This morning, in a session with someone who purports to be able to help me navigate the inside of my head, I happened upon some interesting questions, such as:
Is it ever justified to refuse oneself forgiveness?
There are some things that once done, should not be forgiven. This seems to be a fairly common thread throughout the english-speaking world where the word ‘forgiveness’ has a more or less constant meaning. But, my therapist says, this belief system prevents healing. Maybe she is right. Perhaps in my case she is right, but what about the abstract case? Had Adolf Hitler lived to truly comprehend the magnitude of his crimes from the perspective of one or more of his victims, would he ever be able to forgive himself? Would it ever be appropriate for him to do so? Surely the opinions of his victims must have some weight in this? What if his ongoing failure to forgive himself made him so crazy that he went on to hurt more people? I doubt that any of the surviving victims derive any comfort from the fact that he committed suicide. If you’re a holocaust survivor, or you know one, and you’re not offended by the bluntness of my inquiry, let me know: What does it mean to you that Adolf offed himself? Is it a good thing or a bad thing in your opinion?

In completely unrelated Ubuntu, a name which many people would lately have heard me evangelising, is currently in my bad books. Having spent awfully close to $2000 on Trouble 2.0, I am now discovering that the absolute latest release of Ubuntu, released a day ago, does not understand the disk controller. The controller in question is an Intel ICH7R… about as generic and comonplace as you can get. Grrr!

In other news of crapness and lameness beyond excuse: E and I went shopping tonight. One of the things we sought was a cheap DVD player. We went initially to K-mart in Burwood; an old haunt of ours since it is open 24/7. They had two suitable DVD players on display, but, as is so often the case at the mart of K, they were both out of stock, and no, they would not sell us the display models, even at full price. Peeved, we moved on to Coles in Brandon Park. There we found and MTV brand DVD player, with more features than the basic model at K’mart, for $50. Gleefully, we purchased it and took it outside to the car… to discover that it made an ominous loose-components-rattling-noise. Taking it back inside, we were promptly given a replacement; the second of the three in stock. This we took home, unwrapped, and found that the remote control had a pair of thoroughly leaked, corroded batteries in it, and the battery chamber was lined with battery-goo. This also, we took back. The third and final DVD player in stock at Brandon Park is now sitting in my lounge-room, awaitng me having the nerve to attempt to install it. Doubtless it will explode…