UMOUR ARE GO!

Faith Balm

Believe in God instantly.

E/UMOR checking in...

...from Brussels.

Halliburton Survivaball

For the well-heeled executive.

Shock Doctrine

Backstreets of Guilin

An E/UMOUR special...note the prototype UMOUR invisibility blotter was swallowed by the film-er, allowing him to go unnoticed despite caucasian features.
Shot in Guilin China, mid-August, on a steamy Sunday night.

City of Ghosts

The City of Ghosts is a temple complex sitting atop a narrow, upward-sloping hill like a knifeblade on the banks of the Yangtze river a few dozen miles down from Chongqing (aka "Chungking" in the old british romanization system).

Although the earliest strata of the complex apparently go back to Han dynasty times some 2000 years ago, various pieces have been added as the complex morphed from some kind of Taoist temple into the neo-Confucianist embodiment of the afterlife that it is now. In this vision, the souls of all humanity travel to the city of ghosts for processing.

Things start off innocously enough: Pagoda-like structures combine with carved stone features to yield some typical Chinese architectural beauty:

There are cute little tests that tourists take to determine the truthfulness of their souls, etc...:

And then you start hitting the dieties which, for some reason, don't seem all that happy:

Architectural gremlins, along with a changed color scheme, let you know that you're entering a somewhat less pleasant zone:


And a careful examination of the stone bas reliefs gives you an indication of what's coming:


Angrier deities...

and the temple color scheme goes blue, indicative of the less pleasant parts of the underworld:

The dieties up here are less than comforting...


And now for a veritable Coney Island of punishments meted out to corrupt souls:



Overseeing all of this are the bureaucrats of the afterlife...

Is Your Printer Spying On You?

Did you know that many (in fact, most) color laser printers are spying on you whenever you print a document? Though you may not have heard the news, the discovery was announced in late 2005. Manufacturers embed a pattern of tiny yellow dots on printed pages. The dots are too small to be seen with the naked eye (especially since they're yellow), but under a microscope and blue light they're revealed. The dots are placed in a pattern unique to each printer, and since most color laser printers are purchased through well-documented service providers or direct from the manufacturer, it's simple to track any printed page back to the owner of the printer.

The original idea was obviously to help the government track down currency counterfeiters, since any phony money would be tagged with the yellow dots and would be easily trackable back to the source. But there are also signs of abuse, with the FBI reportedly using the technology to keep tabs on who's printing material for groups like the ACLU and Greenpeace. That's a little scary... and important to remember if you've considering printing a whistleblowing tip or any missive you'd prefer to leave anonymous on a color laser.

If the privacy ramifications of this news bother you, there's some good news. Not all printers have the tracking dots, and the EFF has compiled and updated its list of which ones do and which ones don't. However, as the document notes, remember that even if a printer doesn't include the dots, that doesn't mean it isn't using some other method to track your printed pages. If your printer isn't listed, that means that no information is available about whether that printer includes the dots or not.

-By christopher Null

7/11 11:11

On 11:11

"ELEVEN IS THE NUMBER OF LIGHT When the forces of Eleven become fully activated on earth, they have the power to change history in the making. Within the number and sequences of Eleven (29, 47, 38, 92, 83, 74, 56, 65) lives all answers and questions. Eleven teaches us every problem is a divine opportunity to learn. It shows us how to see beyond what is everyday and boring. It tries and tests our faith and our belief. It forces us to listen to that small still quiet voice within the silent witness. It reminds us we are not victims but victors and are all vast beings who have come to earth to help with the ascension process starting with ourselves. It asks you to finally locate the light within and share it with all. Eleven is our Best Friend and Teacher

11:11 is a number activation sequence. Each time that you see 11,111 or 1111 on a clock it represents that you are being given an opportunity to walk into a Gateway of Manifestation. The universe has just taken a snapshot of your thoughts, which are then manifesting physically in record speed. The time period from November 11, to January 11 is considered to be the HOLY TRINITYmonths the 23 faces of Eve and Atom. All in All it is a divine decree and opportunity issued to all of earth to Wake-up, and become your true light. Eleven is also the number of masters. 11:11 is an encoded molecular structure of Remembrance, activating the Master of Light we have always been. This is the Biological Ascension, and 11:11 is the Ascension Doorway. The Light of Ascension comes in many forms and on many levels. It comes not always in one day, or one moment. For we Ascend and descend continually word by word, thought by thought. Ascension is birthed from every breath, every thought, every word,every day.

