The Darwin Award For: Cleansing the Gene Pool.

I found an old friend just now. The Darwin Awards, given for stupidity that results in either death or removal of the ability to procreate. Here is an example: "Picture this: A young couple driving on Via Dutra, the major freeway in Brazil with tons of heavy traffic, at 6AM under heavy fog the couple decided to park the car for "dating," according to the charming Google translation. And yes, they parked in the right lane of freeway, not on the shoulder or at a gas station -- and naturally, a huge cargo truck comes by and runs right over the car, immediately killing both inside during the act. Double Double Darwin! Two (2) people making two obviously stupid decisions, and natural selection acts at the very moment the two are reproducing . . . Textbook Darwin Award." (http://www.darwinawards.com/darwin/darwin2010-06.html )

Today I was also playing around in a quotation site and found: “If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.” I would say “---try stupidity.” There are so many ways to be stupid it is a wonder anybody survives to adulthood and then to old age. For a laugh and to see just how stupid some people can be, look around on the "Darwin Award" site. And in closing I offer this wisdom from Forest Gump:”Stupid is as stupid does.”

(Forest Gump Quote: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0109830/quotes )Image:http://www.shortsshortsshorts.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/jackass-award.jpg

Why Don’t I Feel "Bucked Up"?

Let’s Look for some Good News
Ok, so we agree that we should look for some good news to “buck us up”. Where to look? Hmmmm. We could look at politics where Tea Partiers are doing pretty well in primaries. That is good news for somebody. And a multimillionaire Doctor (spent $38 million of his own money) under a cloud of suspicion for being involved (CEO) in a company that did some Medicare fraud won the Republican primary in Florida for Governor. That is good news for somebody. And, microbes are eating the undersea oil plumes. That must be good news for somebody. And the Feds are printing money to shore up the economy. That must be good news for somebody. And a Federal Judge stopped embryonic stem cell research to save all those potential babies (that would be defrosted and thrown away anyway) from helping cure disease. Thats just gotta be good news for somebody. And the USDA is getting on top of the biggest Salmonella outbreak ever, after dealing with deadly outbreaks of other disease-causing organisms for the past few years. That must be good news for somebody. And the floods in Pakistan are subsiding in the North but getting worse in the South. That must be good news for somebody. And there are 3 storms in the Atlantic right now, one hurricane, one tropical storm and one tropical depression. That must be good news for someone. (Maybe the “global warmers?) Wild caught fish have more PCBs, Mercury and BPAs than ever before. Is that good news for somebody?
Gee. There is good news all over the place.

So why don’t I feel “bucked up”?

Image and Undershorts available from: http://www.webundies.com/nb242g2m.htm

The Pendulum and Real Americans

The nature of a pendulum is to move one way for a while, then move back through the middle of the arc to the other side, then back then back then back - - - - .
The political pendulum had been in all the possible places in the last 200 or so years. In simplistic terms this means it has been to the right (conservative) to the left (liberal) through the middle and back and back etc. We have come to expect this and only those of us who are experiencing the “away” part of the swing get upset. Cooler heads prevail and sooner or later back it comes, then “they” are upset. No problem with that.
No, the problem I see developing over the last 10 or 20 years, and continuing into the future is the seeming tendency of the pendulum to keep going right. Growing political intolerance (tea party), growing religious intolerance (ground zero Mosque debacle), growing influence of minority religious views on freedom of choice (stem cell/embryo research, gay/lesbian marriage, abortion), growing influence on public school curriculum (scientific creationism, abstinence only education), growing distrust of medical science (vaccination avoiders), growing irrationality in border security (Arizona in a German accent: let me see your papers) all point to the pendulum going farther to the right than it should.
Here is a horrible thought: What if it should go so far to the right that it sticks in the wall and never comes back? The very places and practices we revile will look like us. Now that is a scary thought. And just who are the “real Americans" anyway?
(Read the following OpEd by Dick Cavett for more on this at: http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/08/20/real-americans-please-stand-up/)
Image; helix.gatech.edu/.../Swarner/definition.htm

Help! I Can’t Find The Classroom!

