It took me almost a year since I started bumming to make this start: blogging on art of bumming! Now I understand it is an irony in itself. A bum by definition (ref. online webster dictionary) is one who sponges off others and avoids work. So blogging is just against the very spirit of bumming. However after seeing millions of blogs that are spread around this planet, I feel they are bums in one way or the other. We as humans can not sit idle, so bums in true sense of word, just avoid any mundane work, called chores, that require us to comply and be a tiny tiny cog in the giant economic wheel. But their creative spirit is still alive and thriving and looking for ways to express itself. They just groan at the modern barbaric system which has replaced the word master with superior. They want to find respectable bum life engaging only in activities they truly admire.
Technically the definition still applies to modern bums that this (self-proclaimed) blog represents. But my efforts in the direction to be a true respectable (aka. off street : my due apologies to those bums who live on street but still surf internet) bum has somewhat failed. After all we all need to make a living! I thought I have a girl friend who will be my sugar mama during the time I bum around. But she was smart. She quited her work and is bumming as well! Now we are bumming together! Then there are these advisory books by likes of Robert Kiyosaki who sold millions of copies of his now famous book "Rich Dad, Poor Dad". The unsuspecting individuals who bought this book wanted to live comfortable life as rich bums. Passive Income is celebrated by the book which certainly the bum in us will like to have. I don't know how many of the common bums were able to generate the passive income the way the book advocates. Ofcourse rich influential bums do it. They are the scavengers of the society. But a common bum?! Probably they did so in the booms of the stock and housing market, but in the bust? I am sure many must be back to where they belonged: the dungeon room of a big corporation being whipped to pay off the debts accumulated. And I am sure, Robert Kiyosaki, true to his Hawaiian spirit, would be now bumming on the beaches of Hawaii from the royalty generated by his book. He truly did what he believes in: the generation of a passive income. Certainly like other bums, I also believe in it. But unfortunately, I realize all this ultimately rely on theory of greatest economic fool (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bigger_fool_theory). After some dabbling in investment, I strongly suspect that the theory probably points to me by encouraging others to make money off me! So passive income is still a distant reality for me.
O boy! did I digress?! Well I told you that I am ultimately a bum and the way of the bum is to muse on any topic, however tangential, when the opportunity presents itself. That ultimately is the essence of this blog. To continue my story, my third effort should have been directly what the definition points to: "sponge off others!" But as I already emphasized, since the greatest fool theory points to me, I didn't expect much success in that direction. Further, my bum existence seems to have an inductive effect on all my friends. They are leaning in that direction as well craving to be bum themselves or are half way there. Or should I say it is just meeting of like minds. The others who haven't yet reached that stage, certainly crave for it. So now there are a bunch of us and in one of the lazy "intellectual" exchanges that refused to stop till 3:00 in the morning, the idea of having a bum blog first came up.
So what is this blog for? It is there to celebrate the renaissance of modern bumming life. It is about bums who find recluse from the horrors of corporate existence to muse on life, universe and everything. Of course the answer is 42, but still! As for me, it is my time off to rediscover myself and blog what I find interesting.
I must confess none of us are true bums. We are hibernating before we return to the work dungeons. But during this hibernation, while the spirits rejuvenate, we just let our minds run around unchallenged. And as the wealth depreciates, on positive side, we add less to global warming and inconspicuous consumption that is the hall mark of modern existence. Of course we are not contributing to gross domestic product but right now I am adding to gross happiness product!
Technically the definition still applies to modern bums that this (self-proclaimed) blog represents. But my efforts in the direction to be a true respectable (aka. off street : my due apologies to those bums who live on street but still surf internet) bum has somewhat failed. After all we all need to make a living! I thought I have a girl friend who will be my sugar mama during the time I bum around. But she was smart. She quited her work and is bumming as well! Now we are bumming together! Then there are these advisory books by likes of Robert Kiyosaki who sold millions of copies of his now famous book "Rich Dad, Poor Dad". The unsuspecting individuals who bought this book wanted to live comfortable life as rich bums. Passive Income is celebrated by the book which certainly the bum in us will like to have. I don't know how many of the common bums were able to generate the passive income the way the book advocates. Ofcourse rich influential bums do it. They are the scavengers of the society. But a common bum?! Probably they did so in the booms of the stock and housing market, but in the bust? I am sure many must be back to where they belonged: the dungeon room of a big corporation being whipped to pay off the debts accumulated. And I am sure, Robert Kiyosaki, true to his Hawaiian spirit, would be now bumming on the beaches of Hawaii from the royalty generated by his book. He truly did what he believes in: the generation of a passive income. Certainly like other bums, I also believe in it. But unfortunately, I realize all this ultimately rely on theory of greatest economic fool (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bigger_fool_theory). After some dabbling in investment, I strongly suspect that the theory probably points to me by encouraging others to make money off me! So passive income is still a distant reality for me.
O boy! did I digress?! Well I told you that I am ultimately a bum and the way of the bum is to muse on any topic, however tangential, when the opportunity presents itself. That ultimately is the essence of this blog. To continue my story, my third effort should have been directly what the definition points to: "sponge off others!" But as I already emphasized, since the greatest fool theory points to me, I didn't expect much success in that direction. Further, my bum existence seems to have an inductive effect on all my friends. They are leaning in that direction as well craving to be bum themselves or are half way there. Or should I say it is just meeting of like minds. The others who haven't yet reached that stage, certainly crave for it. So now there are a bunch of us and in one of the lazy "intellectual" exchanges that refused to stop till 3:00 in the morning, the idea of having a bum blog first came up.
So what is this blog for? It is there to celebrate the renaissance of modern bumming life. It is about bums who find recluse from the horrors of corporate existence to muse on life, universe and everything. Of course the answer is 42, but still! As for me, it is my time off to rediscover myself and blog what I find interesting.
I must confess none of us are true bums. We are hibernating before we return to the work dungeons. But during this hibernation, while the spirits rejuvenate, we just let our minds run around unchallenged. And as the wealth depreciates, on positive side, we add less to global warming and inconspicuous consumption that is the hall mark of modern existence. Of course we are not contributing to gross domestic product but right now I am adding to gross happiness product!
5 comments:
fanta-kala-stic, you've finally set the blog up, but it's right time according to PBT (Pacific Bummer's Time which amazingly is even slower than IPT :o).
i've got another consummate bummer for you to emulate, and he's local, right by UCSD! he lives in one of those posh homes on the cliff overlooking Black's Beach, and basically surfs and gets blazed everyday. who is this compatriot in the high art of bumming? Kary Mullis, the guy who invented the PCR technique of amplifying DNA, the foundation of molecular biology and genetic research. he got insanely rich and even won a Nobel prize for his discovery. right after all of that fame, he left academia to basically...bum around and be a his own free spirit :o) f--- the establishment
well if he got a noble prize, he deserves to bum.... he is too difficult to emulate, unless they give me a noble peace prize :)
thats a great first post.
make the rest as entertaining!
You know that I am a tango bum, right... How do you think I have so much time to do all my tango "work" ;-)
i have to say i have always been curious.. America living an American dream but with bumming!
the question is do you follow the webster dictionary of bum.. i.e. "sponging of others" and if yes how.. . i need to know the trade secrets :)
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