Lovely Day For a Guinness

250 years ago today Arthur Guinness signed a 9000 year lease for the Saint James Gate Brewery. I think that's worth celebrating. Cheers!

I'm Sick

I hate being sick. Haven't been sick for a couple of years. Aches, pains, coughing, sniffles, fever, the usual stuff. You think I can get away from work? Ha! Had to come in today to take care of a problem. I shouldn't have gotten out of bed but I was climbing ladders and running things. And the commute was fun too. It's 14 degrees out there with a high wind. Feels great. I'll be back to work tomorrow to deal with contractors as well as the usual stuff. As for now, I'm going to bed.

Blah.

All I Want

Is snow plows with frickin' laser beams attached to their frickin' blades. Is that too much to ask?

And to All a Good Night

I wrote a little essay about my troubled relationship with Christmas, but it was so depressing that I decided to drop it in a file. No point bringing everyone else down. As for you, I hope you have a good holiday.

Nuke the Sun!

The sun – man's oldest enemy. It bathes the earth with deadly radiation. It is the principle cause of global warming. It melts the icecaps, causes droughts and dust storms, and blinds those foolish enough to gaze upon it. The sun is a leading cause of cancer, auto accidents, and heat stroke. Today, on this winter solstice, when we are mercifully free of the sun's malevolence for more hours than any other day of the year, I call upon Congress and the President to finally end the the tyranny of Sol, put our military might to constructive purpose, and fulfill our destiny to destroy the sun.

Thank you and good night.

Other Owls, Number Five – Mr. Owl

Yes, that Mr. Owl. Philosopher, pundit, collegian, and corporate shill. Only Mr. Owl has the wisdom to embrace uncertainty. Some would say that by cutting short the experiment by biting into the confection he proved himself unequal to the challenge posed by the boy, but I would defend his actions. First of all, the question was impossible to answer. There can be no final determinant of the how many licks question because of the variables involved. Size, roughness, and wetness of the tongue are just a few of the more significant variables. Mr. Cow*, for example, would surely require fewer licks than, say, Mr. Turtle. By ending the discussion as he did, Mr. Owl pointed out the absurdity of the question. I would also point out that while the spirit of the experiment may have been violated in the view of the boy, Mr. Owl did, in fact, answer the question accurately. Knowing that the answer must be necessarily different depending on the person licking the sweetmeat, he could only give the answer appropriate to his own circumstance. There was nothing in the phrasing of the question that prohibited biting. Therefore, Mr. Owl gave a correct answer in stating that it took only three licks, followed by a bite, to complete the assigned task. Any further effort on his part would be foolish, and Mr. Owl is by no means foolish.



Mr. Owl. Paragon of wisdom and candy fancier.

*And can someone explain Mr. Cow to me? By definition a cow is a female animal, but Mr. Cow is clearly not a female. Who is this gender bending bovine?

The Weird Books Room

Folderol points us to AbeBooks UK's Weird Books Room. Very interesting volumes within. I love the cover for Soldier Bear and find myself intrigued by The Romance of Proctology and Bombproof Your Horse. I was surprised to see one book that I've read. The Social History of the Machine Gun is actually quite good.

Trivial Hoot Seven

OK, so nobody got my last question about a space traveler, but I am undaunted. Here's another space-based challenge. Can you name the first person to take off from the earth in a spacecraft, reach space, and then fly that spacecraft safely back to the surface of our planet?

That should be easy, right?

One Who Hopes

L.L. Zamenhof, inventinto de Esperanto, naskiĝis 150 jaroj antaŭe hodiaŭ.

Feliĉa Naskiĝtago!

Random Passage

Every now and then I run across a passage in a book that just strikes me. Just thought I'd share one with you today.

I'm reading about the Battle of Chickamauga in Shelby Foote's The Civil War. It turned out to be the second bloodiest battle ever fought on American soil, an all-out slugfest along the west bank of the Chickamauga Creek in Georgia.

All morning, here on the Confederate right, the struggle was touch and go, until the beginning was unrememberable and no end seemed possible. All there was was now, a raging fury. When an owl flew up, startled out of a tree by the battle racket, some crows attacked it in flight between the lines. “Moses, what a country!” a soldier exclaimed as he watched. “The very birds are fighting.”

Glenn's Book of Quotes, Number Sixteen

"My belief is that art should not be comforting; for comfort, we have mass entertainment and one another. Art should provoke, disturb, arouse our emotions, expand our sympathies in directions we may not anticipate and may not even wish." -- Joyce Carol Oates

Behold, The Power of Maniacal Hooting

One month ago Maniacal Hooting told you about the Commonwealth's plan to use federal stimulus money to buy Patriot's owner Robert Kraft a footbridge. Now, under pressure from the outraged citizenry, who quite possibly* were inspired by reading this very blog, the government has abruptly changed plans. The Obama administration has told Governor Patrick that using federal money to reward wealthy supporters might not look too good. Huzzah! The day is saved and integrity is restored to government service.

The project, however, will go on. Deval Patrick has said that the state will find alternative public funding to get this footbridge built across Route 1. I suppose you think that means state tax dollars. Silly taxpayer. This is Massachusetts. We'll find a way to get the rest of you to pay for it. That's how we roll.


*The possibility is roughly the same as catching a meteorite on the same day you win the lottery, but it is definitely there.

Descent of Birds

I think I've said it before, but one of the things that I enjoy about the study of birds is the way it illustrates the power and beauty of evolution. It was, after all, by observing finches that Darwin got his first inklings of the grand process. Here's an interesting article about how bird feeders are affecting avian evolution before our very eyes.

Humbug

Left the house at 9:00 on Sunday, got home 13 and a half hours later. Yesterday was better, only 12 and a half hours. Tomorrow will probably be only 12 hours, but Thursday is my day off. I'll probably only work about 5 or 6 hours.

Holiday season.

Phooey.

The Kirk Answer

Jaquandor quite rightly takes me to task by pointing out that I have not yet provided an answer to the last Trivial Hoot. My apologies. November and December are my least favorite months of the year. It's the busy time in my business. I've grown to hate Christmas – but that's a post for another day.

I asked you to name every adult performer who played the role of James T. Kirk on Star Trek. I also warned you that it was trickier than you might think. That eliminates Jimmy Bennett and the uncredited baby held by Jennifer Morrison in the recent movie. We are left with My Three Kirks.

William Shatner, Chris Pine, and Sandra Smith.

Wha?!
Sandra Smith played Doctor Janice Lester, mad scientist and one of Kirk's many former girlfriends in the last (and pretty close to least) of the original episodes, “Turnabout Intruder.” Lester wants to take over the Enterprise (of course) and uses Super Science (of course) to do it. She switches her personality with that of Kirk. For most of the rest of the episode Shatner plays the increasingly hysterical Janice Lester, posing as Kirk, while Smith plays Kirk in a dress.

I told you it was tricky.

Other Owls, Number Four – X the Owl

X, good old X. Not much of a name, I'll grant you, but a very fine fellow nonetheless. X, as I'm sure you know, lives in the Neighborhood of Make-Believe. Neighborhood is something of a misnomer. It is actually a very small kingdom, ruled by a benevolent but absolute monarch, King Friday XIII. The tiny landlocked state has a low birth rate (only two live births have been recored in the last 40 years, one prince and one platypus), but otherwise seems to be a healthy and nurturing environment. The chief export of the area is rocking chairs. The country has no transnational disputes and is considered extremely stable, except for when Lady Elaine Fairchilde causes trouble with her Boomerang-Toomerang-Zoomerang.

X lives in a hollow space in an old oak tree. Unlike most owls, he has a door that covers the opening to his home. The cross beams on the back of the door form an “X,” which is visible when the door is open. It originally was a standard “Z” shaped set, but Handyman Negri, at the request of X, renovated it to be more distinctive.

