(Wasteland Weekend) Check out the official highlight reel from #WastelandWeekend. Now, it's time for 2025 -- the 15th year of the event -- which aims to be even more epic. Directed and edited by Preston Yarger. Cinematographers: Louis Pei, Christian Cuevas, Justin Ramsey, Nathan Gresham, Christian Agurto, Dane Rising, Mike Darling. Filmed entirely on location at Wasteland Weekend, Mojave, California, 2024.
Wasteland Weekend?
Where's Max? Let's go beyond Thunderdome!
If driving on the 405 Freeway at rush hour isn’t "Mad Max" enough for Americans, then LAist has got a party at the end of the world that might catch some eyes.
Thousands of people will descend on the Mojave Desert on Wednesday, Sept. 24th, 2025, for the annual Wasteland Weekend (wastelandweekend.com) -- a five-day bash inspired by post-apocalyptic franchises like "Mad Max" and "Fallout."
What started 15 years ago as a group of "Mad Max" fans looking to hang out has grown into an intensely immersive destination for people from around the world.
LikeBurning Man, this festival takes place on a barren landscape. But Wasteland Weekenders go all-in on creating another world.
Not actual atomic bombs with radiation -- but the equivalent of six massive atomic blasts to level the tiny outdoor prison formerly known as Gaza. That's what Israel's nationalist Zionist army has dropped with the help of U.S. taxpayers and paid cheerleaders from around the world.
(The CJ Werleman Show) Israeli pro-war propaganda, psyops (psychological operations), and public relations HIDING Israeli losses, 10,000 IDF deaths, massive rises in suicide among its war criminal genocidal force (breakingthesilence.org.il), rape, alcoholism, drug abuse, spousal abuse, and the most decrepit moral standards in the world among a cohort of Zionist killers heralding themselves as the "most moral army in the world" born of white racist elitist Ashkenazi (Germanic European) Zionist Jews in the world, using the USA and EU as their main bases of operation, while operating freely in many other countries that dare not openly criticize them.
(Miki Nebulah) A week after the U.S. became guilty of the worst crime against humanity in history by bombing Buddhist Nagasaki (on Aug. 9, 1945), the nation of Tokyo had still not surrendered. If the Japanese had not surrendered on August 15, 1945, as it did, the U.S. war criminals would have struck again with a third experimental and potentially more powerful atomic bomb a few days later. How tiny our differences are in the vastness of space yet how magnified on earth. The draconian ETs must be proud. Nov. 10, 2010.
LYRICS: "Unorthodox Manifesto"
The memories far beyond their reckoning/ Have begun to lurk in the distance/ Like visual objects dearly known/ The grace of devil's hands/ As they walk with me like a medium/ Well I choose and require a burnout/ Resting in expanded malicious force/ Drained for murderous weapons/ Knowing where you stand/ In the magnitude of this thought/ Looking at the spirit of fire and flames/ Enduring on the throne of the black heart. [Repeat Verses 1-3]
The Jewish Holocaust in Palestine
It's very simple: We kill them all, no more POWs
A bringer of evil I am/ And therefore also a carrier of light/ As I use this focus through the dark/ And face the shine in the dead end/ Limitations do not exist/ When you are ahead of the crowd/ With the art of confidence/ I reign at the throne of my soul/ The value of this darkness unwinds/ Travelling the other path/ A hidden triumph/ But obvious to the strong and wise/ By understanding this reality/ I remain in a twice-colored cloud/ With feet connected solid in the ground/ And thus I get peace of mind/ A bringer of evil I am/ And also a carrier of light/ As I use this focus through the dark/ And face the shine in the dead end.
CJ Werleman, July 3, 2025; Dimmu Borgir; Middle East Eye, July 3, 2025; Pfc. Sandoval, Shauna Schwartz (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly
Trump attends Les Misérables and MAGA VIPs, falsely brags about saving LA and reveals he played the flute
(Jimmy Kimmel Live)
June 12, 2025: Trump, Melania, and a handful of MAGA VIPs attended opening night at the Kennedy Center for their performance of Les Mis, Trump chimed in on the situation in LA by saying that it would be a crime scene without the military being present, “No Kings” protests will be popping up all over the country this weekend, Trump revealed yesterday that he used to play the flute, he broke out the presidential sharpie today to sign a series of resolutions and steer the conversation towards the dangers of windmills, Sen. Rand Paul got un-invited to the annual White House Congressional Picnic, and in honor of Father’s Day the show goes out onto Hollywood Blvd. to find out how much dads really know about their kids.
