Xn3cTs

January 20th, 2008

Well, I’m writing my first post here in this site. (I wrote “Acting as a Path to a Spirituality of Compassion” a long, long time ago. 2001? My brother Errol posted it here.) I don’t know much about blogging. All I know is that, at the very least, without meaning to be derogatory to those who do practice it, it could be some kind of an “online diary or journal.” Or simply, where one puts up the ramblings and rumblings of one’s mind. And heart.

I’ve had some posts in my friendster account: http://xn3ct.blogs.friendster.com/xn3ct/

And one of these days, I’m going to organize the writings I’ve done. Perhaps here.

For now, let me “talk” about the name of this site: xn3cts.com

I first thought of the name “xn3ct” in the 80’s. There was this song “Dear God.” (No, not the one by Midge Ure which has lines like “Give me… peace in a restless world…”) I’m thinking of the more scandalous (and for me then, probably heretical and blasphemous) song of the same title by xtc. (Some of the lines go like this: “Did you make man after we made you?” And this was way before I even heard of Marx and Feuerbach.)

Anyway, I thought the name of the band was clever. Instead of spelling “ecstasy,” they had “xtc.” And remember this was also the era of bands like the INXS (“In excess.”)

It was 1988, I was still in the seminary and I was thinking of a name for a band to form. I came up with “xn3ct.” Yeah, for “eccentricity.”

Well, in the end, the band never came to be. Fast forward to the 90’s and the internet was starting to become more and more popular. The need for an email address became more and more pressing.

And so, I picked it for my yahoo email.

And why not? I’ve always thought of myself as, well, weird or eccentric. My write-up for our high school yearbook reads in part: “Call him ‘weird,’ and he’ll even thank you for it.”

And so, “xn3ct” it was! And is!

Between then and now, I find out that there are quite a number of people who also thought of using the same name.

In fact, most of the domain names with “xn3ct” have already been bought.

Fast forward to the present. My brother Errol told me that he bought the domain name xn3cts.com

I would have been extremely delighted, save for one teeny bit of “flaw.” (If one may call it a “flaw.”)

The extra “s.”

I thought “xn3ct” was perfect. “xn3cts” is well, “ex-en-three-cee-tee-es.”

My brother reads it as “eccentricities.” The main page has this text: “Eccentricities ni Ian.” Puede. Mga kaweirdohan ni Ian.

Or…

It could also be read as “Eccentricity Is!”

Normality is not! Eccentricity is!

Long live ab-normality! Long live eccentricity!

Eccentricity is!

best regards,

ian

Tags: Music, names, Philosophy, Writing, xn3ct, xtc
Posted in Life, Music, Philosophy, Writing | 2 Comments »