IMBB #16 -- Eggs

There's a more or less monthly foodblogging event called Is My Blog Burning?, which posts a theme at the chosen host blog. People who do dishes around that theme post their work in their own blogs, and the host blog posts links to all the various entries.

This month's theme is "Eggs", and the host blog is Seattle Bon Vivant's blog.

Update, 7/16/05: Seattle Bon Vivant has the links to other entries posted now, here in Part 1 and Part 2. (81 entries in all.)

I've been following the IMBB events for a few months, but haven't had the time or inspiration to contribute until today, when I realized the lunch I was whipping together fit the newest IMBB theme. AND I had the digital camera handy. So here it is:


AKA Blutwich: Blutwurst Scramble Sandwich

1/2 Cup diced blutwurst
2 Eggs
2 tablespoons buttermilk
The Holy Trinity (salt, pepper, garlic) to taste.
French roll

Saute diced blutwurst slightly until it starts to crumble in the skillet. Mix eggs, buttermilk, and seasonings together. Arrange blutwurst in a ring in skillet, pour egg mixture into center. Cook, turning gently; you want the eggs and blutwurst mixed but not homogenized.

Spoon cooked mixture onto French roll. Enjoy



Blutwich in progress.


Finished: looks gruesome, tastes good.

Making this again, I'd probably cut the recipe in half and put it on a smaller roll, or split it between two people; it was a bit large for one.

I Have No Idea. . .

. . .why everything in this blog after the header is suddenly appearing underlined and/or boldfaced.

Update, 6/23/05: I checked the template, per Patrick Connor's suggestion, but didn't find anything that, so far as I could tell, would account for the universal underlining after the header. (Didn't really expect to, since the last time I made any changes to the template was when I updated some links on the blogroll, months ago.)

So I decided to try changing templates. Seems to have worked, except that the profile is now underlined. I can live with that, if the rest of the blog stays okay. Now I'll have to reinsert the blogroll info and the Malzberg quote.

AND... when the Malzberg quote came out underlined, I checked again, and found an end-underline command in the template, WITHOUT -- search as I might -- a begin-underline command anywhere before it in the template. But by moving that end-underline command before everything in the sidebar, I seem to have gotten everything back the way it should be.

Weird.

I was getting a little tired of the "Scribe" template anyway, so we'll stick with this "Sand Dollar" for a while.

Re-Update, 6/25/05: Well, fooey. The more recent posts are okay, but now everything from the "HEY KIDS!" entry and after is underlined again. [scratches head]

[a few minutes later] Found it. Missing closing HTML for the title on the 'HEY KIDS!" post. I'm scrabbling up the learning curve bit by bit.

The Household's Newest Occupant(s)

We've been holding the line at four cats for the household (our three -- Gremlin, Tia, and Bastet, and our housemate Kay's one --Shadow).

However, when Hilde and I were over at her brother and sister-in-law's house last month to help Greg install a new swamp cooler on the roof, Hilde was sitting out in the front yard when a small, incredibly friendly, young cat came up and started rubbing against her legs and purring. Greg and Deb said it had been around the neighborhood for several weeks, but apparently didn't have owners. They hadn't taken it in because of 1) their large dogs, and 2) one of their closest friends and another frequent visitor are EXTREMELY allergic to cats.

So we ended up bringing the cat home, right? Wrong! We were tempted, but we gritted our teeth and kept telling ourselves "We already have four cats, we already have four cats..." and went home without it.

So a few days later housemate Kay goes over to visit Greg & Deb, and comes home with...


Cassandra

...a small, incredibly friendly, young cat.

Cassandra was kept in a separate room for several days, until we could get her to the vet and checked out for feline leukemia or other diseases. The vet said she was about nine or ten months old, and gave her a clean bill of health.

Well... if you don't count the part about being pregnant, and probably due to drop several kittens in 1-2 weeks.

""We've been suckered!" I cried when Kay told us the vet's news. "Again!" responded Hilde. (Back in the early 80's, a small white cat, mewing piteously, jumped up on the kitchen windowsill while I was getting ready for work. We took her in, and several weeks later Bridget gifted us with five kittens.)

This actually explained a lot. Cassandra had obviously spent a lot of time around people and other animals, and not that much out on the street. So apparently her original owners, when they realized she'd been knocked up, drove her to a different part of town and tossed her out to live or die on her own. Which is how our household eventually ended up with such a sweet-tempered cat. (So thanks a lot, you fucks, you shits, you goddamned walking pieces of moral filth! Thanks.)