Living in the same tree is X's neighbor and closest friend, Henrietta Pussycat. She occupies a small house that is secured to a stout branch very near his door. Henrietta has an unusual and somewhat debilitating speech pattern that over the years X has learned to understand. He sometimes acts as her translator. The owl and the pussycat are great friends, and although there have been rumors of a deeper relationship, nothing is known for sure.

X is, I believe, unique in his blue plumage. Most owls have feathers that help them blend into their surroundings, but X has never been one to blend in. He sits in his great tree, a very public owl, always glad to greet a neighbor. Here's to X. Moral exemplar, nifty-galifty owl.

Tales From the Crypt

We spent part of an afternoon at the Museum of Fine Arts this week, mostly looking at the new exhibit, “The Secrets of Tomb 10A.” I've always been a sucker for ancient Egypt, so I had a wonderful time. 10A was the tomb of a governor and his wife who were mummified 4000 years ago. Sometime in the distant past Governor Djehutynakht's tomb was tumbled by grave robbers who made a hash of the place, ripping everything, including the chamber's mummified inhabitants, to bits. In 1915 archaeologists working for the MFA found the place, and the museum has spent decades putting things together. It's really quite fascinating. There were dozens of model boats, some symbolizing the boat that the dead would take on their journey in the afterlife, some representing boats used in funerals, and others of a more pedestrian nature, like kitchen barges (upon which little figures can be seen making beer) and fowling boats, used for hunting. Bits of the canopic jars where there, which surprisingly had feet instead of flat bottoms. Models of people about their work, making bricks or farming, were found near tiny representations of jars, bread, tools, weapons, and walking sticks, symbolically giving the deceased the things he would need in the afterlife.

I found the coffins themselves to be the most interesting. Little things, like the liveliness of the painted birds or the details on the doors painted on the inside were strangely moving and beautiful. Little painterly touches give one a sense of connection to a tomb artist of the Middle Kingdom period. I was reminded of Shelly's "Ozymandias." “Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair! Nothing beside remains.” Nothing of the power of kings and governors lasts, but art, the work of unknown carvers and tomb painters, that lasts and is still charged with power, millennia later.

The richness and complexity of their religion is daunting. It seemed as if every surface of the coffins were decorated or written on. The robbers had broken the governor's coffin apart, affording us a view of the parts that were never meant to be seen, including the places where one panel was attached to another, forming a join. I was struck by the hieroglyphs scratched into the joins of the coffin's panels. They weren't decorated, as they would be unseen, but it was still deemed necessary to write spells here. The inside of the boxes were virtual spell books, giving the dead all the words he would need to proceed safely through the complicated, hazardous, and wonderful life that awaited Egyptians on the other side.

The complexity and diversity with which human culture makes it's efforts to come to grips with the eternal never ceases to fascinate. The ancient Egyptian effort was, perhaps, the richest and most difficult of all. Intertwining mythologies that changed based on what part of the Nile Valley you came from and what century you where there, with century after century layered on top of that, created one of the greatest wonders of mankind – Egyptian religion, and all that it inspired. Remember, when Djehutynakht died the great pyramids had been standing for about five hundred years. In all that time the culture and religion didn't stand still. It kept evolving, changing, and growing. It's only natural that he needed a guidebook.

I wonder, is religion, and all its expressions, the great collaborative art project of every civilization? In attempting to grasp truths beyond our ability to comprehend, are we in fact creating truths and beauty beyond what would otherwise be our ability to create? Looking at the care and skill that those ancient artists lavished on things both simple and beautiful, reading the the prayers and incantations written for the governor, I am moved by the power of belief.

Happy World Television Day

Today is one of the most important days on the United Nations calendar, the day we are to celebrate TV as a medium of “peace, security, economic and social development and the enhancement of cultural exchange.” In solemn commemoration of this august occasion, I will now go watch SportsCenter and then Scooby-Doo.

I Am Jack's Grotesque News Item

When did Tyler Durden get to Peru?

Bumper Sticker Politics, T-Shirt Theology

Do you remember all those T-shirts and bumper stickers from a few years ago that read “01.20.09?” Did you think they were funny? Well I didn't. I thought they were negative and mean spirited. They brought nothing to the debate but acrimony. You want to criticize the president, his party or policies, then fine, do so. But leave the empty-headed negativity to sports, where you can indulge yourself by saying the team from some other town stinks. It's still obnoxious, but at least it doesn't really matter.

Today I read about T-shirts and bumper stickers that say “Pray for Obama: Psalm 109:8” The verse reads “May his days be few; may another take his place of leadership.” I like that one even less. Taken out of context, the verse cited simply calls for another to take his place in the Oval Office, no different than the 01.20.09 signs and the 01.20.13 signs I've already seen. But biblical verses do not exist without context. The next two verses continue: “May his children be fatherless and his wife a widow. May his children be wandering beggars; may they be driven from their ruined homes.”

That isn't even close to funny. It is, in fact, it's a stone's throw from being illegal.

Psalm 109 is a curse, what biblical scholars call an imprecatory psalm. The psalmist calls upon God for help against lying, deceitful enemies who falsely accuse him. He calls down a terrible curse upon those enemies. Its use is nonsensical, as the president, while he may be viewed as an enemy by his political opponents, does not stand accused of bearing false witness against anyone. This disconnect between the quoted verse and the target of the curse suggests a glibness in the use of the Bible that I find to be somewhat distasteful.

Contemplating this, I find myself comforted by another verse -- Proverbs 26:2.

“Like a sparrow in its flitting, like a swallow in its flying,
an undeserved curse goes nowhere.”

Trekgasm

How did I miss this? Bloopers from the most recent Star Trek movie.

Amusing if you are a Trekkie. Otherwise, meh. I, of course, was amused.

My Dear Wormwood

The other day I strolled into my neighborhood bookstore. I had been reading a big history and wanted to take a break, so I was browsing for books that I've always wanted to read but just never got around to. I fell upon The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis. That's been on the giant to-be-read list for a very long time.

As is often the case when I do this sort of thing, I feel a bit of a fool for not having read the book before. Perhaps if I had read Lewis's wisdom years ago I'd have not fallen into error, as I certainly have. On the other hand, when I look back at myself as a youth, I see a pretty sharp guy who lacked a good deal of the wisdom I now have. I'm not sure that I would have taken the lessons this book offers. I'm not sure I would have understood. As Edmund Wilson said, “No two persons ever read the same book.” I am not the same person I once was, and neither, I hope, are you. I've already added Screwtape to my to-be-read-again list to see what a grayer me gets out of it. I think it's a rather nice gift to my future self.

The book is in an epistolary form, made up of letters from Screwtape, a senior demon with an administrative post in Hell, to his nephew Wormwood, a young tempter on his first assignment trying to secure a soul for his master and from God, here described as the Enemy. The central literary conceit is that old notion that every person has a guardian angel and a demonic tempter at his side, whispering advice. I think this personification of our internal dialog can be a useful tool. It can throw light on what might otherwise be dimly realized thoughts. It can help us be more aware of the cognitive distortions that often lead to needless anguish. And it can help us to focus on our healthier notions, the “advice” of our “guardian angels.” One caveat though: if you find yourself coming to believe that the voices in your head are really other people, seek professional help.

The cartoon image of the devil on the shoulder is usually seen as advising big, flashy sins of the seven deadly or ten commandments variety. That's not what Lewis was interested in here. In one letter Screwtape tells his nephew that he should create a feeling of dim uneasiness and a numbness in the heart of his “patient.” He will then no longer need to provide pleasures as temptations. Rather than focusing on work or sleep or prayer, the man will waste his time doing things he neither likes nor dislikes.