The themes are varied but all involve missing an important event. Teachers forget where their class meets for the first time, or can’t find the room, or don’t remember when the class starts. Sometimes they sit around BS-ing or doing something else and suddenly remember a class they had an hour ago. Sometimes they are assigned to teach a class that is completely out of field. I am sure the list is longer.
These are dream scenarios that most of my colleagues and teacher friends over the years have had play out a few days before school starts. The damn dreams seem so real that sometimes they wake up and still worry. In my student days I had the same kind of dreams only they usually involved a math class I registered for but never attended until I had to take the final. Anxiety produces these modest night mares, and after the term starts mostly they go away, until next term. Longevity is no protection, nor is subject matter competence.
Friends in other professions have told me that they, too, have these dreams. Bankers dream of missing money; realtors dream of not being able to find a house for a “sure bet” client; auto sales people suddenly can’t remember where the dealership is or maybe how to drive. Same phenomenon.
So all you teachers, new and old, who are among my friends take heart. You are not crazy and you are not alone. And I can tell you from personal experience that the dreams never stop completely. They abate sometimes, but don’t go away forever. Last night I had an “A&P” dream. And if I remember the time, place and content, I may make it to class sometime somewhere this week.
Image: flickr.com/photos/egalloway/1296924920/

If You aren’t Cheesed Off, you should be.

There are times when it’s better not to know and this is one. Yesterday Afghanistan “donated” a million dollars to Pakistan flood relief. NPR mentioned this in a story about the relief effort. A MILLION DOLLARS of your tax money!!! Where the hell does everybody think the Afghanis GET the money they throw around and steal. Steal? So far more that 3 BILLION DOLLARS in CASH, that’s CASH folks, has openly left Afghanistan on pallets and suitcases (1). American tax dollars or worse, dollars we borrow from the Chinese or some other country.
God this cheeses me off (euphemism alert). The Taliban cut up and kill people, the government openly steals, and soldiers and civilians die.
It is really a catch 22 though, isn’t it? We and NATO leave and the Taliban takes over along with Alcaida, and everything gets worse. We stay and we go broke and Americans die. Who the hell got us into this in the first place, anyway? Oh yeah, Bush. And Obama isn’t making it any better so far.
Sally asked me last night after a series of minor rants (I really must stop that) “isn’t there any good news?” If there is, I don’t see it.
1.http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704638504575318850772872776.html?mod=ITP_pageone_0
Image: www.extravaganzi.com/1-billion-dollars-in-cash/

Guilt and Spirits

I have been mulling over the moccasin incident for two days now. I am troubled by the incident in a way that is new to me. I have quietly meditated on the problem and asked the spirit guides for insight and at first heard only silence. The second time I heard thoughts that seemed to be not my voice. The thoughts were this: “You (addressed to me as if someone/something not me was talking) didn’t give the brother a chance to escape, and you didn’t try hard enough to capture before killing. This was due to your own fear. The brother did not threaten you except by being, and that is not sufficient reason to kill. You will suffer for this for some time to come. You may be forgiven.”
I don’t know the origin of these kinds of thoughts, but I suspect they come from deep inside my own conscience, whatever that is. The alternative answer lies in some other source, a deep and present spiritual source. This morning in the periphery of my vision a grey shape moved quickly away as I contemplated writing this. I think this is the right thing to do and I am sorry to have killed my brother.
Image: cropped photo of brother snake, dead.

Hearing Voices in Your Head?

I do. All the time. I have conversations with myself, and hear music complete with lyrics. I hear dialogue and make up scenarios. I read out loud in my head. What some people think of as “thinking” others call “voices”.
We all think of things in terms of thought or voice or lyric or dialogue. We all practice confronting some uncomfortable situation in our heads. We rehearse speeches and what we will say to someone when needed. This is normal and healthy.
The voices that are unhealthy, if not normal, are those that tell you to do something, or somehow take control of your actions. This is thankfully rare. David Berkowitz, the “Son of Sam” killer is an example of someone who claimed to do things because voices told him to do them (1).
Voices are heard regularly during religious moments and considered normal. The point here? I guess when I write something that includes “hearing” things in my head I get a little uncomfortable thinking that whoever reads what I write will think “now there goes a wacko.” But I think this sort of thing is normal, the difference being that I do admit to having some strange thoughts from time to time. Or maybe the strange part is that I submit my thoughts to public consideration, while most people keep their innermost thoughts, well, inner. There is a certain risk to going public and I don’t have a clue what the motivations for doing so are. It just seems right, and as Davy Crockett is quoted as saying “Be always sure you are right, then go ahead” (2). So I go ahead, thinking in my head that I am right.
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Berkowitz
2. http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Davy_Crockett#Unsourced
Image: http://www.utexas.edu/features/archive/2002/crockett.html

Beautiful Woman Mutilated

Synonym: different words with the same meaning, like Taliban and asshole, or, Taliban and demented sick bastard. The comparison can go on and on. Read on.


