Today I am ending this blog. Ever since the blog, ever since the facebook, ever since the myspace, the avatar, the internet second life, I have talked - really talked - to fewer human beings. I am following the progress of people I know/knew through internet updates, and others follow me through mine. We are creeping around each other; it isn't just voyeurism, it leans towards espionage. I'm starting to get that feeling that the panopticon/big brother put forth by our philosophers, prophets and sci-fi writers is turning out to be the people themselves and not any mechanisms of power that control them.

When I used to get in touch with people I called it communication, now I call it a press release. Ugly. So I intend to end this web presence in hope that it inspires mutual asking of "what's up".

I kept a blog for three years now, which is well beyond their usual life expectancy. But I've never been a fan of choosing broadcast over personal interaction. I need to remind myself of myself.
Touch takes time.

Today I am here on earth, a teresstronaut setting the orbiting parameters for my own Personal Space Program.

Today I am going to cheat death by dying while I'm still alive. Right now. I am dead. Ric is dead. R.i.p. R.i.c. Don't worry, I will still be around, if you need me just send me an email or whatever. I will haunt the rest of my own "life", but I will not, cannot die twice. Especially nowadays. If my body eventually dies off (remember the old testament definition of death, "a person is not dead until the head is no longer part of the body, whether from being removed or by rotting off"), I will merely consider it as a type of agnostic resurrection. Reborn directly into the abyss.

Ah, this feels good already. I feel my fear of death diminishing with every second that I'm dead. It would be illogical to fear what has already passed.

Only when we are dead will we know what it is like to truly be alive.

Today I heard a man howl for his leg. I wondered what was under the biohazard ash. Then I went back for Nachos Grande.

Today I'm suddenly aware that I have not spoken much with "old friends" lately. I have not spoken with many new ones either. I am only speaking to strangers nowadays. This is the path of least resistance.

Today things are completely different. Yet there is still the same chain of events: action, circumstance, outcome... no matter the variables, things tend to run themselves at some point.

Today there are big things and small. Tuna Jazzarole: small. P-l-o-t: litter bigger. I googled myself and actually whispered, "what do they want from me?": getting bigger. I am an artistic director of a place: a big new thing.