It has happened once again. Daylight Saving Time has taken effect, and we have now switched back to “standard” time. It seems ironic to me that we now spend less of the year in so-called “standard” time. The idea has long passed its use, and its recent alterations have only made an already confusing matter even more confusing. Abolish Daylight Saving Time! Pick a time and stick with it. As things pick up politically and proper candidates emerge, I will do what I can to help end this nonsense. You can too!

We just had Halloween with its usual weird vibe, now we have the off-kilter feel of everyone adjusting to going back to Eastern Non-Standard Time, and shortly we will have the Full Moon Freakout! Things got weird in a hurry.

Every Full Moon has its own adventures, and seems to follow a similar pattern. Skeptics will say that the full moon doesn’t feel any different, or cause people to behave differently, but many would beg to differ. I would argue that if one becomes aware of it, and if one does something to commemorate the cycle (listening to the Dark Side of the Moon while taking a salt bath, for example) then they will notice the effects much more. It seems repeatable, and thus subject to the same laws and methods as any other repeatable phenomena. It starts out feeling pretty normal, gradually escalates, then things start feeling really weird at about the halfway point, and by the end you feel ready for it to end. This full moon proved no exception, and I thought I’d just document a few of the little things I wanted to write down in one post.

The weirdness started after I took an awesome salt bath, which I love to do on full moons because a salt bath helps the body detoxify, which apparently happens during full moons. I slept for a few hours, and woke up very early (or late depending on your point of view.) I learned that Asus had just released the successor to my Netbook literally the day before I ordered mine. I felt kind of upset, and for about ten minutes, considered returning mine for the newer model. I decided not to, however, because it didn’t differ too much – 6.4 ounces lighter, an extra hour of battery life, and a new case design didn’t seem worth the hassle.

That prompted a rousing discussion about Microsoft versus Linux on a Netbook. I will not rehash the whole debate, as many have already become familiar with the various arguments. Blind people may know Windows, but having something forced on them by a monolith does not make it the best. As for the argument that the manufacturers design the Netbook for Windows, I would just say that without people with the hacker spirit, wanting to do things with their machines beyond their design, we wouldn’t have Netbooks in the first place!

After I simmered down from that, I read a rather disconcerting and poignant email from my friend Chuck Young. You can find him on the blog roll, though I doubt he will publish the article he sent me! By this time it had gotten onto about eight o’clock in the morning, and I need to take a power nap, prepare a shopping list, and meditate.

As well as declaring this the Summer of the Netbook, I also declared it the Summer of Zazen. They don’t call the hara the Golden Stone for nothing!

After recharging and getting my shopping order, it had gotten on to around three o’clock, or noon Pacific time. Ordinarily this wouldn’t matter, but today something extraordinary happened, at least in the eyes of many: Michael Jackson’s Memorial. Oh no! I feel awful blogging about this. I only watched small amounts, as I couldn’t stand hearing people going on and on about Jesus. Viewing it reminded me of viewing Twitter in the past week: lots of #moonfruits! Ha, I saved that joke for now! Things felt kind of creepy, and a kid cried. I tried to enter the mind of a Michael Jackson fan, and feel some remorse. It worked for around two minutes. I still don’t know what the scene looked like, but I heard they had a solid gold casket on stage. I kind of hoped that something cool would happen, like they would lower it down on air, or that the lid would creak open and Michael Jackson’s ghostly countenance would emerge. Alas, nothing of the kind happened, but as with the initial event of his death, I could feel the collective pull. Every channel showed it, and within minutes of it ending they had sound bytes and collages. Programs continue to run as I write this. It also sort of weirded me out that it happened under a full moon. Did they know?

As I sit here outside typing on my lovely netbook, I realize how much I love blogging under the night sky with a full moon, the cool feel of the summer air mingles with the sounds of a suburban town, and the astral light of the full moon permiates my spirit and this entry. I can sense it with my third eye. I only ever saw moonlight once in my life, when a September full moon reflected off the ocean. It looked like a glittering mirror.

Check out our special Full Moon Freakout episode of Behind the Curtain! It features a bunch of Frank Zappa, and a demonstration of predictive programming.