You can make him waste his time not only in conversation he enjoys with people whom he likes, but in conversations with those he cares nothing about on subjects that bore him. You can make him do nothing at all for long periods. You can keep him up late at night, not roistering, but staring at a dead fire in a cold room. All the healthy and outgoing activities which we want him to avoid can be inhibited and nothing given in return, so that at last he may say, as one of my own patients said on his arrival down here, "I now see that I spent most of my life in doing neither what I ought nor what I liked". The Christians describe the Enemy as one "without whom Nothing is strong". And Nothing is very strong: strong enough to steal away a man's best years not in sweet sins but in a dreary flickering of the mind over it knows not what and knows not why, in the gratification of curiosities so feeble that the man is only half aware of them, in drumming of fingers and kicking of heels, in whistling tunes that he does not like, or in the long, dim labyrinth of reveries that have not even lust or ambition to give them a relish, but which, once chance association has started them, the creature is too weak and fuddled to shake off.

It's the little sins that seem to get most of us. Self destructive habits, mindlessly wasting the little time that we have, not pursuing real happiness, not being about our work, not doing what we know to be healthy, that's what destroys us. It separates us from God, Lewis says. Our own little tempters don't need to counsel violence when despair will do. If we can't be separated from religion, we can at least be separated from God by focusing our minds on how superior we are as Christians. The Enemy would rather have us focusing on mere Christianity and selfless love of others. According to Screwtape:

The Enemy wants to bring the man to a state of mind in which he could design the best cathedral in the world, and know it to be the best, and rejoice in the fact, without being any more (or less) or otherwise glad at having done it than he would be if hit had been done by another. The Enemy wants him, in the end, to be so free from any bias in his own favour that he can rejoice in his own talents as frankly and gratefully as in his neighbour's talents—or in a sunrise, an elephant, or a waterfall. He wants each man, in the long run, to be able to recognize all creatures (even himself) as glorious and excellent things.

I don't want to leave you with the impression that the book is a collection of nothing but profound insights. It is a form of novel; it tells a story, cleverly and with some humor. Sometimes Lewis uses Screwtape to comment on matters regarding England and her Church, but most often he is writing about things that apply to the universal human condition. I'm already looking forward to reading it again.

Analysis Spock?

Leonard Nimoy on Obama: “There will be people sniping at him for what Dick Cheney referred to as 'dithering.' Well, for Christ's sake, how about giving it some thoughtful process before you send thousands of kids to die? It's painful to watch the political game, them trying to outdo each other, to get political points at the expense of reality and intelligence.”

Logical. Flawlessly logical.

Diabetes Day

Today is World Diabetes Day. So what, you say? Diabetes isn't all that serious, it it?

Here are a few fun facts from the American Diabetes Association. Did you know that “diabetes kills more people in the United States than AIDS and breast cancer combined?” You probably know that the number one killer in America is heart disease, but did you know that “adults with diabetes are two to four times as likely to die of heart disease as those who don't have diabetes.”

More fun facts: “Diabetes is the leading cause of kidney failure.” It is the number one “cause of new blindness in adults ages 20 to 74.” It is “responsible for more than 60 percent of all nontraumatic lower-limb amputations.”

The number of Americans with diabetes is growing. The ADA says that if this growth continues at its current rate, one third of babies born in the US in the year 2000 will eventually develop the disease. For racial and ethnic minorities that prediction jumps to one half.

In a time when we are discussing the cost of health care you might want to know that diabetes takes $174 billion out of the economy every year.

Diabetes is an enormous threat to public health, yet it sometimes seems that no one has noticed. Today would be a good time to learn more, to take action, and to begin to stop diabetes.

11th Month, 11th Day, 11th Hour

My mother grew up in a small town in rural America. She remembers what used to happen every November 11th. At 11:00 AM the church bell would ring the time. People would stop what they were doing. Working, walking, talking, teaching, even driving, it didn't matter. They would stop, stand, and silently commemorate all those who had served in our armed forces. In time, this practice declined.

Today, Americans are freer, safer, and more prosperous than most of the world. If there are any veterans reading this, I'd like to offer you my thanks.

Patriotic Stimulation

A big thank you will soon be due to American taxpayers from our favorite local football team, the New England Patriots. Governor Patrick wants to spend $9,000,000 of stimulus money to build a footbridge that will connect parking lots at Gillette Stadium and the Patriot Place shopping-dining-spa-entertainment-museum-hotel-shooting range-outpatient clinic. This will make it much easier for Pats fans to cross Route One and enjoy the spectacle of their team crushing another foe.

Just a few years ago this would never have been possible. In those dark days the deluded people who ran things in the Commonwealth thought that spending public money on a private investment was an outrage. Government, it was thought, should not be in the business of giving our money away. While other states went into debt to build new stadiums, the leaders of the General Court let it be known that if the Patriots wanted to build a new facility, they would have to do it with their own money. Taxpayers would kick in to widen the highway in the area, but Mr Kraft would have to spend his own money for his new stadium. He did, and it is a very nice place.

Today, we are much more enlightened. Now we know that to stimulate the economy the government should borrow billions of dollars and spend it on all sorts of projects. Besides, it's not like we're paying for it. It will be our children and grandchildren. That, my friends, is change we can believe in. Together, we can give millions to The Kraft Group to stimulate the economy, create jobs, and make game day just a little nicer. Thank you taxpayers. You're all Patriots now.

More Gloom For the Bookstore Business

Waldenbooks says they will close 200 stores after Christmas. That means another 1500 booksellers out of work. When I worked at Waldenbooks it had well over a thousand stores. It will be well under 200 by this spring.

Waldenbooks began in 1933 as a rental library. People who wanted to read popular books would pay three cents a day to borrow them. It was a great business and by the mid-1940s they had over 250 locations. In the 50s the new killer app came out: the affordable paperbound book. Rental libraries, once a vital part of the cultural landscape of America, went the way of the gaslight. Waldenbooks adapted and thrived.

Today's killer apps, ebooks, the internet, and big box bookstores (which won't survive this century either), are too great a change for the now mall-based chain (malls aren't doing so well either). Erstwhile arch-rival B. Dalton is down to just a handful of shops. It is a business model that has outlived its utility.

Pity. I like moderately sized bookstores. I bought my last book in one. But the future is not bright.

The Great Escape

Twenty years ago today something remarkable happened. Something that I always believed would happen but never believed that I'd live to see happen. Twenty years ago today the Berlin Wall came down.

For those too young to remember, the wall separated communist East Berlin from free West Berlin. It was designed to keep the people of the east from escaping oppression. Long, tall, and wide, it was actually a set of parallel walls with a large area between them to afford the guards a clear field of fire. Before the wall some 3.5 million Germans escaped, about 20% of the population of East Germany. After the wall was completed about 5000 Germans escaped. Well over 100 were killed in the attempt.

I am reminded today of something that Mohandis K. Gandhi once said. “When I despair, I remember that all through history the ways of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants, and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it--always.”

Today bits of the wall are displayed all over the world (like this one in California), lest we forget the terrible lesson of history and the irresistible power of the human spirit striving for freedom.

Salute

Charlestown is steeped in history. It was founded 381 years ago and has been officially part of Boston since 1873. It's where the Battle of Bunker Hill was fought. George Washington had trenches dug there as part of the siege of Boston. It has been a tight-knit, mostly Irish neighborhood since the 1860s. The Charlestown Navy Yard has been there for more than two centuries, and it has been the permanent home of the USS Constitution since 1934. Townies take a justifiable pride in their heritage.

About twenty years ago a lot of what we used to call “yuppies” moved into the neighborhood. They were not always welcomed with open arms by the established residents, as it was thought that the newcomers might change the essential character of the place. About ten years ago another wave of upper middle class people began to move in. Condos were built and old buildings were turned into new condos. The newcomers liked the old town. Mostly.

