By now I have years of blog posts saved up from half a dozen blogs. All the blogs have been removed from the internet except my last one, “The Cynicism of Diogenes” which I will delete as well eventually. But some blog posts should remain forever on the internet. For example, the one on “The Cynicism of Diogenes” where I relate my experience at summer camps should always be up there, for it’s perhaps the only place on the internet where you can read about Camp Onibar. I just got an e-mail today from some other guy that went to Camp Onibar.

The original post on the “Diogenes of Sinope” blog about Summer Camp can be found here. I’m getting a surprising number of hits from people searching for “Camp Onibar”. I only went there one summer.  I was about nine years old, I’m guessing, so that would’ve been 1968. But that’s not right, since I remember talking to another kid at LSD camp (Landon Summer Day) about Martin Luther King getting shot, and that was 1968. So maybe I was ten and it was 1969 that I went to Camp Onibar. I think one of the reasons that I went to Camp Onibar is that my Dad went there as a kid, so it must’ve been around a long time, since my Dad was born in 1923.

The following post is worthy of being resurrected from obscurity on my hard drive. I think it never got the exposure it deserved because it was written right around the time I was kicked off Blogtimore. It originally appeared on the Harish blog on Wednesday, September 21st 2005. The events described really happened. You can’t make this up.

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Once upon a time I was at a 7-11 buying a chili-cheese hot-dog when a guy comes up to me and asks me if that’s my Volvo parked outside. I say “yes”. He says he’s a cop and that I’m in violation and that he can write me a ticket for $500. He follows me out to my car, asking questions. He’s not in uniform but he’s neatly dressed and at first I take him at his word. I go along with what he said, that he’s a cop. But the more questions he asks the more I wonder if he really is a cop. Perhaps I should ask to see some ID. But then I think that that might piss him off and I’ll get that $500 ticket. I’m trying to figure out what to do when I let loose a loud long fart. I’d been feeling flatulent. The “cop” hears the fart (maybe smells it as well) and makes a disgusted face. Before the cop regains his composure, I say “Excuse me,” hop in my car and drive off.

Once upon a time, there was an Anarchist Hippie http://www.hippy.com

The Anarchist Hippie published a newspaper on a machine called a mimeograph (http://www.officemuseum.com/copy_machines.htm). Much of his newspaper was concerned with a war in a little faraway country. He also would publish technical stuff about how to make long distance phone calls for free. He sometimes didn’t get along with his relatives! Ma Bell didn’t like him publishing technical stuff about how to make long distance phone calls for free. Uncle Sam (http://www.sonofthesouth.net/uncle-sam/world-war-1-poster.htm) didn’t like him publishing a newspaper about the war in a little faraway country, even on a mimeograph.

Finally the war ended. His mimeograph machine sat in a corner gathering dust. He went into business, selling dried plants. His Uncle Sam took a dim view of him selling the dried plants, but he did it anyway.

Eventually, the Anarchist Hippie managed to get money saved from selling those plants. He wondered what he should do with the money. Selling dried plants could be dangerous, and he wanted to get out of the business. I heard he even spent some time locked up in Ol’ Uncle Sam’s basement for selling funny little pills with a chemical on them. This chemical supposedly inspired a song by a British musician. The song was called “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7F2X3rSSCU).

The Anarchist Hippie decided that it was time to get into another business, something that wouldn’t make his Uncle Sam angry again. “Ol’ Uncle Sam’s basement is no fun,” thought the Anarchist Hippie. “I’ve got to find another business! But what?”

He thought and thought. Finally he decided to build magick canoes. “I’ll build the very best magick canoes in the world!” exclaimed the Anarchist Hippie. Sure enough, he made every magick canoe from the finest materials. All his canoes were hand-made out of Real Wood, and even had some Love in them as a special ingredient. Love was a favorite Hippie special ingredient. But Love is an expensive special ingredient, boys and girls, so most people just bought metal canoes without any Love in them. It was hard for the Anarchist Hippie to sell his magick canoes, and so the magick canoes piled up in the Anarchist Hippie’s huge warehouse. It wasn’t long before The Anarchist Hippie was surrounded by high piles of magick canoes with Love in them. The Anarchist Hippie realized that if things continued, soon even his huge warehouse wouldn’t have any more space to fit in even one more canoe, even magick ones.

