Back from Starwood 2001

From: "Rev. Ivan Stang" <stang@subgenius.com>
Newsgroups: alt.slack,alt.binaries.slack
Date: Mon, Jul 23, 2001 1:31 PM

STARWOOD DEEPLY IMPURIFIED BY SKANKY CULT INFILTRATION!!

As the SubGenius "Jane Goodall among the Pagans," I have been accepted
almost as one of them, and have been able to photograph them in their
natural habitats. Last week at Starwood, I broke a barrier in
anthropology that some may find perverted. Rather than merely living
among the Pagans and videotaping them, I participated in their most
sacred ritual, the Lighting of the Sacred Giant Bonfire.

You would not BELIEVE how they stretch this ritual out. Friends, my
arms are still tired from holding that huge home made torch while they
mumbled their mumbo jumbo over it and the other 7 Holy Torches. These
Torches actually had names, like Love (which was mine!), Prosperity,
Peace (which was Wei's), etc. etc. I even had to learn the Sacred Dance
Steps. Luckily all this sacrednes is a complete hodge podge of
disparate religions -- Feminized Lakota mixed with New Age-ified Cabala
mixed with recently Invented Wicca, even Voodoo thrown in lately, now
that everything's all "world beat." So basically it's unholy enough
that I can stomach it.

Starwood was originally meant by its founders to be a NON religious
festival, but the Pagans outnumbered the teknos back then, in Northern
Ohio, and now Starwood is a freakish mish mash of fringe beliefs.

Anyway, I got to be one of the 8 Honored Torch Bearers who lead the
parade and light the big fire. (Actually there are charges set inside
the huge stack of wood, ignited by remote control -- nowadays the
"lighting by torch" is just theatrics.) I did this while wearing my
usual uniform of baggy pants, sneakers, a Dobbshead t-shirt, a Satanic
grin and a beat up jacket. It was FUN -- AS IF STOKING THE VERY
FURNACES OF HELL!

I also got to frogwatch a Church of All Worlds "Water Sharing" ceremony
in the pool, which was DENSELY PACKED with obese hippies. The water had
become a dingy brown in color. I stayed out of that pool, my friends,
for all the rest of the festival.

Why did God have to make so many directions? Four!! I am SO tired of
people having to worship each god damn direction of the compass before
they do ANYTHING in Pagan land.

Victoria Ganger and Revelry, the singing trio that Princess Wei is part
of, was missing a member, so the Queen Mom herself, the Mom of Princess
Wei, filled in. The Queen Mom also attended our devival with ESO in the
Pufferdome.

Because I knew my mother in law was in the audience, I tried not to say
"fuck" as much as usual while I was preaching. This is a problem that
preachers in most other religions don't ever have to face. Not that
Queen Mom couldn't HANDLE it; it's just that I can't SAY it in front of
a mother in law.

Einstein's Secret Orchestra delivered possibly THE most spirit-filled
performance of their career, playing for THREE HOURS including their
new rendition of the Doors classic, "The End," and their head banging
"Bang a Gong."

The Pufferdome was a new inflatable dome this year, much bigger than
last year's, and we projected the "Psychedelic Dobbshead Collage Video
for Raves" on the walls of it -- many people sat outside the dome,
listening and watching from that side (the image is visible both inside
and outside). We had an excellent turnout considering that it was at
midnight, and competing with a fireworks/laser show and Phylis Curott's
Wiccan Labyrinth Maze of Lights.

Unfortunately, I don't think there is a good recording of this concert
and devival. ESO did their regular set, but Lonesome Cowboy Dave also
did a lot of Dave-like ranting, and my sermon was all unscripted and
brand new, inspired by a tortoise in a wading pool.

A Pagan camping near Tranquility base had a kind of petting zoo that
included a big African tortoise of some kind. That tortoise patiently,
ceaselessly circled the perimeter of the dry plastic wading pool that
formed his universe throughout the entire festival, looking for a way
out. Chas noted that it was a metaphor for Life. Are we not all like
that tortoise? The best we can hope for is that a bad 12 year old boy
will come along as STEAL us, torture us a little and then let us go in
the woods... thence we'll crawl up onto the highway and get run over.
Yes friends, WE are that tortoise -- but "BOB" is that MEAN 12 YEAR OLD
BOY! That was the sermon in a nutshell. We stretched it out some. I
think I also did that routine about "THROWING AWAY MY COMICS". And I
showed off the whyaskwhyaskwhy Full Metal Dobbshead (NOW AVAILABLE IN
CHEAPER SMALLER SIZES!!), making big twisted shadows with it on the
Pufferdome walls to hypnotize the audience.

I will post a few pics from Starwood that Wei took, on
alt.binaries.slack and later in SuBSITE. I am behind on Hour of Slack,
though. I have to spend the rest of today "fuck-cutting." I have #795
-- all 4XD recordings -- ready in its X-rated Internet form. But I
gotta cleanse the broadcast radio version. And friends, that is a LOT
of fuck cutting.

I have gotten to the point that I can SEE the word "fuck" in a sound
waveform on my monitor without even playing the sound. And the waveform
for "shit." I bet I could hand draw those from memory in Photoshop with
a mouse, feed the image into a sound wave form re-decoder, and it would
play back the words in a fucked up non human "voice." . Well, maybe not
yet, but I'm getting there. What I need is a speech recognition program
that'll go through Hour of Slack audio files, select out the Fucks and
Shits even amidst background noise, and replace them with a bleep or a
"Bob". Or reverse them. "Cuff 'em if they can't take a joke! Act like a
Dumb Tish and they'll treat you as an equal!"

--
4th Stangian Orthodox MegaFisTemple Lodge of the Wrath of Dobbs Yeti,
Resurrected
P.O. Box 181417, Cleveland, OH 44118 (fax 216-320-9528)
A subsidiary of:
The SubGenius Foundation, Inc. / P.O. Box 140306, Dallas, TX 75214
SubSITE: http://www.subgenius.com PRABOB

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Original file name: Back from Starwood - converted on Thursday, 23 August 2001, 10:40