Rather than 1-2 weeks, it turned out to only be one day later before Cassandra produced...


"Tentatively Andy"

...a white & dark-grey tabby-marked kitten. (There was a second kitten, but it didn't survive. It may have been laid on by its mother and suffocated; this happens sometimes, particularly with first-time litters.)

The kitten's slightly over two weeks old now. Both mother and kitten seem to be doing fine. Our friend Anne has expressed interest in adopting Andy when he gets old enough.

The other cats, and the dog, seem to be adapting well to the new cat. (I'm not sure they've realized the kitten is there yet, since it's only been out of its nesting box a few times, for a few minutes.)

Well, for some reason, Gremlin does seem to feel a bit insecure about his place in the household...


We are not recycling any of the cats, honest.

HEY, KIDS! Don't Let Any Of Your Dumb-Ass Grownups Try This At Home!

Multi-tasking is NOT an option. 

Who knew? Dry potting soil is flammable.

In fact, it will smolder and burn slowly, for hours, like a not-so-good cigar, as all the peat moss and other organic material in the potting mix burns into ash, and the plastic pot melts and shifts into a Geiger-influenced piece of alien art.

The lesson here is... when you have smokers visiting the house, maybe you should hunt up an actual ashtray for them to use, rather than having them drop their cigarette butts into that handy pot of "dirt".

Why Enlistments Are Down

The Army and Marines are continuing to fail to meet monthly enlistment quotas.

I am reminded of one of the other neighborhood kids in my teenage years, in the late Sixties, during the Vietnam War.

Mike was a war-lover. His idea of "The Good Old Days" was World War II. He hated Germans. Nazis in particular, but Germans in general. He wanted to kill Germans. He used to take war comics and slash at them with a penknife, muttering "Take that, Jerry! Die, Kraut!" He was... oh, what's a polite word?... nuts.

But since WWII was over ("Damn it!"), it looked like he'd have to settle for Vietnam, and a chance to kill Asians instead. As soon as he finished high school, he said, he was going into the military and volunteering for Vietnam.

Then his mother had a heart-to-heart talk with him:

"Mike, as your mother, I want you to know that I don't want you going into the military, and I especially don't want to see you going to Vietnam. In fact, I so MUCH want you to not go to Vietnam that I will STOP you. I will stop you any way I have to. Do you see this box on the table? Let me show you what's in it. This is your father's handgun. It's loaded, and I'm pointing it at your leg. Specifically, I'm pointing it at your kneecap. If you TRY to join the military, if you even THINK of trying to join the military, I will take this gun and put a bullet through your knee. I am serious; I mean every word I am saying. If you try and join the military, I WILL SHOOT YOUR STUPID BRAINLESS ASS RIGHT IN THE KNEECAP. I will CRIPPLE you. I will cripple my own son, and go to prison for it, rather than see him die in a godforsaken hellhole for no good reason. Have I made my feelings on this matter clear?"

Mike never enlisted. Last I heard of him, he was leading a normal life, with a wife and children, in Puerto Rico.

I suspect there are other mothers right now, holding similar conversations with their children about the military and Iraq.

Crassphemy

A French shoe designer is producing a line of shoes decorated in "Hindu mythological style", including a depiction of the Hindu god Rama.

A number of Hindus are upset.

The news article says, in part:

"It has come to the notice of Hindu Human Rights Group that you are currently marketing shoes with the pictures of our sacred and highly revered Hindu god Lord Rama printed on them," said a letter sent to Minelli by Web-based activist group Hindu Human Rights Group (www.hinduhumanrights.org) .

"We wish to point out to you that Lord Rama thus illustrated is actually worshipped by millions of Hindus across the world. It stands to reason that such a display of contempt for the spiritual beliefs and practices of a billion Hindus worldwide is causing a sense of fury and outrage in the Hindu community and we have received numerous complaints from Hindus in France."

...

The group wants Minelli to withdraw the product. "Hindu Human Rights ask that you withdraw this line of shoes from circulation and sale immediately so as to prevent further unwarranted stress and distress to Hindus worldwide. Naturally, we also expect you to publish a fully apology to the Hindu community," the website adds.

Expatriate attorney Brij Mohan Dhir has supported the bid, and is himself mobilizing opinion to protest production and marketing of the shoe.

In a letter to Minelli, he wrote, "Your act and conduct showing Lord Rama on shoes is rather degrading, defaming, agitating, upsetting, intolerable, outraging our religious beliefs and emotions, spreading ill will and hate between the communities, and against the norms of democracy and fraternity or brotherhood and against law and order as it may cause breach of peace in the world."