Scientists discovered a lost civilization in the desert that vaporized and turned to glass
(LifesBiggestQuestions) Sept. 12, 2024: In what is now Pakistan (born in 1947 at Partition from India), the ancient ruins of Mohenjo-daro (the City of the Dead) hint at an advanced civilization's mysterious demise.
Could their end have come about by a sudden catastrophe rather than gradual decline?
Evidence of vitrified (glass-ified) structures and skeletal remains suggests a powerful superheated force swept through this metropolis of the Indus Valley Civilization (IVC), which also included neighboring Harappa. Explore the theory: Was Mohenjo-Daro atomically vaporized, leaving melted nuclear ruins?
Uncover archeological clues like scattered skeletons of people who died on the spot, still holding hands and evacuating, and enigmatic "glass beads." What caused this devastation? A natural disaster? An ancient weapon mentioned in the Vedas?
Discover the unsettling possibilities surrounding this ancient city's destruction and history's first use of atomic weapons on a civilian population, even before the war crimes the USA committed in Japan, Bikini Atol, and the Nevada and underground test sites, which are still making people sick.
A blonde bombshell was snubbed for playing a doll;
a man was nominated for playing a doll;
a woman was nominated for playing a baby (sort of);
a Jewish scientist was lauded for making genocide possible with a single bomb. Oops, this is Hollywood, so we better scratch that one off the list now that Steven Spielberg doesn't make easy winners anymore.
Ten pictures will vie to be considered "best." Let's talk about what happened.
Oppenheimer received 13 Oscar nominations.
Not nominated were director Greta Gerwig after being lauded for her super contribution to society and the world for writing the Barbie movie. Writers don't usually get credit, so that's okay. Bottle blond actress Margot Robbie is sure to outshine her with her beauty and take the gold. Nope. No nomination for the human barbie doll. (And we don't mean Amatue, aka "Human Barbie" Valeria Lukyanova, who is making her own low budget films in Ukraine but being spiritual about it).
I'm like Nazi psychic Vril Oracle Maria Orsic.
Cillian Murphy plays J. Robert Oppenheimer. All hail. Whether Christopher Nolan is anyone's speed or not, the Academy loves him. Oppenheimer, Nolan's drama about the man who developed the atomic bomb, led all films with 13 nominations in both what are sometimes considered "major" categories (like best picture, best director, best actor, and adapted screenplay) and "technical" categories (like sound, production design and visual effects). It's not a record; a couple of other films, including Titanic, have received 14. Still, it's a very big total.
Jewish (and pro-Israel blank) Amy Schumer was going to write and play a large Barbie, and critic Jason Nathanson asks, "Would we be here if she had?" (KFI AM 640)
In another year, Poor Things' 11 nominations or Killers of the Flower Moon's 10 might have led the nominations. This makes director Martin Scorsese the most nominated ever, even if he has only won one. But not up against this kind of — forgive the phrase — explosive acclaim.
Sofia (Danielle Brooks) and Celie (Fantasia Barrino) in the 2023 reincarnation of The Color Purple get attention. Brooks was nominated for her supporting performance.
A couple of contenders came up empty or nearly so. There were a lot of films that elbowed their way into big nominations; that's what you get when you start with 10 best picture nominees.
But both Origin, the latest film from director Ava DuVernay, and All of Us Strangers, the love story starring Andrew Scott and Paul Mescal, were left out of the nominations.
The Color Purple musical adaptation was nominated only for Danielle Brooks' supporting performance — a richly deserved nod, by the way. More
On July 25th, a NASA scientist was studying images of a region of Mars called "Cydonia" when something caught his eye.
He had to take a second to process what he was seeing.
He grabbed a magnifying glass.
There was no doubt. On the surface of Mars, 140 million miles from Earth, was a structure in the shape of a human[oid] face.
It is huge, about a mile wide, with two eyes, a nose, and a mouth. Around the face are pyramids and structures that don't look natural. They look like they were built...by someone.
The following day, NASA held a press conference. Of the thousands of photos sent back from Mars, all anyone asked about was The Face. Who built it and why?
Is it a message from an advanced civilization now long extinct? Is it a religious artifact? Is it solid like the Great Sphinx at Giza, Egypt? Or could it contain chambers like the Great Pyramid?