The only blot on their otherwise perfect urban paradise was that ship. Not the view, mind you. Looks great, adds to the resale value and all that. It's the noise. The Constitution is a Navy ship. It is, as you've probably heard, the oldest commissioned warship in the world. Every day, just as it has since 1798, the crew raises the flag in the morning and lowers the flag in the evening. At each ceremony, morning and night, they fire a cannon in salute and play the national anthem. The townies have been setting their watch by it for 75 years.

But the newcomers say it must stop. At the very least not on weekends. And maybe turn down the volume. “Over the summer, we have entertained several times, and we have had guests sit up in shock when the cannon goes off,” the residents wrote. “It has also awakened them at 8 a.m. while they are vacationing and then blasted them again at sunset.”

I feel for them. I do. When you are entertaining your guests, it just doesn't do to have cannon fire when they want to sleep in or enjoy their evening cocktails on the balcony. Certainly not.

I just wonder why, if the sound is such a terrible bother, they moved in next to a ship that has been doing exactly the same thing in exactly the same spot for three quarters of a century?

I would like to suggest a solution. I believe that the problem could be one of the load being fired. The sound would probably be muffled if actual cannonballs were loaded instead of just powder and wadding. They would most profitably be aimed inland, perhaps up on the heights where the newer buildings are located. Such a plan would likely eliminate the source of the problem.

No need to thank me. I'm just glad to help.

Cat Flu

This morning's news brings us word that a cat in Iowa has been infected by the H1N1 virus. This is, of course, terribly serious, especially for the kitty, and a useful warning to infected cat owners. Still, I couldn't help but wonder what John Cleese was doing in Iowa. Apart from being a full-time stapling machine, of course.

Trivial Hoot Six

Great googly moogly. It's been way too long since I did one of these trivia things. Number five was during the summer. That time I asked if anyone knew whose sarcophagus was pictured. David Rupp nailed it. An unheard of Triple Hoot to David, the king of maniacal trivia! The answer was Captain John Paul Jones.

I'll stick with the captains but this time go all Star Trekkie on you. Name every adult performer who has played the role of James T. Kirk on Star Trek. By “on Star Trek” I mean official, canonical Star Trek, not parody Kirks, not fan-made Kirks, but real, official James T. Kirks on real, official Star Treks.

Who played Kirk? It's a trickier question than you might think.

Some Are More Equal Than Others

Yesterday Maine voters rejected the idea that the law should apply equally to homosexual and heterosexual people.

I'd like a law that says that no State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Too radical? Yeah, such a law would probably never pass, at least not in today's America. Pity.

Glenn's Book of Quotes, Number Fifteen

"Fools show their anger at once,
but the prudent ignore an insult." -- Proverbs 12:16

I told you that I'd give you one from the Book of Proverbs. It's pretty solid advice too. Folks who walk around with a chip on their shoulder seldom come to good ends. I've seen a lot of hotheads make a bad situation worse. Keep your cool. This has been a public service announcement from the Committee to Keep You From Making a Fool of Yourself.

Proverbial Wisdom

The Book of Proverbs is a great read, chock full of useful and interesting, um, well, proverbs. Lots of it still speaks to us today. Some of it, not so much. I re-read it the other day and added several lines to my famous Book of Quotes, which I may share later.

It got me thinking about various attempts over the years to produce a gender-neutral translation of the Bible. Proverbs makes clear the futility and folly of the effort. Like a lot of the books of the Old Testament, it is an anthology of writings and wisdom stitched together as one volume, often reflecting different styles and points of view. Much of Proverbs is intended to be advice to a young man about to enter adulthood. The proverbs are intended to remind the fledgling of the way he must follow and the things he must avoid to lead a good life. Some of it is advice on choosing the right sort of wife and avoiding the wrong sort of woman. Trying to pretend that these lessons were intended to be universal takes it out of its context and strips it of meaning. Taking instructions to a young Jewish man of a couple of millennia ago and finding universal wisdom in them is a valuable exercise, but trying to do that in a translation is a mistake.

While the core message of the text is that the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom, it expands upon that to give advice about not ruining your life by breaking societal taboos. We all know that coveting your neighbor's wife is one of the top ten sins, but it can also lead to a whole lot of messy problems here below. There are several admonitions against giving in to the wicked wiles of your neighbor's wanton wife. I found the advice of 6:25-26 to be particularly interesting:

Do not desire her beauty in your heart,
and do not let her capture you with her eyelashes;
for a prostitute's fee is only a loaf of bread,
but the wife of another stalks a man's very life.

Yes, if you are sorely tempted by a married woman, the Bible's advice is to get yourself a prostitute. This sort of thing tends to create difficulties for people who argue that the Bible is the inerrant word of God and that every passage therein can be used as a guide to life. It is filled with little contradictions. Several other passages condemn those who patronize the oldest profession. Proverbs 29:3 tells us that

A child who loves wisdom makes a parent glad,
but to keep company with prostitutes is to squander one's substance.

Oh darn. I was all set to go check out the naughty pages on Craigslist.

I'm interpreting the meaning of these apparently contradictory proverbs as being that while both are sins, one of them is far worse as it could cost you your very life (few prostitutes have dangerously jealous husbands). I could be wrong about that. Bear in mind --

One who is clever conceals knowledge,
but the mind of the fool broadcasts folly. (12:23)

I have a lot more to say about the proverbs, but perhaps I should just keep it to myself. Don't want to look too foolish.

Happy Birthday Ursula K. Le Guin

In the extraordinarily unlikely event that Ursula K. Le Guin reads this, I'd like to wish her a happy 80th birthday today. Thank you for Earthsea. Thank you for the Hainish novels. Thank you for the ansible. Thank you for The Left Hand of Darkness, The Dispossessed, The Word For World is Forest, The Lathe of Heaven, Catwings, and “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas.”

In the likely event are not Ursula K. Le Guin, and if you have not yet discovered her, I urge you to get yourself a birthday present.

The End is Nigh

Fourteen years ago I was working in a bookstore. I had been a bookseller for several years and I would be a bookseller for several more. Our store was pretty new. Business was good. Our company and its biggest competitors were growing quickly. I thought the future was bleak.

“The end is nigh,” I told my co-workers. “What we think of as the traditional bookstore, a clean and well-lit place that offers a variety of books for sale at prices the average person can afford, is a twentieth century invention. It's had a good run, but it won't survive the coming century.”

I had been to the mountaintop. I had seen the growth of cell phones (I didn't have one yet). I had seen the internet (I had just gotten hooked up myself). “One day,” I predicted, “we will all carry around little electronic tablets. They will have screens that are so much better than the glass tubes we use today that it will be like reading on paper. They will have built-in telephones and internet connections. When we want a book we'll just log onto the bookselling website, transfer the funds to them electronically, download the text, and we'll be reading the book in minutes, anywhere, anytime.” I was a prophet of doom.

This morning I read that competition (oh that dratted free market) has continued to drive down the price and improve the quality of the little electronic tablets. I don't see how my prediction can fail to come true. Eventually the tablets will be all-in-one devices; telephone, music player, notebook computer, portable library, GPS, camera, health monitor, and probably force field, air purifier, and Soylent Green dispenser. What was bad news for music stores and the folks who made film is now bad news for bookstores and the neighborhood Soylent shop.

I sometimes miss working in bookstores, but I'm glad I got out when I did. I'm usually not all that good at predicting the future, but this time it looks like I nailed it.

Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

Happy Global Handwashing Day! At first it seemed strange to me that there is a day to promote handwashing that is supported by the UN, the US government, and the World Bank. What's next, Wear a Coat When it is Cold Day? How about International Don't Play in Traffic Day?