The San Francisco-based activist has circulated a copy of the letter widely on the Internet. If Minelli doesn't back down, he is considering filing a complaint in the European Court of Human Rights, he warned.

I recognize the language used in the complaining website and by Mr. Dhir: It's lawyerese.

"contempt", "fury", "outrage", "stress", "distress", and that entire "degrading, defaming" et cetera paragraph from Dhir are all in a standard style for complaint letters: use strong language, predict dire consequences, and imply that any offense by the person addressed was deliberate and malicious. In short, start from the most extreme position.

Doing so means that when both sides compromise and reach a settlement, the odds are it'll be a fairly reasonable settlement. Standard legal negotiating tactic.

But... c'mon, is there an official Office of Hindu Symbolism Trademark & Copyright Protection somewhere? What Minelli has done is... crass. It's commercial. It's co-opting religious symbols to make money.

But what he's also done is... produced some really cool-looking shoes. I think those white pumps with the Hindu-style woman's face are lovely. I can appreciate them as art and design. I don't think I'd buy a pair (if I could wear shoes that narrow), because they are decorated in a style associated with a particular religion, one I don't follow, and it would feel disrepectful and hypocritical to wear them. (Buy a pair purely as an art object, to put in a display case? Mmmmm... maybe.)

But if I was Hindu, I'd consider buying a pair for my wife to wear for fancy occasions. In that context, wearing them would be respectful.

If the shoes had been designed and produced by a Hindu designer, rather than a French one, I don't think the likelihood of the complaints, particularly such strident complaints, would have been very high.

And one bit of irony to finish off with: On the India Times webpage where the article appears, at the bottom of the webpage, the very first Google Ad to appear is for...Ganesha-shaped chocolates.

(Last minute: Showing a draft of this to Hilde, she raised the question of whether Christians would be similarly upset by shoes with Jesus portrayed on them. Apparently not: I gotcher Jesus Shoes right here. [most of the way down the page, between the Jesus Visa and the Jesus hot air balloon])

(Last last minute addition: Alternately, a little more searching finds the news report that apparently "Jesus & Mary sandals" were sold by one European store, who withdrew the product after receiving 200 complaints in 48 hours; but they also sold 4,000 pairs. From the photo accompanying the BBC article, I suspect the problem wasn't that Jesus and Mary were portrayed on the sandals, but that wearing them involved walking on Jesus' face.)

Memorial Day

This was a comment posted on The News Blog. I thought it worth repeating, and thinking about today:

Out of curiousity I spreadsheet the latest listing of American soldiers killed in Iraq to see their ages.

Ages 18-29: 1,240 (75%)

Ages 30-39: 315 (19%)

Ages 40-49: 85 (5%)

Ages 50-59: 13 (1%)

Age 60 : 1

Total: 1654

DPBandit 05.30.05 - 1:34 am #

So many young people, gone.

Self-Improvement, Part 3

In Self-Improvement, Part 2, I promised a monthly progress report on the diet/exercise program ("8 Minutes In The Morning") I'd begun following.

I began the program at a weight of 180 pounds a bit less than five weeks ago. When I weighed myself two days ago, I was...

...167 pounds.

Thirteen pounds in a month.

Ummm...wow.

I think this program works.

Other effects besides the direct weight loss:

1) The exercises each morning have increased muscle definition and firmness, particularly noticeable in the legs and thighs. A lot of the waist fat has faded away, and while not quite there yet, looking in the mirror holds a hint, an anticipation, a lurking possibility of actually ending up, eventually, with... [he whispers the words]... six-pack abs!

2) Cutting way-y-y back on refined sugar, and a lot of the caffeine, seems to have almost completely eliminated the energy swings during the day that would occasionally have me close to nodding off at the wheel while driving. I use a spoonful of molasses on my morning oatmeal, Splenda for just about every other sweetening need. (With a few exceptions, like baking bread; you need that sugar in the mix to get the yeast working properly.)

I think the keys to a program like "8 Minutes In The Morning" being effective are: 1) that any such program should include both a reasonable diet plan and an exercise plan/schedule, and 2) that the participant needs to be in a mental and emotional place where he/she will follow the plan, and avoid cheating or giving up on the program. That last one is the toughy for a lot of people; even just a year ago, I would have been a lot more likely to have dropped out of the program before much progress. But now, at this point in time, I seem to be willing to make that effort and exercise that amount of self-control.

(Yes, I have had to play catch-up on the morning exercises a few times. And yes, I have cheated, a little bit, on the diet; I still let myself have a can of regular sugared soda about once a week.)