Then NASA threw cold water on the speculation. They claimed they had a second photograph of the area taken shortly after and it showed that the face was nothing more than an optical illusion.
Small problem. That second photo doesn't exist.
So why did NASA [an acronym for "never a straight answer"] lie?
The answer to that question is in the other pictures.
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Christina Randall, 6/20; BBC News, A Current Affair, WSJ, 6/20/23; Eds., Wisdom Quarterly
(WQ) Do people know what an implosion is? Most do not. It is an explosion. Why? When the pressure outside is greater and a crack forms, the pressurized space collapsing with tremendous force. So forceful is the collapse, the implosion, that it immediately causes an explosion. Try it. Take a fluorescent bulb or better an old TV tube. Set up a high-speed camera. Then make a crack in it with, say, a baseball bat. Now play the tape back in slow motion. See how the tube draws in then immediately, with explosive force, shoots out? That is an implosion, which triggers an explosion. So what happened at the bottom of the sea or below the water at some as yet unknown depth? The pressure outside the submersible capsule got too great. At the bottom, where the Titanic sits, the depth is 4,000 feet. And the pressure is 6,000 lbs. per square inch. That means that one inch of the sub is bearing the weight of two SUVs, and this is true for every inch of the sub. When it cracks -- and it was bound to crack because it was only built to withstand pressure to a depth of 1,300 feet, according to reports coming in. The sub had been used multiple time, each time pressurizing and decompressing it, which would apparently weaken the structure. It would, therefore, not take much to instantaneously cave in and immediately obliterate the contents as the sub descended. It was doomed. And the view from it is bad, very bad, with just one small hole at the tip for everyone to look out of, no seats, and nothing to do but get claustrophobia and cold, in the dark and praying to get through it. Now they've been reborn. Will anyone else be taking the tour?
UPDATE: Five missing after Titanic sub "Titan" disappears in Atlantic Ocean | OceanGate
(Christina Randall) June 20, 2023. As a search and rescue mission continues for a private submersible that went missing while on an expedition to explore the wreckage of the Titanic, more is emerging about its five passengers. Among the confirmed passengers are British businessman Hamish Harding; Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood and his teenage son, Suleman; and French explorer Paul-Henri Nargeolet. Stockton Rush, the CEO of OceanGate, the company that operates the vessel, is also inside it, the BBC reports. OceanGate billed this trip as an opportunity to "become one of the few to see the Titanic with your own eyes." The company said the fee for securing a seat on the vessel was $250,000.00 (a quarter million U.S. dollars), according to its website. The trip was billed as more than mere tourism, however. OceanGate notes that each of its dives has a scientific purpose. More from CBS News: cbsnews.com/news/who-is-o...
Missing Titanic sub has 40 hours of oxygen left says US Coast Guard
(BBC News) June 20, 2023. A tourist experimental submersible (not actual submarine) that went missing on a visit to the wreck of the Titanic with five people on board has just 40 hours of air left, the U.S. Coastguard says.
The search to locate the small, deep-diving vessel is ongoing after it lost contact while diving near the wreckage of the Titanic.
The research vessel Polar Prince lost contact with the crew of the Titan sub an hour and 45 minutes into its dive.
Tour firm OceanGate said it was exploring all options [including discounted prices for future voyages to the bottom of the sea?] to get the crew back safely.
Gallows humor is the worst humor, but sometimes it's the only thing for a tragic situation -- a helpless tragedy as people are dying, and the whole world is helpless to save them. That's capitalism, that's freedom, that's adventure. Climbing Mt. Everest (or the possibly taller K2) involves risks, real risks. That's the thrill, that's the accomplishment Should free agents like OceanGate be stopped because daredevils died? An airline was taken down and the bodies of the deceased never recovered; therefore, we must all stop flying commercially. It's too dangerous! We need regulations, a nanny state, restriction. Let's join forces to end travel by sea, submarine, and airplane. We need to walk and take trains. Wait, no, trains are too dangerous. Just look at Ohio and India. It's foot traffic and bikes, but all bikes must have training wheels attached, and everyone must from now on wear safety helmets. Can ya imagine? So the only question left is, Might they find Osama bin Laden's fake corpse down there? How about that diamond? And how much of a discount are we talking about? It was $250,000.00 a ticket before. Half-price now?
Misery is a complex thing. More often than not, we know when we are feeling shitty. Less frequently, however, do we know the root of our suffering.