Then I looked around and realized that there are a lot of people who never got message. In the developing world folks are dealing with grinding poverty and a host of other problems, so they may have missed this particular lesson. Here in the west I see people in rest rooms who don't bother with the sink. I'm not sure that they have any excuse, but that doesn't mean that they're irredeemable. Here at Maniacal Hooting we like to do our part to make the world a better place, so I now present the following public service message on the occasion of Global Handwashing Day.

Wash your hands.

Thank you. That is all.

All Work and No Play

In case you're wondering where I've been, the answer is work. Or sleeping. Work, eat, sleep. Not exactly the most balanced life, but sometimes you don't get a choice.

Things should be back to what passes for normal soon.

Best Music Review. Ever.

"The opening section, 'From Dawn to Midday at Sea,' begins with the plaintive call of the oboe, announcing the rising sun. The English horn and the trumpet answer in a minor key, as if to say, 'Thanks for the tip, asshole.'"
via

A Thousand Points of Darkness

Happy Banned Books Week!

Check out this interesting map of book bans and challenges in America. Don't see your hometown yet? Want to put it on the map? Head down to your local library and challenge something. Pick out something you feel like objecting to, or just use this handy list. And thank you for protecting us from books.

It Takes a Graveyard

Neil Gaiman is killing me.

Sometimes, when I read a good book, I am inspired to take metaphorical pen to paper and do a bit of writing myself. “Oh,” I say to myself, “I see what that writer did there. That's great. I'll bet I could do something like that, but make it my own.” Reading, you see, fuels writing.

Then I read Neil Gaiman. “Oh, I say to myself, “that is brilliant. I could never even come close to that.” That's it, pen down, muse drops dead.

This summer I read The Graveyard Book. It has won a boatload of awards, it is brilliant, and yes, I could never even come close to it. And neither could you (unless you happen to be Neil Gaiman, which is pretty unlikely).

Written to be enjoyed by younger readers, it tells the story of Bod Owens, a boy whose parents are murdered, is adopted by ghosts and is raised in a graveyard. That's all I'm going to tell you. The rest you're going to need (and I mean that) to read for yourself. The characters are wonderful and the story is both affecting and exciting. Gaiman takes established elements of fantasy and horror and has quite a bit of fun with them. The prose is suffused with mystery, menace, and magic, balanced by humanity, friendship, and love.

I was pleased to read that the writing of this little volume took Gaiman a long time and was a lot of work. The thought that this was the product of one or two drafts would have been too much to bear. I suppose the encouraging lesson to take from that is that writing is a craft and that if you work at it you can produce good stuff. But it probably doesn't hurt to be a genius too.

Other Owls, Number Three – Nite Owl

Okay, so this guy isn't really an owl. But I like him.
This is Dan Dreiberg, better known as Nite Owl from Watchmen by Allan Moore and Dave Gibbons. If you only know Watchmen as a movie, you have missed out. It is one of the best books I've ever read. Nite Owl is a character who resonates with the comic book geek that I used to be. An intelligent guy who becomes what he admires most, a costumed crime fighter. Batman became Batman because of an obsession; to avenge the murder of his parents and to terrify the criminal underworld as he had been terrified as a child. Nite Owl became Nite Owl because he wanted to dress up like a bird and do good, flamboyantly. In fact, as we learn in the book, it is only when Dreiberg is behind his mask and fighting evil does he feel fully himself and fully a man. It's a little pathetic and, to me, touching.
Putting the abnormal psychology aside, Nite Owl is a pretty cool superhero. He's broadly in the Batman mold as has no super-human powers but relies on his brains, an array of amazing gadgets, and a gigantic bankroll. His greatest gadget is the Owlship, which he calls Archie (short for Archimedes, the owl in The Sword and the Stone). One of the greatest rides ever, it flew and floated with no visible means of support, was a good thing to have in a fight, and was a total chick magnet.
So here's to Dan Drieberg, for dressing up like an owl and fighting bad guys. How cool is that?

That Old Time Religion

One of the intriguing things about reading the Bible is the very ancientness of it. It's a little glimpse into the life of a vibrant, interesting tribe of people as they lived thousands of years ago. That alone would make it a fascinating read, even without the fact that it is the most influential book in western civilization. I've been thinking about the Book of Psalms lately. Imagine singing psalms in the Second Temple. Some of them would have been contemporary. Some of them had been sung hundreds of years ago in exile in Babylon, and some would have been sung hundreds of years before that in the First Temple. You would have felt connected by song, ceremony, and ritual to your whole community, the living and the dead going back more than a thousand years.

I wonder what those ceremonies were like. Had you been in Jerusalem, say 2200 years ago, what would you have seen and heard in the Temple? We'll never know for sure. What was the music like? How did they dance, play, and sing? What were the rituals, the gestures and actions, the stagecraft, if you will, of faith? The psalms themselves sometimes give us tantalizing little clues.

Psalms 75, 76, and 77 include instructions at the beginning like “To the leader: with stringed instruments,” “according to Jeduthun,” or “Do Not Destroy.” The meaning of the first one is obvious, the other two might be something like saying “to the tune of . . .” My favorite bit of instruction is in Psalm 118. This one has what many scholars consider to be a textual error. It's going along normally when the poetry suddenly stops making sense. Check out verses 26 and 27:

Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the LORD.
We bless you from the house of the LORD.
The LORD is God,
and he has given us light.
Bind up the festal procession with branches,
up to the horns of the altar.

Those last two lines don't make any sense. They are singing the name of the Lord, blessing someone “from the house of the LORD,” that is the Temple, and then, what? What do those two lines mean?

Did you ever read a play? You'll notice that the dialog is interspersed with written stage directions. This is likely the same thing, but in this case a bit of liturgical direction has gotten mixed into the verse. It looks like a transcription error, a biblical boo-boo. Read it this way and you can try to imagine what it must have been like. The choir is singing, blessing the one who comes, probably with a festal sacrifice. They sing that the Lord has given us light. Perhaps one of the priests stokes up the fire at that point. Then the priests would bind the sacrifice to the altar. The song continues:

You are my God, and I will give thanks to you;
you are my God, I will extol you.

Which seems an appropriate verse for a sacrifice.

Interesting isn't it? Those two odd lines might just be giving us a glimpse into a ceremony that was centuries old when Jesus was born.

There are a few other psalms that I find particularly intriguing. Psalm 6, which is sung with stringed instruments; “according to The Sheminith,” whatever that was, is a lament and a prayer for healing. The first seven verses recount the psalmists miseries and ask God for help.

I am weary with my moaning; every night I flood my bed with tears;
I drench my couch with my weeping.
My eyes waste away because of grief; they grow weak because of all my foes.

Suddenly, everything is different.

Depart from me, all you workers of evil,
for the LORD has heard the sound of my weeping.
The LORD has heard my supplication; the LORD accepts my prayer.

What happened between those two verses? I wonder if there was some sort of ritual done at this point to indicate God answering the prayer. Something we can only imagine but can never really know. The psalms were not dry literature or poems quietly read, but an integral part of a vibrant religious service.

Can you hear the celebration of Psalm 150?

Praise him with trumpet sound; praise him with lute and harp!
Praise him with tambourine and dance; praise him with strings and pipe!
Praise him with clanging cymbals; praise him with loud clashing cymbals!

This was a loud, singing, dancing, fervent musical of a sabbath.

Not all of the psalms were quite this joyful. Psalm 51, for example, clearly comes from the time when the people of Israel were captives in Babylon. The Temple of Solomon had been destroyed. The traditional sacrifices could not be made, the traditional rituals could not be performed.

For you have no delight in sacrifice; if I were to give a burnt offering, you would not be pleased.
The sacrifice acceptable to God is a Broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

It ends with a prayer that the Lord will allow the sacred city of Jerusalem to be rebuilt so that He would again “delight in right sacrifices, in burnt offerings and whole burnt offerings.” The people yearned for the rituals of their fathers.