“I’ve got to find another business!” thought the Anarchist Hippie. “But what?” He thought and thought. His Ma Bell was not as mean as his Uncle Sam, so he thought maybe he should see what Ma Bell  http://www.wired.com/politics/law/news/2…) was doing in her kitchen.

Ma Bell was always busy. She was always working on something. Some people out in Hippie Land (that’s way out on the Left Coast) had been fooling around with funny machines called “Apples”. These people in Hippie Land thought that someday everyone might own an Apple. A boy called Big Blue scoffed. “Har! Har! Har! Our Big Blue Apples are way too big and expensive for everyone to have one one! That Anarchist Hippie is one silly fellow.”

But the Anarchist Hippie was undeterred. He decided to have a party. It wasn’t a birthday party, boys and girls. It was a Festival. Hippies love Festivals! He would call his Festival the “Internet Love Festival”! He’d invite some very special people to his Internet Love Festival. He invited a Writer! Can you guess who the Writer was, boys and girls?

I guess by this time the Anarchist Hippie had patched things up with his Uncle Sam, at least a little bit. He invited even invited a couple of people who worked for Ol’ Uncle Sam! One person He was a Programmer. The Writer wasn’t sure what a Programmer did. Writers ask a lot of bothersome questions sometimes. The Writer asked the Programmer what Programmers did. The Programmer said, “I know how to talk to Apples. I speak Computer Languages, and I can write stuff that Apples can read!” The Writer thought that was silly. He didn’t know that Apples could read! Is that true, boys and girls? Can Apples really read? The Programmer wrote things for special Apples, called NASA Apples. NASA Apples helped put people on the Moon back in the Hippie Days, and put people in Outer Space. The Writer wondered why anyone would go to the Moon in the first place. Maybe there was a lot of cheese there! The Writer had heard that the Moon was made of green cheese (http://www.vermilion-sands.com/rantlib/greencheese.html), and the Writer liked cheese. Anyway, in Outer Space there was plenty of space for lots of canoes with love in them. Space isn’t a problem in Outer Space.

The Anarchist Hippie also invited another person who worked for Uncle Sam, but this fellow didn’t say what he did for Ol’ Uncle Sam. This guy’s name was 0097. What a funny name! When the Writer asked 0097 what he did for Ol’ Uncle Sam, 0097 just grinned a big slow grin and winked an eye.

The Anarchist Hippie invited an Artist. The Artist had drawn pictures for the Anarchist Hippie’s newspaper, back in the Hippie Days. His pictures had poked fun at Ol’ Uncle Sam’s war in a little faraway country.

The Anarchist Hippie even hired a Caterer. The Caterer brought special Hippie food for everyone to eat at the Internet Love Festival. Everyone loves to eat food, especially Hippie food with Love as a special ingredient.

The Anarchist Hippie invited a few people more, and had his first Internet Love Festival. Everyone talked about the Internet. The Writer didn’t know much about the Internet. However, by this time it was clear that Big Blue had been wrong about Apples. Many people were buying Apples to have in their own home. The Writer even had his own Apple, and posted to things called BBSes (http://www.bbsdocumentary.com). People on the BBSes were starting to talk about the Internet. The writer tried to connect his own Apple to the Internet and see what everyone was talking about at the Internet Love Festival, and on BBSes, but was disappointed. It was full of writing only Apples and Programmers could read, and the Writer wasn’t a Programmer. “This is strictly for geeks!” thought the Writer. “Who’s going to connect to the Internet? Even BBSes are more trouble than they’re worth.”

To be continued?