

Some people get better with time
And some people have a hard time (yeah)
Some people, they age like wine
And other people, they can’t find themselves, man
Some people get better with time
And some people have a hard time (y’know?)
Some people, they age like wine
And other people, they can’t find themselves
You gotta move on, move on, move on, move on
Move on, move on, move on, move on
Man move on, move on, move on, move on
Woman move on, move on, move on

Your body is a tool, mind is too
Shape them well, feed them the finest food
If knowledge is power then most of us are bustlers
It’s easy to be that you’ve got to tussle with the fact
Bring yourself back to the essence
Make your presence felt when you’re there and you’re stressin’ your points
Put oil on your joints kill the t.v
Deal with people face to face
If you don’t believe me join the race
Flow some oxygen through the brain
Remember that you learned and apply it so you gain
Drop dame on a lame and later he’ll be walkin
Chalk it up is just choppin on frozen options
Never frozen cause we are the chosen
Bout to set it in motion and keep coastin
Keep coastin, keep coastin, keep coastin

Some people get better with time
And some people have a hard time (yeah)
Some people, they age like wine
And other people, they can’t find themselves, man
Some people get better with time
And some people have a hard time (y’know?)
Some people, they age like wine
And other people, they can’t find themselves
You gotta move on, move on, move on, move on
Move on, move on, move on, move on
Man move on, move on, move on, move on
Woman move on, move on, move on

 

Mystik Journeymen – SWEAT (Feat. Murs & The Grouch) – Lyrics by brb

this song always helps me think about whats important. i couldn’t find the lyrics anywhere, so this is what i was able to come up with. if anyone has any corrections please let me know.

 

 

{sunspot jonz}
you got to sweat it out let it out
move it out do it out
break it out let it out
do it slow
whatchu know?
whatchu sho
on the m-i n to the d
you ain’t fucking with me
like my ex girlfriend
express psychologies with whom degrees are bunk(?)
keys to the underground krunk(?)
where we rock it down rough
rock it down rough rough
rock it down rough rough
rock it down
open to L.A.
i ? on the under california sun rays
holidays on written static(?)
play ink run and raise the world
think
if you feel the drama
think
if you love yourself
think
if you wanna make a difference
make a different outlook
if you wanna be a crook steal the days that it took
to get the family where they at
hit the hails, tip the scales, shift the handrails
to round up you’re a tell
5’2″ is too short
every time i’m on a plane
i think like i’m not going to make
but i can’t let fear break me
and take my pride
did no lie til the day i day
it’s a family affair like sly

{luckyiam}
since the mercury rose
the crowds explode
below the heat rose to the door in force
Brainstorms rainstorm
figure out the riddle
i’ve proven good clothes
and choose they staff the piddle
they fiddle with the monitor
i monitor the baby worso(?)
partake in endo with other
if you wonder a window i do begin in
and i win in a 5 percent an i’m bending my will power
pretending living and giving my all
attractive women they getting to get with legends
effortless effortless
isn’t how it should be
come on people could we
have little moment of your precious time
sweat it out earth and in the afterlife

{the grouch}
i’ma let these toxins out
because there ain’t no way i can get high
off of hotboxing doubt
fear and negativity
living inside me is an art
i don’t gotta kick start
like a water drip mark
i make imprints in time
indents on your mind with the simplest of rhyme
i’m digging a ditch to bury treasure in
measuring up over my last and resolve to self pleasurin
whose up for betterin the planet with a slick-out
look-on situation so familiar you’re like damm it i feel ya
sweat drips down my brow
i’m accomplished now
i’m not swamped it’s a challenge to make it happen
you need a balance to feel my rapping
killer adapting skill never fiat?
prefer the feeling of space
i’m still in a place of living for the love
giving what i got
and sweating up above

{murs}
it’s like yes sir
murs’ freshest red single
with the mic spread eagle
so you know I have to bless her
money shot
luckyiam
to be standin with the grouch on a track made by sunspot
making magic, wreaking havoc on the live stage
hooked with e an a at 18 was my age
3 years away from legal
3 years away from evil
raise the ignorance level
and i might have to see you
but i think not
you let your mind drip
i think straight shots
more valuable than gold
cuervo i downed it
with my family surrounded
don’t feel i’m being punished
just because i’m underground
in five years i’ve restricted my tears
and afflictions like fear was my addiction
staying clear of the friction
don’t need no static
cuz when you fall off and lose it
we still gonna have it

 

list running processes in linux

i have always used

# ps awx

for listing system process information. but recently i wanted to list more specific memory and processor details in snapshot mode of the entire system. the command # top is great for monitoring a live system, but if you want to be able to store snapshots of processes for logging, # ps is the command to start from. i was led to the -u switch and have been using the following version:

# ps aux
USER       PID %CPU %MEM    VSZ   RSS TTY      STAT START   TIME COMMAND