Who can blame them? Imagine singing and dancing in the Temple, the spiritual home of your people, the physical nexus of your covenant with God, when number 100 is the song of the day.

Make a joyful noise to the LORD, all the earth.
Worship in the LORD in gladness; come to him in singing.
Know that the LORD is God.

It must have been wonderful.

Now Pitching, Ahab

I just saw this over at the NYT. Literary baseball t-shirts – absolutely must have. They're not taking orders just yet, but I can wait. Perhaps a Thoreau or a Poe for me and a Prynne for my friend.

Waiting, Flying, Waiting

Oh man am I pooped. I've been on a business trip this week. Those things always tire me out, but the killer was the ride home. My second flight of the night was supposed to take off at 9:15 and land in Boston around 10:30. No such luck. At about 9:30 someone from the flight deck announced that there would be a delay.

“Aaaaaah, we've got a light on the panel that's not supposed to be on, and aaaaaah, we're having maintenance check that out, we'll see if we can, aaaaaaaah, get underway shortly.”

Something about jet pilots, they all do that aaaaaaaah thing.

Round about 10:00 the stewardess tells us that it is an electrical problem and that they are trying to repair it. If they can't, we may have to get on another plane. Guess what?

“Aaaaaaah, the aircraft has a major electrical problem, the safest way to fix it is to entirely replace a component. That part is in Atlanta, so aaaaaaaaah, we're going to aaaaah, move to another airplane.”

Anyway, we take off about 15 minutes after we were scheduled to land. It wasn't too bad. The passengers took it all with good humor, the stewardesses were very nice, and once we finally got into the air the flight was smooth.

By the time I got back to terra firma the T, our local mass transit system, was running at its absolute slowest. A bus, two trains, and a long wait in a station later, I was back home, at 1:30 this morning. Oof.

By the way, the best leg of the trip was getting to the big international airport that I spent so much time in. I started from a small local airport that is surrounded by farmland. From the waiting room you can see the control tower and two silos. I guess that's why they called it barnstorming. I caught a Cessna out of there. It was less crowded than the jet I would be uncomfortably waiting in later. In fact, I was the only passenger. The view was very nice for a few minutes. Then we got into the clouds. We flew through a little storm. Nothing bad, just some rain and wind. The little plane bounced and and bucked. If it weren't for the seatbelt I probably would have tumbled from my chair a couple of times. It was kind of fun.

I've never been a big fan of roller coasters. You get jumbled around, you experience g-forces, and for all that you end up where you started. In a little propeller driven airplane going through storm clouds you get the jumbled around part, but you don't have the heavy g-force, you get to see the sun streaming through the clouds above, below, and around you, and when the ride is over you're in another town.

It's good to be home. I'm going back to bed.

Requiem

Lynn asked for a story about alien violins. It got me thinking, so I dashed off this little thing.

Tony cradled the instrument in his arms. It fit as if it had been made to rest there. The ship had docked twenty minutes ago and he had been waiting to see the commissioner since he got on board. He could wait.

Caruthers strode briskly into the room. “Congratulations. I see you've had some success.”

Tony looked at him quizzically.

“They gave you one of their violins. That's got to mean something. And linguistics is thrilled by how much more of the language you've worked out. I was right to send you.”

“They didn't give it to me.”

“Oh? You were still the best team for the job. Husband and wife, xenologist and musician. Just the right people to study these beings.”

Tony looked at the violin. He was sitting, the bow on the table in front of him. Caruthers sat down facing him.

“Look, uh, I'm sorry about Judith. How long ago was the accident?”

“Four months. We had only been here six weeks when it happened.”

“So you've been alone here all that time.”

“Not alone.”

“No, of course, you've been with them, the Londi. What does it mean, by the way, their name for themselves?”

“I'm not sure about the translation. The nearest I can come is 'keeper.'”

“I see,” he said, not sure that he did. “Well then, you've made some good progress on the language. Hoboken was particularly interested in their music. Did Judith learn anything much about that before . . .”

“Before she died. No, not really. It was what we focused on at first. We'd listen to them play for hours. Every musician playing a unique tune, all beautiful in their own way, but all clearly in the same genre. Totally alien, but eerily familiar. We'd listen to their performances, solo and in groups, we'd record and play them back, but Judith could make nothing of them. She said that the musical system they use is completely unfamiliar, and very complex, but for all that it is still moving, still beautiful.

“We worked on it for weeks. I moved ahead with basic linguistics and made cultural observations, but everything seemed to center on what we called the violins. After a while I began to wonder how they are made.” He took up the straw-yellow bow and held it over the deep green violin, as if he were about to play. After a moment he put the bow down on the table again. “I had gone to ask about that very thing when it happened.”

His head was bent down, as if he were staring at the table top. Caruthers wanted to interrupt, wanted to get him back on track, but he didn't.

“She just tripped. On a step. A slip and fall. What's the worst that can happen? A bad bruise? A sprained wrist? A stupid little accident. No sense.” His eyes were filling with tears. “We travel hundreds of light years. We put down on an alien planet, live among a new species, only the eleventh intelligent life-form we've found. Exotic, amazing, exciting. We're the couple on the recruiting poster. 'See the universe, discover new life, be a pioneer.' All that, and she dies in a household accident? Why?”

“I don't know Tony. It doesn't make any sense.”

“No. I didn't understand. But the Londi, they seemed to. They understood my pain. In mourning, we finally had something universal, something we both understood.”

“They understood mourning? That was some key to understanding?”

“Yes. They talked to me. They showed me how they make the violins.”

“Good.”

“Beautiful, isn't it? Notice how the deep color lightens as you move up the fingerboard? Look at the way it's shaped. All curves. No straight lines, not a flat surface or a sharp angle on it. It seems to flow, as if it were in motion, even though it is still.”

“Yes, they look as beautiful as they sound.” Caruthers waited for Tony to continue, but he seemed lost in thought. “So, uh, they showed you how to make them?”

“At first, I thought it was just a funerary rite. When we were on Silaris a tribal elder died. They built a fantastic boat with great gray sails, laid him on the deck, and sent it out during a storm. When we were part of the contact team on Trimania we learned that the dead were boiled in a mild acid, cleaning the bones of all flesh. Once every sixteen days for the rest of the year relatives open the tomb and wash the bones. I thought it was a Londi ceremony, nothing more. I was touched that they grieved with me.

“They helped me bury her. A little more than three feet down, no box, just Judith, in the rich, black soil. We buried her slowly, gently, one handful at a time. And right there, right over her heart, I placed the bulb.

“It was a little violet thing, half the size of my fist. When the all the soil was in place, we watered it. Tears, of course, but more. Her grave was like a mud pie.” He smiled slightly at the thought.

“Some sort of symbolism perhaps? Water of life?”

“I thought the same. Even in mourning, even then, I was still a xenologist. But no, not symbolic. Practical.

“In a few days the plant sprouted. It grew surprisingly fast. In a week it was a meter tall. In two, it began to twist. They showed me how to tend it, how to direct the growth so that it finally grew into the proper shape. This shape.”

“The violin? The instrument is grown? Any craft work? Whittling, cutting, sanding? What about the strings?”

“No. When it reaches it's final shape the stalk is cut, and that's all. The strings grow right where they are. You have to tend it carefully to make sure that they grow where you want them, but they do grow.”

“And they grew it over the grave. Why?”

Tony didn't answer. Not at first. He picked up the violin, the neck in his left hand, the base of it pressed against his chest. He took the bow in his right and drew it across the strings.

He had never been particularly musical. Not like Judith. Judith loved music, and she was good at it. But now he played, and the music was wonderful.

Judith had been a sad and lonely little girl. Alone much of the time with a drunken father and an emotionally distant mother, she had escaped into her studies. In her whole life she had never seen a happy marriage and didn't think they existed. Then she met Tony. Tony brought joy, enthusiasm, and unconditional love into her life. Her adult life was as different from her childhood as a lake is from a desert.