(But you know what the most dangerous menace to following the diet has been? Rotisserie chicken! You know, that "healthy" alternative to fried chicken? Except that the skin on those roasted chickens is so flavorful, so well-seasoned, so dripping with juicy, browned deliciousness that once you start eating it, you don't want to stop until it's all gone.)

If you should want your own copy of the "8 Minutes In The Morning" book, here are links to Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

(Having read a draft of this post, the spouse comments: "Won't it be hard to do your exercises with your arm in a sling from patting yourself on the back so hard?" Ahem.)

You Devil!

Foodie tip for the day:

I had to make up a large batch of deviled eggs (two dozen eggs) for a potluck yesterday.

One of the odd things about deviled eggs is that even though you take all the yolks from the hardboiled eggs, and then ADD extra ingredients to the mashed yolks, when you spoon the filling back into the whites' half-eggs, you run out of filling before you run out of eggs! Every friggin' time.

So there I was with an empty filling bowl, and eight half-eggs left over.

But... I happened to have a tub of roasted red pepper hummus in the fridge, so I filled the remaining eggs with a spoonful of the hummus, and added a piece of sliced olive on top. Tasty alternative, and they went over well.

Kill The Wa-a-a-b-bit...!

Working for the Postal Service, I get to skim the headlines on quite a few small-town newspapers.

One such I saw today was a front-page article about the local police being suspicious about a woman who'd visited several local businesses and tried to get them to put out donation cans to "Save Toby".

"Toby" is a rabbit. Supposedly, a kind-hearted person found the injured rabbit under their front porch several months ago and nursed it back to health. Wanting to give the cute little bunny The Good Life, the kind-hearted rescuer set up a website to raise $50,000 for the bunny's future needs.

If the kind-hearted rescuer hasn't raised the $50,000 by June 30th, 2005, however, Toby will be butchered and eaten by the kind-hearted rescuer.

Supposedly. There are a number of indications that the savetoby.com website is just a put-on, and it's been bandied about and linked to a lot; doing a Google search on "Save Toby" gets thousands of hits.

But what tickled me about the particular newspaper piece was that it reported Toby's injuries had come about via "being mulled by a cat".

Wow. First, get a big pot. Then some red wine. Then some spices. Then a heat source to get it all simmering and ready to toss the bunny in. Damn resourceful cat.

And for the final touch, the newspaper this was in was the HAGERSTOWN HERALD. If Harry Warner, Jr, were still alive, he'd die of embarassment.

(And I have just managed to write a post that mentions food, felines, and fandom. I think I hit the Trifecta!)

Surprisingly Not-So-Terrifying News

After many years of trying to get the project going, it now appears that, yes Virginia, downtown Phoenix will be getting a new 1,000 room hotel, in conjunction with a major expansion of the Phoenix Civic Plaza's meeting and function space.

What this would mean is that Phoenix will finally have enough hotel rooms and function space close together to be able to host some of the larger conventions and trade shows it's been missing out on.

Like, say... a Worldcon.

Oh-h-h-h, shit.

Phoenix had a Worldcon once before, in 1978. For most of the attendees, it was "a pretty good con." Behind the scenes, though, it was... ummmm... why don't we settle on the word "exciting"? It was very, very, very exciting. It was so exciting that I had, literally, nightmares about it for, literally, years afterward. It was so exciting that it's only in the last few years, after a quarter of a friggin' century, that I've gotten back onto a moderately cordial basis with some of the people who so angered and disappointed me back then. (And there were several people involved who, even now, I cannot think of a single polite word I would say to or about them. But it's only several, which is a great improvement over the immediate aftermath of That Hideous Summer.)

That 1978 Worldcon pretty much maxed out and strained all the then available hotel rooms and function space available in downtown Phoenix. And that, as well as the bad taste left in the mouth of Phoenix fandom, has been one of the major reasons there's never been another Worldcon bid from Phoenix.

But with the new hotel and function space being built, I can see one coming. I don't know when exactly, but probably sometime in the next five to ten years, someone will announce the start of a Phoenix Worldcon bid.

This is not necessarily bad news. (Why, yes, I am surprised to find myself saying that.)

In the years since the 1978 Worldcon, Phoenix has developed a core group of con-running fans who actually seem to enjoy and get satisfaction out of putting on decently run conventions. They've put on dozens of Leprecons and Coppercons (our annual local conventions), as well as a number of Westercons, World Fantasy Cons, World Horror Cons, and I think one NASFIC.