Memorial Day

It was a solemn ceremony. Mourners dressed in military uniforms interspersed with civilians dressed in black were gathered around the large rectangular ditch approximately half the size of a basketball court. Speeches were made at a podium dressed in the American flag; tears were shed, guns were fired and a lone trumpet played. The sky was fittingly overcast, a cold drizzle made it seem as if nature herself shared the sorrow on this day and during this tribute to the fallen.

And then the bulldozers came, scoops held proudly upwards towards the sky. The scoops were laden with the 3,454 bodies of the fallen in Iraq and draped with American flags so that the individual bodies could not be seen. And then, in turn, each bulldozer dumped its load into the large ditch as Taps was played on the trumpet. As the scoop tilted, the first few body bags rolled out and down, some hitting the edge of the scoop and tumbling out, but then followed by the larger almost fluid mass of bodies behind. A collared clergyman stood at the edge of the ditch, making the sign of the cross with his hands.

After the last of the bulldozers had dumped its load into the ditch, the 3,545 gray body bags now formed a large pile as the clergymen began their ceremony. "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust" could be heard between gusts of wind while a single scoop pushed dirt onto the pile, its warning beep sounding as it repeatedly backed up to get more dirt.

After the pile was buried and the mound tamped down by the bulldozer, as the mourners filed out some tossed bouquets onto the giant mound, other stood and said quiet goodbyes. And as the last mourners filed out the bulldozers turned and also drove away in single file.

Let's Write A Song...

To all Ritual Specialists, and any interested readers:

Lets write a song! We hope to complete our Modern Psychedellic album ( titled "More Pink Pigs Head") with a collabrative effort that will feature a long "splurge-like" jam as acompaniment for sound-bites and spoken words which harken back to the Vietnam era and it's parallels with today's folly in Iraq.

Here's the plan:

Write a line or two, using "psychedellic imagery" to discribe your thoughts, opinions and/or impressions about the war in Iraq, the Bush administration, global warming, or any other current world events. Use metaphore and symbolism to convey your ideas in a psychedellic way while making sure to be clear that this is 2007, not 1968. Drawing paralells will be a major plus, as that is the concept for the song.

After we have assembled some "lyrics" from you all, as well as some "sound bites" of both historic and current events we'll assemble a "sound montage" and then gather the crew to record a musical accompanyment.

Thanks and good luck!

Call 'em what you like, but they ain't terrorists

Call them murderers, call them combatants, call them the enemy, call them Islamic radicals, but they're not terrorists. A terrorist is someone who tries to unnerve a civilian population and undermine its faith in government.

Killing soldiers is merely another act of war, there is no better definition.

A nice place to visit but I wouldn't want to live there

A Eu-mor expedition to a glacier was undertaken last week, in conjunction with some efforts that UMOR is organizing with regards to Global Warming. More information coming soon.

Note the absence of living creatures: No creature would willingly tolerate such conditions.

E/UMOR is analyzing the harsh conditions endured by some of nature's creatures as a byproduct of Darwin's terrible inventions of evolution and adaption:

E/umorite EM can officially report being shocked by conditions on the glacier and can only imagine what has to be endured to live in such places.

Dogpoop bag sign

Geneva, Switzerland.

Damn those Swiss dogs are smart: Not only can they read French, they've apparently learned to hold their own dogpoop bags in the absence of thumbs.

uMor has it...

...rumour has it there are a new batch of UmourSounds up on the main Umour site, which one might hear if one is sufficientlly curious.

Strike One!

Let's call this a foul ball. Mind the collateral damage, boys.

New Radiation Symbol

You gotta love this one. No, it's real.

Go get your own war, we saw it first

Doesn't Iran understand? It's not where a war is located that's important, it's who calls it first that matters. Why are they trying to muscle in on our war? I mean it's not like they have the inventory of countless defense contractors to burn off. Look, if they have domestic issues they want to solve there's plenty of other countries they can pick a fight with. Why do they have to be such copycats and stick their hand in our pie?
OK, let's make a deal. Whe we're done with Afghanistan Iran can throw their own war there after we hightail it. And don't worry, those Afghans have plenty of fight left in 'em: It won't just be "sloppy seconds".

Permission Granted

As a reader of the Umour Ritual Forum, you are hereby given permission to bitch-slap anyone who uses the Energizer Bunny in conversation anymore. For intance, if they refer to a hard-working person as 'just like the energizer bunny, they keep going and going', that's when you have the right to slap them straight across the lips.

If you wish, print out this page and cut out this post, and hand it to the slap-ee after the reproof.

You'll be glad you did.

Thank you.
EU-MOR

Greetings from Camden

The Forbidden Zone

How could we have possibly overlooked this for all of these years?!?!? Order the full movie at www.forbiddenzonethemovie.com