In time she felt that something was missing, something she needed but couldn't name. It was Tony's idea at first. She had never wanted, never dreamed that she would want to bring life into the universe. Now she knew. She wanted to be a mother. She wanted to make a baby with Tony, to have the family that she never had before. It would be soon, they would start right after this mission. They would take a leave to start their family. She loved the child, yet unborn, not yet conceived. The image of it was her great joy.

All this, all this and more, was in the music that came from the violin. Caruthers had only ever met Judith in passing; he barely remembered her, but now he felt all this, her joy, her pain, her dreams, her love, her yearning, hopes, prayers, tears, and desires. It was all there, in the loud, soft, soaring, simple, rich, vibrant music that Tony drew from the violin.

Caruthers thought of himself as a hard man, a tough man. He wasn't used to crying, certainly not in front of other people, but now he did. He looked into Tony's eyes as the music ended and he felt the man's loss.

“The music, it's . . .” He wasn't sure what he was going to say.

“It's their souls. The Londi play the souls of their dead, all their lives, and long after.” For a long minute he held the instrument close to him, then raised the bow and began again.

Divided We Fall

Today Barack Hussein Obama, a secret Muslim from Kenya, began his plan of indoctrinating American children in the tenets of radical socialism and laid the groundwork for a Hitler Youth-like mobilization of our kids.

That would be a funny sentence, if only you couldn't hear pretty much the same thing being said in seriousness by rather a lot of my fellow Americans. I just want to pause for a moment and ask something.

What the hell? Seriously, what the hell has happened to people? The President of the United States wants to speak to school children about the value of education and hard work. How can this be controversial? He is our chief of state. He speaks for our country. Whether you agree with him on the issues or not, whether you even like him or not, he deserves respect and polite deference. It is, or used to be, the American Way.

Back in the 1950s there was a children's TV show called The Small Fry Club. Every weekday host Big Brother Bob Emery would lead kids in a toast (with milk) to President Eisenhower. Once upon a time our youth were taught about courtesy, respect, and good citizenship. In time this practice declined. With it, I fear, so has America.

Back in 1988 President Reagan spoke to a group of school children. His talk touched on such issues as free enterprise, open markets, and low taxes. The speech was broadcast to schools around the country on three different days. There were no protests, there was no controversy. The leader of the free world wanted to speak to children. It was only right and proper that he do so.

Things stared to go sour back in 1991. Then President George H.W. Bush spoke to America's kids urging them to stay in school, stay off drugs, and don't become hoodlums or whatnot. America, on the whole, thought nothing of it, naturally enough. But a few political leaders of the opposition criticized him for his “political advertisement.”

As the 90s wore on things got worse. The right absolutely hated Bill Clinton. They threw every bit of mud they could scrape up at him. It was nasty. But I didn't think that American civility was dead. In my naivety I thought this had more to do with Clinton being the type of man that he was than any serious change in the “American Way.” Clinton, after all, played hardball politics harder than most and made a lot of mortal enemies. Since he was a flawed human being with a penchant for lying and obfuscation, he became a pretty easy target and a polarizing figure. I thought that once he left office things might revert to normal.

Silly me. During the Bush Administration the concept of civility and polite deference to the president died an altogether ugly death. Bush was a monkey, Bush was a Hitler, Bush was evil, stupid, venal, traitorous, and America's greatest enemy. He was either behind the 9/11 attacks or knew about them in advance and did nothing to stop them. In a few cases anti-Bush hysteria reached levels of criminality. Bush campaign headquarters were vandalized. People were intimidated. Tolerance for people with different points of view was no longer a virtue. It was a weakness.

But Bush too was a polarizing figure. Perhaps, I thought, when he passed from the scene things would calm down. Obama came into office as an inspiring figure, the best communicator to hold the job in twenty years. The problems we face together are serious. American political debate has always been passionate, vigorous, and acrimonious, but now, I thought, the madness can come to an end.

And again, silly me. Anti-Bush fervor sowed the wind. Now we reap the whirlwind. Those who said that the president stole the election have been replaced by those who say that the president is not a citizen. Those who said that the president allowed 9/11 have been replaced by those who say that the president has a secret pro-Islamist agenda. Those who said that the president was a fascist have been replaced with those who say that the president is a socialist. And those who said that the president is a new Hitler have been replaced by those who say that the president is a new Hitler.

It is the ultimate in hardball politics and demagoguery. Anything that the other side does is not simply wrong; it is evil, stupid, or both. American politics is now a zero-sum game. Anything that could be counted as a win for one side is a loss for the other. Can we compromise? Impossible. What is best for America? Insignificant.

Who says that it's time to back off from the precipice? Laura Bush, for one. What really got me thinking about this (and breaking my own rule about political blogging again; perhaps it is time that I admit that it is a silly rule) was this editorial in that radical lefty rag, Forbes:

Call me naïve, but I believe that Americans ought to accord their president a formal, ex officio respect, irrespective of party affiliation. He is, after all, the president of all of us (whether we like him or not), and it is unseemly that we should withhold civility from him on grounds of political disagreement. As things stand, no blow seems low enough, no criticism off limits, if the president happens to be from the other side. The pursuit of happiness has given way to the pursuit of picayune point-scoring.

I'm beginning to think that it is too late. Crazy days are here to stay. A demand for fairness, moderation, and civility does not seem to be building up in our country. I see a growing dissatisfaction with politics and a desire to reject both parties, but I see nothing to replace the current model. The leaders of the right will stop any serious medical insurance reform so the left can't score a win. The leaders of the left will demand prosecution of officials from the former regime (and guess what will happen when the balance of power shifts again?). Their followers scream at each other and occasionally come to blows. And nobody seems to care that they are fighting in a burning house.

August 32

Did you have a good Mootday? We sure did. The traditional Mootday Breakfast of cold cereal and milk was enlivened this year with the addition of dried raspberries. And there was much rejoicing.

The annual discussion of a possible Mootday Parade was glorious. Several bands were discussed, including one fairly exciting high-stepping troupe of youths, as well as the famous Top Secret Swiss Drum Corps and at least one band that featured a cello section. Ragtime and klezmer musicians would be included. There would be acrobats and a guy on stilts, but clowns were to be excluded. This ban extended to professional politicians.

After the parade people retired to their front porches, where lemonade, iced tea, or good beer was consumed. Some chose to stroll through the park and sit on the grass. Ice cream vendors nearly ran out of cones. Jimmies were plentiful. In the evening diners, clam shacks, and roast beef joints were all crowded with hungry celebrants. The relative merits of fireworks were discussed. Most agreed that the ones that look sort of like chrysanthemums were pretty.

Mootday

Once I spent some time at a place where it was part of the routine to fill out forms. One of the routine forms was a log that recorded a couple of daily events. Running down one side of the form was a column of boxes labeled “date.” Once every few weeks we'd get to the bottom of one form and start afresh with another. Someone would usually fill out all of the dates in the appropriate column. One day I noticed that one of my colleagues had done this task. “8/28, 8/29, 8/30, 8/31, 8/32, 9/1, 9/2 . . .,” it now read.

I wondered about this. Was there a day I was missing out on? I couldn't remember having ever worked on August 32. Was there a holiday I was missing out on? I turned to the World Wide Interweb to see what I could find out. Turns out I had been missing something. There was a book about August 32. There was a movie. It is of some importance to the music industry. But there is not a lot of information about the glorious 32nd of August.

It seems to be a relatively blank page on the calendar. Before someone comes along and makes it a workday or a national day of remembrance or some such unpleasant thing, someone should claim August 32 as a holiday. As the foremost authority available, the task has fallen to me.