I find a fair number of those con-runners to be... okay, how do I put this politely?... "stodgy". This is not a bad thing, when stodginess is accompanied by dependability and competence.

So I think a Phoenix Worldcon, with the new facilities being built, might actually be a doable thing again. It would still be a stretch, and whoever was on the committee would find themselves strained and pressured by the task, but I think most of the current group of con-running fans in Phoenix could do it without the... "excitement"... that came so close to overwhelming the people involved in 1978.

So if a Phoenix Worldcon bid comes into existence sometime in the future, I'm offering a deal: If the Phoenix bid has the most boring bid parties, the dullest promotional literature, and the stodgiest people at its head, they'll definitely have my vote!

Notice How One Truck Is Sitting A Lot Lower Than The One Next To It?

(see post below)

This Is Why

The National Association of Letter Carriers, NALC, in association with the Pstal Service, has been conducting a national food drive on the 2nd Saturday in May for 13 years.

The Food Drive actually started quite a bit before that, on a local level right here in Phoenix. I believe the first year I started working as a letter carrier, 1978, was the second year for the Drive. It collects millions of pounds of donated canned and dry goods for distribution to food banks and charities across the US.

My current route, which encompasses a large seniors-only trailer park and an upscale neighborhod of large homes on half-acre lots, tends to get a lot of donations.

Most of this comes from the trailer park residents, a lot of whom are on restricted incomes themselves. Well over half the 350 residents of the park left out a bag of food, sometimes multiple bags, by their mailbox Saturday.

By contrast, of the 160 families in the upscale neighborhood, only about 25-30 left out donations.

And that was a better response from the upscalers than I've had in previous years.

And it was a lot better than the response I got from my previous route. That was mostly a very upscale, golf-course-outside-the-back-door gated community, a stone's throw from the million-dollar estates in Paradise Valley. The last time I collected from the over-300 residences there, I drove back to the station with a single plastic tray holding about two dozen cans.

It may be a cliche, but the empirical evidence I've seen on the food drives does seem to suggest that the more money a household has, the less likely they are to donate to charitable causes.

Why is that? And what would it take to change that?

If You Can't Strike At Them In Their Own Country, Go Someplace Where The Security Sucks

Today's elections in Britain rouse strong feelings. And apparently someone felt that the best way to register his vote was to set off explosives in front of a United Kingdom governmental building.

Except that between decades of dealing with the IRA, and joining with the US in the invasion of Iraq, security in Britain itself is tight, tight, tight.

So, obviously, the best course is to go to some other country, some country where the security isn't as tight, and to set off your explosives at a British consulate or mission.

What country would you choose? What city would you go to?

How about the United States? How about mid-town Manhattan?

What's being described as "two small grenades" were set off in concrete planters in front of the offices of the UK mission in New York early this morning. No injuries, and the only major damage outside the planters was a foot-long piece of concrete being propelled through one of the building's plate-glass windows. (But if someone had been standing in the path of that piece of concrete....)

What struck me about the photo in this BBC news article, though, was that the heavy concrete planters were obviously designed and set in place as obstacles to vehicles attempting to leave the street and ram into the building.

You can also see, in the photo, that yellow tape has been put across the street to block access to the planters while police investigate.

So that physical security line stops at the curb.

Which means that if, instead of a couple of grenades, the person(s) responsible had decided to go for the spectacular, and loaded a truck up with ammonium nitrate and diesel fuel, they wouldn't have been able to smash their way into the building before detonating (as in the Beirut Marine barracks bombing). They would have had to settle for parking at the curb. (Okay, it's NYC. Double-parking.)

Just. Like. Timothy. McVeigh.

Hoarders

Our housemate Kay came across this news item:

A Peoria woman who was found with nearly two dozen dogs and cats crammed inside her mobile home has been arrested on multiple felony and misdemeanor counts of animal cruelty.

The stench from the home was horrendous and the animals were living in "deplorable conditions," Peoria police spokeswoman Shelly Watkins said Tuesday. "The animals were without water and many were deathly ill."

The suspect, Laura Yvonne Kuhn, 44, was taken into custody on Monday and booked on nine felony and 12 misdemeanor charges of animal cruelty, Watkins said.

It marked the second time in four years that Kuhn has faced such charges, Watkins said.

She was taken into custody in 2001 after 32 animals, including 20 dead ones, were found inside her house, Watkins said. Kuhn pleaded guilty in that case and was fined $1,300.

Nine of the animals had to be euthanized, Watkins said. The others accepted by the Arizona Humane Society for care and treatment, she said.