Take a good long hard look at this photograph. This woman was found guilty of fleeing abusive in-laws. Her sentence from a local Taliban commander was to have her ears and nose cut off. So they did.
If you ever had any sympathy for those fundamentalist bastards who routinely misuse the Qur’an to justify their miserable existence and pronouncements lose it now. Wiping them off the face of the earth is too good for them. First, unman them. Then uneye them. Then unlimb them. Then say “Have a nice day” and walk off. Am I pissed off? Aren’t you?

Serpent in Paradise

Yesterday as I walked past the French door that opens on to the porch/pool deck I noticed a brownish largeish snake slither under the old coal burning kitchen stove that decorates a wall out there. The stove was my grandmother's, and that tale is for another time. I called Sal to come look, and fetched my Snake Stick (pictured) to catch the critter. CRAP! A genuine moccasin!! Not a brown water snake or Hognose snake. These are often mistaken for moccasins. No, this was the real thing. And, it had just fanged a large skink, now twitching under the stove.
In recent years I have come to understand that living things are no less deserving of life than we are, and so have become more likely to catch and release than squash or kill. Example: Wasp in the house? Catch it in a glass and let it go. Ditto with a fly. Step over bugs or critters on the ground if possible rather than crush them. Catch and move snakes. (I still poison rats in the greenhouse, though, and eat meat too. And I understand the definition of “hypocrisy”.)
But I have a firm agreement with poisonous snakes. I don’t go into their territory to kill or bite, and I don’t want them in mine. Mostly it works. We live in an area criss-crossed with streams and not far from a lake. We have cotton mouths, pygmy rattlers, regular rattlers and copperheads in the watershed. They almost always stay away. And if I see one in the yard or edge, or on the road, I try to move them on. Not so this moccasin. This beauty was inside the screened porch. Inside with lots of plants and pots to hide in. Inside with the pool. Inside for how many days? Just luck that I saw it, instead of getting a bite under the table or when reaching to pluck a dead leaf. I did try to catch it, but couldn't, so I reluctantly shot it. At some level I am still sad, and am working through this with the help of some guides I have in the spirit world. I have written about this in earlier essays if you care to look. Yeah, that’s right: Search? Spirit world? If you know me you know my argument is with Religion, not Spirits. Big difference.
Paradise is again serpent-free (I hope) , and the loose screen found is now fixed. This morning both of us looked very carefully before stepping barefoot onto the porch. And will for some days to come.

The Mysterious Moonflower (Ipomoea alba)

The lush vine twines upward on the fence and as it goes produces large flower buds. These sit there, green and still, waiting for darkness to arrive. Well after the sun goes down one or two buds begin to stir ever so slightly. Then, in less than a minute, a four to six inch flower, pure white, opens to welcome the pollinators of the night. When the first rays of morning begin to lighten the sky, the edges of the flower droop in a kind of flaccid slide, and by full light the flower is a wilted shadow of its former self.
This is the cycle of the Moonflower, a kind of Morning Glory. Night bloomers are really special flowers. They take advantage of all the light of the day to grow but don’t compete for the daytime pollinators. Instead they attract night moths such as the hawkmoth.
I love a mystery, and in looking around for information on this beauty I found a confusing array of both common and Latin names. Numerous Moonflowers are out there. Mine turned out to be currently and probably definitely named Ipomoea alba . But take a look at the synonyms I found:

Synonym:Calonyction album

Synonym:Calonyction aculeatum

Synonym:Calonyction bona-nox

Synonym:Ipomoea noctiflora

Synonym:Calonyction pulcherrimum

This is the kind of thing that gives people headaches. What is it really called? Why the confusion of names? Where is a definitive source for this pretty puzzle? In addition to a mystery I love to ferret around looking for odd things, and this expedition turned out to be easier than I though. The USDA has a plant taxonomy (names and classification) data base called GRIN which stands for Germplasm Resources Information Network. Using DNA analysis and a classification method called Cladistics, the exact relationships of one living thing to another can be assessed. Voila! The statement below is the definitive position of my mysterious plant:

“Though formerly classified as genus Calonyction, species aculeatum, it is now properly assigned to genus Ipomoea, subgenus Quamoclit, section Calonyction.” (1) and my species is alba .

A beauty by any name is still a beauty, and this is one for sure. And, as a bonus, as are most moth pollinated flowers, it is wonderfully fragrant.

1. http://www.ars-grin.gov/cgi-bin/npgs/html/taxon.pl?20135