I declare August 32 to be Mootday. Mootday shall have no significance. No work shall be done on Mootday as it wouldn't matter if it did, so why bother? Take it easy, engage in theoretical discussions, have a drink, sit in a park, listen to birds, and just have a reasonably pleasant time.

Mark your calendars now. Happy Mootday.

Protecting The Public From Books

Bibliophile Bullpen's aching head nearly explodes after seeing this report about how the Brooklyn Public Library has locked up a book in a vault so that it cannot contaminate the public with its dangerous words and pictures.

I suppose we should redefine librarians as our protectors. The new librarians will stand on the thin black and white line that separates the public from dangerous literature. They will keep us safe from disturbing thoughts, offensive ideas, and unpleasant images. Welcome, my friends, to the twenty-first century.

As I read the article it occurred to me that it must get pretty warm in that vault on a hot day like today. I imagine that the temperature gets troublingly close to 451 degrees Fahrenheit.

A Haunted House

Christopher Golden is a nice guy. I've met him a couple of times and he is always decent, friendly, graceful, interesting, and an all around good person to hang with. He's also a good guy to read if you like horror and dark fantasy. When I read his first novel, Of Saints and Shadows, I thought it was pretty good. Not great. Flawed, but lots of fun. In time he grew as a writer. Later novels like The Ferryman and Strangewood blew me away. He's probably better known for the many media tie-in books he's written, but the fact is the dude can write.

Wildwood Road is . . . well, it's a ghost story, sort of. A haunted house story, sort of. It starts with a guy driving his wife home from a party. She has, uncharacteristically, had a little too much to drink and is asleep in the backseat. It's late and his eyelids are getting heavy. As he drives through the dark and twisty country road he sees, at the last moment, a little girl in his path. He barely misses her. Being a nice guy he stops. The little angel is out in the middle of nowhere, probably lost. He gives her a ride home, which is farther than he expected and around a lot more twists and turns. She directs him to a dark, creepy old house. She says thank you and bye and leaves. He follows, just to make sure everything is okay. It's pretty late at night after all. The house seems to be run down. He knocks. No answer. He steps in. No one to be seen. But there are sounds. And there are smells. He hears the laughter and footsteps of children. He gets confused. His experience in the house is strange and dreamlike, then frightening. He hears the little girl's voice. “Come find me,” she says.

After this everything changes. Golden give us believable characters that we like and care about, then he puts them though the ringer. He injects a powerful element of creepiness into their comfortable suburban lives. This is a scary story, but not so much because of the supernatural elements. I usually don't find supernatural horror to be all that frightening because goblins don't really exist. The boogyman isn't much of a threat in our all too frightening real world. Wildwood Road is truly disturbing. What is threatened here is more than a bite on the neck, a trip to heck, or mere death. What is at stake here is the very nature of ourselves, our minds, memory, sanity, and cognition. This is more than a little spooky.

So this is a recommendation and a warning. Read Wildwood Road if you want a good horror story, but know that you may find it to be, well, haunting.

The Power of Quantum Flux

Interesting article about how a writer used a literary device to improve his science fiction novel. I think I might try something like this next time I get a spot of writer's block.

Note: a variation on this technique could also work for the fantasy genre.

Trivial Hoot Five

In our last occasional installment I asked where you might find a certain list of supplies. It didn't take David long to crack that one. It was, in fact, the inventory of a survival kit in a B-52 flying into the Soviet Union in the 1964 classic Dr. Stangelove. It was read off by Slim Pickens who played the unforgettable Major Kong. David is now an official double-certified smart person and gets a double hoot from yours truly.

This is going to be a tough one. It's another in our series of visual-historical questions. Take a look at this rather ornate sarcophagus.


Quite a thing isn't it? You may want to click to embiggen. This is the final resting place of a famous dead person. The question is, who?

CNR Kicks Blank

I can personally verify that every statement made in this video is the simple, unadorned truth. The man was all that and a bag of chips.
via: Bits and Pieces

I Now Possess Complete World Knowledge

Faithful readers of the weblog know that I recently read a book that compiled fictional diseases. This, while very informative, was hardly adequate. What I sought was a volume that would provide me with complete world knowledge, a compendium of the most important and useful facts possible, facts that are entirely made up. Where could I turn for such a thing? I immediately thought of the guy who plays the PC in those Mac vs. PC commercials. He looked like a fellow who might just be able to create an almanac of invented facts that would satisfy my requirement. I was, needless to say, correct.

When John Hodgman isn't shilling for Apple Corporation he is busy as a noted wordsmith, correspondent for the Daily Show, and all around witty person. He has, for the benefit of you and me, brought together a remarkable collection of knowledge in the areas of his expertise that he has titled, appropriately, The Areas of My Expertise. The areas that he refers to is, of course, complete world knowledge of facts that are his invention. I can say, without hesitation, that John Hodgman is the world's leading authority on facts made up by John Hodgman. It is for this reason that I recommend this book on the subject and no other.

Why, you may ask, would you want to learn facts that are wholly fictional? Would you not be better off learning facts that are, in fact, factual? Don't be foolish. Factual facts are boring, pedantic, pedestrian things. Fictional facts are scintillating, interesting, and other attractive adjectives. A standard almanac can tell you when the moon will be in its various phases. Mr. Hodgman can tell you how these phases will affect different types of were-beings. A standard book on deportment might tell you how much to tip a bellman, but this book can tell you how much to tip the hotel phrenologist. Milady's Standard textbook may help you get through barber college, but wouldn't you rather learn about discredited hair styles like the Napoleon Hat or the Spitting Cobra. Of course you'd like to learn the dark secrets of professional actuaries. The revealed history of hobos will open your eyes to a history that has existed too long in the shadows. And I think any reader would benefit from the book's collection of interesting information about our fifty-one states.

Here are two facts that are not made up: John Hodgman is an extraordinarily amusing writer, and I just put the sequel to this book on my very long to-be-read list.

Glenn's Book of Quotes, Number Fourteen

“Direct your eye inward, and you'll find,
A thousand regions in your mind,
Yet undiscovered. Travel them, and be,
Expert in home-cosmography”
-- Henry David Thoreau

That, my friends, is the journey worth taking. Why seek without for wisdom when there are worlds yet unknown within? Since you are going to be living the rest of your life in your own head, you might want to figure out what's in there. Unless of course you've already looked and found it to be empty. Then by all means hit the road.

Mythmaker

Ursula K. Le Guin is a great writer. I don't throw the word great around easily. I don't mean that she is just really, really good. I mean that she is a national treasure. She writes science fiction and fantasy that deals with profound questions of life and death, culture, morality, and ethics. Her writing is deceptively simple yet always beautiful and frequently profound.

I guess you could say I'm a fan. But in my usual slow way I only now got around to reading the last (so far) of the Earthsea novels, The Other Wind. It's been about ten years since I read the previous novel, Tehanu, so I'm glad Le Guin was gentle with us forgetful readers and wove little reminders of past events into the plot. I would say that if you are new to the series you could read this one without getting lost, but you shouldn't do it. You should read A Wizard of Earthsea first. Really. Drop what you're doing and go get a copy.

The Other Wind introduces us to a young sorcerer, Alder, who comes to our old friend Ged for help. He has been having troubling dreams about his wife in the afterlife. He sees her, nightly, reaching to him across the wall that separates death from life. Ged does what he can for him and then sends him to the island of Havnor to see the king. There he meets Ged's wife Tenar and their daughter Tehanu. From that simple start Le Guin creates a tale about love, reconciliation, magic, dragons, and the meaning of life. In the process she completely re-works the mythical structure of Earthsea and it's concepts of death and existence. Mythopoetic fiction does not get much better than this. It is a wonderful finale to a great series.

Edit: Oh fer cryin' out loud! I misspelled "Ursula." What a knucklehead I be.