Our aversion to facing ourselves perpetuates an inner climate of denial and sadness.
Following a conversation I had with a complete stranger about anxiety and coping mechanisms, I found myself walking through the doors of the Quebec Vipassana Meditation Centre in Montebello looking to understand myself and to find some kind of closure to things that I hadn’t yet resolved.
The typical vipassana ("insight") meditation course is drawn out over ten days. The practice is largely founded on the principle of accepting the present as it is.
[All free 10-day Goenka vipassana retreats worldwide strive to be identical. Apply to attend one nearby at dhamma.org. Free to first time "new" students.]
For the first three days, we practiced anapana [-sati, "mindfulness of in-and-out-breathing"].
Focusing solely on the triangular space [under and] around the nostrils and the Cupid’s bow, the soft bit of skin above the upper lip, I learned to hone my awareness to feel subtle sensations in that area. For me, it felt like tiny flecks of electricity dancing across my face.
On Day 4, we learned to begin scanning our bodies from the top of our heads to the tips of our toes slowly, carefully. Through this simple technique, it’s believed that we can [calm body and mind to prepare the mind for developing insight to] find inner peace and harmony.
After the first meditation session, we took a vow of silence. Goenka chanted in Pali -- the sacred language of Theravada Buddhism -- in a deep, grumbling voice [that sounds like he's from Transylvania with an Indian accent].
We shyly attempted to repeat his words. The delicate voices of 60 women gradually filled the meditation hall with a beautiful, harmonic sound until the chanting abruptly ended.
We agreed not to speak, touch, or even look at each other for the next ten days. Twice a day, we ate [free delicious vegetarian food] in silence, the only sound the clinking of utensils against plates and bowls.
A subtle smile from another meditator became a cherished yet outlawed interaction.
Each day brought a different storm. According to Goenka’s evening [recorded] discourse, most people find that Day 2 and Day 6 are the hardest. I mean, on the second day I saw a woman run outside into the darkness and never return, but we don’t need to talk about that.
On the third day, I found myself experimenting with meditation techniques I had learned in the past -- something that the Centre emphasizes you shouldn’t do.
[Bad trip hallucinating]
I am freaking out, man, freaking out! (Askew)
Forty-five minutes into the midday session, I lost myself in what, at the time, seemed like the be-all-end-all of spiritual experiences -- but which now I can only describe as terrifying.
I felt a powerful vibration go through my body [possibly prana going through the body's chakra system], and a gross sensation took over and swept me up into a sea of disturbing, DMT-esque mental imagery that seemed to promise -- but never to deliver -- enlightenment.
[This is so far from what "enlightenment" or bodhi actually is that it is not worth correcting.]
I tried to speak with the instructor, Rachel, about it.
“You are supposed to focus on this area, nothing else,” she replied, circling her nose with her index finger. “You cannot bring your old practices here.”
“It was so powerful though, I —” [I tried to explain.]
“Don’t argue with me,” she said sternly, cutting me off mid-explanation.
Feeling angry, uncertain and unsafe, I went back to my room and thought about what gave her that authority. I resented Rachel for not validating what I’d experienced.
“With one leg on the white horse, the other leg on the black horse, you’re bound to fall through the middle,” I’d hear later that evening on the Goenka recording.
I then realized that you had to dedicate yourself to one technique to allow it to work the way it’s supposed to.
I cried constantly throughout the week. I cried constantly throughout the week. ...I burst into tears as I suddenly thought...I wept in the meditation hall, muffling my sobs with my blanket, which I pulled over my head as terrible thoughts polluted my consciousness.
I pictured my family dying, my loved ones committing horrible acts, and the world ending. I felt trapped by the unending and explosive chain of dark thoughts, reactions, and misery.
The concept of sankara, which loosely means “reactions,” explained my feeling of eternal misery.
I pictured sankara as a collection of little rocks in my stomach -- miseries that piled up over the years. Sankara is your “craving” and “aversion.” It’s the reason why we’re all so sad.
And apparently you can eradicate it through meditation.
I had to find an OUT from my sankara. I knew there would be no relief in giving up. Leaving the course early would mean returning home with an open wound. So I decided that I would stay to try to close it.
As time went on, I found safety in the meditation and in the powerful beauty of a group of women silently confiding in each other.
I grew fond of Rachel’s simple responses to my complex worries. I found a dormant creative energy within myself that I had forgotten existed. Put simply, I went into THE VOID and came out known. More
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