You hear about these animal hoarders from time to time. But usually it's not someone you know.

Laura Kuhn is someone we know slightly (friend of friends, basically). And in that 2001 incident, after her cats were seized by Animal Control and turned over to the Humane Society, she called around to everyone she knew, even us, crying and begging and asking us to adopt her animals from the Humane Society and then "please give me my kitties back!" on the sly.

Hilde and I looked at each other in the middle of that phone call, and said "Ummmm... I don't think so." If Laura couldn't take care of her animals properly before the 2001 seizure, there was no way we were going to help her get back her pets unless there was clear evidence they wouldn't be mistreated again. (Oh, and those "20 dead ones" found in 2001? Gosh, Laura never mentioned that when she spoke to us.)

With the new felony charges, Laura is looking at a possible three years in prison. And I can't really work up any sympathy for her. I know that animal hoarding like this is the sign of serious mental problems, but if prison time is what it takes to keep her from acquiring new dogs and cats to mistreat, I can't disapprove of it. I hope she gets mental health treatment, but keep her the hell away from any animals until then!

(What is WRONG with these people? Your animals are SICK! Your animals are DYING! You're living in FILTH! How much of a frigging CLUE do you need?)

Simple, Quick, Delicious

Here's something really good, from here, that I made a few days ago:

Tomato Bread Soup

1 tsp.....olive oil
1 Tbsp....small leek (white part only), chopped
4 Tbsp....cloves garlic, minced
2 Cups....chopped peeled tomatoes
1/3 Cups..chopped fresh basil
1&1/2 C...vegetable or chicken stock
1/2 tsp...each salt and pepper
2 Cups....day-old cubed Italian bread
2 tsp.....freshly grated Parmesan cheese

Heat oil in heavy saucepan over medium heat. Cook leek and garlic 3 minutes or until softened.

Stir in tomatoes and basil and bring to boil. Boil gently 5-10 minutes or until slightly thickened.

Add 1 cup stock, salt and pepper; return to boil, stirring. Remove from heat and stir in bread. If necessary, warm remaining stock and add t reach desired constituency. Serve sprinkled with Parmesan. Serves 2.

I used a red onion instead of the leek, didn't bother to peel the tomatoes, used dried basil instead of fresh, and used some leftover garlic bread. Still came out wonderful. Add a bit of diced cooked chicken, or ham (maybe prosciutto?), and it's a full meal. Definitely a make-again recipe.

George Bush, Girly-Man of Mystery

(un-PC language may be encountered below)

Much has been made lately, and photos posted, and jokes told, regarding President George Bush's public walk, hand-in-hand, with the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia. The gist of which has been that two guys holding hands together is... ummm... faggy.

The official White House line on this has been that holding hands is a sign of trust in Arab culture, so Bush and the Prince holding hands was really a sign of respect for the Prince's culture. Not something faggy, but something actually manly. (Manly, dammit! Manly!)

But still...

Okay, George Bush is a guy. Sowed some wild oats as a young man, drank too much, probably tried drugs (probably a, probably large, number of times). But he grew up, straightened up, married and had children, ran a number of businesses (badly, but hey, shit happens), ran the state of Texas (badly, but hey, shit happens), and is now running the entire US government (badly, but hey...).

So why did George W. Bush decide, in college, to let people think he was gay?

I grew up in the 50's and 60's, and the change in attitudes toward homosexuals since then has been... extraordinary. Simply extraordinary.

Back then, there were no "gays". There were just "queers", "fags", "homos", "sissies", "nancies", "perverts" and "cocksuckers". Back then, if teen-aged tough guys were broke, what they frequently said to their friends was "Let's go down to the bus station and roll some queers." That wasn't just talking tough, either; if you beat and robbed a queer, you got away with it, because the police of those days would look the other way, literally. Homosexuals, or people assumed to be homosexual, were not considered or treated as human beings; civil rights routinely granted to normal citizens were simply ignored if society identified you as queer. There was no public acceptance of homosexuality. None. Homosexuality was something closeted, hidden, denied.

This began to change with the Stonewall Riots, and with a few brave individuals like Merle Miller who openly identified themselves as homosexual. It was a new attitude of "We're here. We've always been here. We're not going away. Deal with it."

And, amazingly, a good deal of the public has learned to deal with it over the last forty years. In spite of incidents like the Matthew Shephard murder, or the anti-gay-marriage movement, the degree to which homosexual men and women are openly recognized and accepted as part of modern society is... flabbergasting... to someone who can remember what it used to be like. It's been an incredible, incredible, sea-change in societal attitudes.

