Chiron awarded contract by U.S. Be afraid, very afraid

Just when I thought my fear of needles couldn’t get any worse. I read in San Jose Mercury News, the drug maker Chiron has won a $62.5 million contract from the United States to make Bird Flu vaccine. When I was reading the story the company who won the contract sounded familiar. I was right, it turns out that Chiron was the same company who last year had to dispose of unnumbered doses of flu vaccine. This is the same company who’s Liverpool plant was in such disarray had their license suspended by the British government as well as having the FDA pull their approval.

Now after a fit of panic from drug companies who say bird flu will turn into a pandemic and all the news shows make nice graphics showing how freaking crazy this virus is, the federal government has said all is well at Chiron and is free to make vaccine for the American public. Well hey cousin; that’s insane. I for one will be keeping my sleeves rolled down tight this year.

Mercury News Item

robertsilvey.com

Mars on the horizon as Libby is indicted

As Mars nears the earth again this year, some 60,000,000 miles closer; a fact that NASA said last year would be one of the most spectacular scenes in sixty odd thousand years. And now it’s coming back? Thanks NAS-HOLES I wasted the end of my last summer.

But it’s ok because Libby getting sent in head first. It’s not Rove but hey if there ever was a name for a squalor, it’s Scooter Libby. Anyone with a name like that must be used to breaking under pressure. Oh Dear God, I know I have not been the best servant but in the name of Pat Robertson please grant me this wish; you son Karl has been able to work in this town too long uninhibited, without any legal repercussions; I think he thinks he’s you.

How Karl Rove wasn’t indicted is an act of God by it’s self. Rove seems evermore like a lawyer with a grudge

1000 Bars in one year, Can he make it?

I saw this guy on G4/techtv a few months ago. He's on number 894, great bar guide and well worth the read.

1000 Bars

Prison Number What?

It’s four AM in Iowa and I’m no closer to understanding the Valery Plame case then I was this afternoon. There’s talk in all directions, threats of indictment from every angle. This are messed up royal, I need not be surprised. When you live with beasts you get there byproduct. Libby, Rove and Chaney; all name’s which already look great in a children’s history book about government and it’s scandals within it. They also look great following a prison number; just for the names alone.

A Supermarket Revisited

It was a simple list; two loafs of bead.
Simple enough for a mere child with five dollar in his or her pocket.
Yet I gawk at the supermodel in isle four.
She’s touching the bread and I peek from behind the cap gun display.
Children attacking each other with foodstuff.
All I want it bread.
God help me.

More Isle’s full of concerned citizens negotiating local politics.
National politics is dealt with only in the food court.
Cleanup in some isle I never heard of, an isle I’ll probable never see.
The woman on the speaker is lying, I never heard of isle seventeen.
All I want is two loafs of bread.
God help us.

It’s Official

I’ve finally done it. Today I bought my own domain name. Now when you type TheEmptyChamber.com you come to this little darling of a Blog. I did this for two reasons, making it easy to find the Blog and secondly, bragging rights.

You’re a nobody in this world unless you have your own domain name. No more fear of reprisals from unknown people on the street wanting to abuse and unfairly mock me. I’m a somebody now.
I know it’s not the league of nations Nuclear Club, but hey Damn-it I have a URL and Damn-it I’m proud.

Another blog to note

Let yourself Live

Just like everyone else

What the hell am I thinking? Do I want to be one of those consumers that fits into one of those plastic slots?
I hate logo t-shirts and I never voted on American Idol. But now that I’m thinking of starting my own Podcast does that not put me into the rest of America's baby bird open mouth consumers? Still the whole idea intrigues me. I have always had something to say and I remember when I was ten I tied a bale of wire around the house to try and make a AM radio station. All it did was make my ass red for a week.

But if I do decide to jump into the world of Podcasting I think I would have to call it something else. Thought-streaming, will-this-make-me-money-one-day-cast. It’s like public transportation, you can sit there by yourself but one day your going to get missed with.

Even more dead poets

Oh forgive me my sins of using other peoples scratch, but I just can help it. Its too good. Here’s another one. If the only thing you get from it is peaceful reverence then its all worth it

A Supermarket in California By, Allen Ginsberg
What thoughts I have of you tonight, Walt Whitman, for
I walked down the sidestreets under the trees with a headache
self-conscious looking at the full moon.
In my hungry fatigue, and shopping for images, I went
into the neon fruit supermarket, dreaming of your enumerations!
What peaches and what penumbras! Whole families
shopping at night! Aisles full of husbands! Wives in the
avocados, babies in the tomatoes!--and you, Garcia Lorca, what
were you doing down by the watermelons?

I saw you, Walt Whitman, childless, lonely old grubber,
poking among the meats in the refrigerator and eyeing the grocery
boys.
I heard you asking questions of each: Who killed the
pork chops? What price bananas? Are you my Angel?
I wandered in and out of the brilliant stacks of cans
following you, and followed in my imagination by the store
detective.
We strode down the open corridors together in our
solitary fancy tasting artichokes, possessing every frozen
delicacy, and never passing the cashier.

Where are we going, Walt Whitman? The doors close in
an hour. Which way does your beard point tonight?
(I touch your book and dream of our odyssey in the
supermarket and feel absurd.)
Will we walk all night through solitary streets? The
trees add shade to shade, lights out in the houses, we'll both be
lonely.

Will we stroll dreaming of the lost America of love
past blue automobiles in driveways, home to our silent cottage?
Ah, dear father, graybeard, lonely old courage-teacher,
what America did you have when Charon quit poling his ferry and
you got out on a smoking bank and stood watching the boat
disappear on the black waters of Lethe?

-Allen Ginsberg