But in the late 60's and early 70's, that change had barely begun. If you were a guy who did something regarded as "sissy" by most of the public, you could still find yourself labeled as a fag, even if that weren't the case. It wasn't fun, and it could even be dangerous. Sometimes just being a heavy book-reader, or not being a sports fan, was enough to get the label applied. And there were some activities that almost invariably would make others certain you were queer.

A male hairdresser? Faggot.

A male interior decorator? Pervert.

A male cheerleader? Oh, you betcha. In that era, you could be a hard-partying, hard-drinking, skirt-chasing frat boy in college, but if you put on that uniform and picked up that megaphone and pranced around on the edge of that football field, I guarantee you that at least half of the people in the stands would think of you as if you were wearing a big signboard with the words I'M A BIG SCREAMING HOMO written on it.

So why did George W. Bush become a cheerleader in college? Why did he choose to do something that he must have known would make many people think he was queer?

(You know, it must have been an interesting phone call home after making the cheerleading team: "Mom! Dad! I'm a cheerleader!" *thud* *thud*)

What was going through his mind back then? I really have a hard time trying to understand it.

Was he a straight guy just so dumb that he didn't realize what people might think? Did he think his party-boy reputation would keep people from thinking he was gay?

Was he, umm, "confused" about his own sexuality? Was cheerleading a "safe" way to act gay without actually going so far as to have sex with other guys?

Or... is George Bush actually bisexual? Is he attracted to both women and men?

I really don't know. But the cheerleading, and the public hand-holding.... these are no-brainers. They look faggy. And while homosexuals in general have made great gains in public acceptance, the American public in general doesn't want "sissies" to be their national leaders.

So why did the President (and why did his staff!) decide that the hand-in-hand walk would be a positive PR moment, a good photo-op?

What the heck is going on inside that skull?

In My Neverending Quest. . .

. . . to reduce complex issues to sound bites, bumper stickers, or posters, I came up with:

Faithful To My God

Loyal To Our Country

Separation of Church

and State:

Not Just A Good Idea,

It's Constitutional!

Self-Improvement, Part 2

Back about the beginning of February, I mentioned I was trying to lose some weight and replace some of the middle-aged fat with greater muscle mass, via doing some exercises every few evenings (as well as watching my diet, something I've tried to do anyway for years).

Hummph. Some progress made, but not much. Started at 183 pounds, got down to 179 once, but mostly bounced around between 180-182.

Most of the lack of progress is probably because I was intending to do about a half-hour of exercises every other evening before going to bed. In actuality, this tended to be about very third or fourth night; on too many nights, going thru the fairly long checklist of TTDBB (Things To Do Before Bed) kept me up late enough to hit The Wall. ("The Wall" is the point at which your body overrules your good intentions and starts to shut your brain down regardless of whether you're still standing up.) And once you've reached that point, just finishing the last of the TTDBB is a struggle, and the exercises tended to get pushed back to the next night (or the next, or . . .).

So . . . I'm trying something that 1) is a more formal, structured diet/exercise plan, and 2) time-shifts the physical exercise to mornings. Not that there isn't a TTDBGTW (Things To Do Before Going To Work) list too, but at least in the mornings, you start with a full tank of energy, instead of the last few dregs.

The plan is the "8 Minutes In The Morning" routine developed by Jorge Cruise. I've been interested in it for a while, and picked up a copy of the book from Quality Paperback Book Club a few weeks ago.

(It's been available from QPB for a couple of years now. And when I checked Cruise's website, I found he's currently pushing the latest iteration of his fitness program, The Three-Hour Diet, which basically adds smaller, more frequent meals to the 8-Minute program. With my schedule, I'll stick to the original version, thanks.)

The exercise portions of the program are two strength-training exercises, performed with light dumbbells, done each morning. The exercises vary to work different parts of the body each day, rotating on a 28-day cycle. You do a set of 12 of the first exercise. Then, rather than a rest, you move directly to the second exercise and do 12 of that. Repeat three more times, for a total of four sets of each exercise, all within about an eight-minute time period.

(It actually takes a bit longer, since he recommends some running in place beforehand to warm up, and also some cooling-down stretches afterward. But altogether, it shouldn't take more than fifteen or twenty minutes each morning.)

He also has a fairly rigid diet program to follow. It's pretty much based on the Diabetic Food Exchange diet, and the first week ("Quick Start") only allows about 1000 calories per day. After that, you go to a calories/exchange-allotment based on your current weight. (For me, about 1600 calories per day.)

The diet calls for eliminating almost all refined sugars (AIIIEEEEE!!!), most caffeine as well (DOUBLE-AIIIEEEEE!!), and almost all fats except "healthy" ones. Ummm, okay; I've known for a long time that I drink too many sodas, and tend not to watch fats as closely as I should. But, jeezus, my caffeine too?

Cruise also recommends soy milk and soy cheeses in place of regular dairy products. His rationale lies in the possible allergenic reactions to regular dairy. Since I've never had that problem, I think I'll stick to the skim milk I've used for years. (Some of the soy milks aren't bad, but unless soy cheeses have improved a LOT in the fifteen or twenty years since I last tried them, I'll stick to small amounts of regular cheese, thanks.)

He also recommends, as the healthiest oil to use, flax oil, reputedly highest in Omega-3. I picked up a bottle at Sprouts, my local farmers' market/health-food store, to give it a try. Interesting; it had a faint grassy aftertaste, sort of like alfalfa sprouts. Didn't bother me, but some people would probably find it offputting. (Flax oil also apparently breaks down under high heat; Cruise mentions several times that it should be added to hot foods only after they've finished cooking.) Since I take several fish-oil capsules a day, I'm probably getting enough Omega-3 already.

The book also contains a number of motivational messages, and suggests keeping a journal. I think, though, that unless you come to such a program already motivated enough to follow its guidelines, those messages, or a journal won't really help.

(So, umm, why am I writing this post? Because posting my intention, in public, to try the program will help keep me following it more closely than I might otherwise.)

Did the first exercises, and started following the diet, yesterday morning. Starting weight: 180. I'm planning on posting progress reports about once a month. (Consumer-Reports-R-Us!)

My Letter To TIME

Dear Time magazine:

I am writing in regard to your decision to feature Ann Coulter on the cover of your April 19th, 2005 issue.
April 19th is the 10th anniversary of the mass murder of men, women and children in Oklahoma City by domestic terrorist Timothy McVeigh. Ann Coulter's reaction to that day of horror was to regret that McVeigh had not gone to the New York Times building instead. Later questioned if she regretted that statement, her reply was that she would have had no regrets about such an attack on the New York Times as long as only editors and reporters were in the building.

Ann Coulter advocates the murders of anyone she declares to be "liberals". And you not only put her on your cover, you gave this enabler of terrorism, this advocate of death and murder a fawning, gushing article that attempts to make her seem sane and reasonable.

I am a letter carrier. Yesterday, I had to deliver dozens of copies of your magazine to my customers. For the first time in over twenty-five years of working for the Postal Service, I felt sick and ashamed of what I was doing.

Sincerely,

Bruce Arthurs
Glendale, AZ

Support The Patriot Cat!

In a moment of mass dyslexia, Congress today passed the Patriot Cat.

Hate The Sin, Love The City

Hilde and I went to see SIN CITY earlier this week.

I didn't expect Hilde to like it; she generally likes blow-em-up-real-good action movies, but she doesn't like characters (even "good guy" characters) that are brutal, callous and cruel (even towards "bad guys" that deserve it).

And the "good guys" in Sin City are brutal, callous and cruel. They're "good" because their actions are directed towards "bad guys" whose own brutality and cruelty are directed against innocents. (The "innocents" are, invariably, women.)

But I was surprised to find that even I was uncomfortable with the unrelenting level of violence and bloodshed in the movie. Particularly since I've read most of the original SIN CITY comics and loved them. (As widely noted, the movie is "the most faithful adaptation of a comic ever done.")

I think there are two main reasons for this differing reaction between comics and movie:

First, the comics are, essentially, short stories. They're stripped-down, pure-essence, high-speed morality plays. Reading one, even the multi-issue stories, can be done in half an hour or less. The reader can live in Sin City for that length of time, the reader can tolerate the continuous violence and bloodshed and desperate struggles.

But Robert Rodriguez collated four of the original SIN CITY stories into the movie. For over two hours, the viewer watches beatings and shootings and killings, and more beatings and shootings and killings, and still MORE beatings and shooting and killings. And in the end, it's just...

...too fucking long.

(The couple sitting next to Hilde and me in the theater got up and left partway through the movie. I think it was at the point where the dog was tearing a hunk of meat off of Elijah Wood.) (Fair Warning: If you see this movie, you'll never trust Frodo again.)

(I should probably also note that this movie probably sets a new record for the number of times, and number of characters, that are kicked, punched, stabbed and shot in the groin. And, in the movie's most notorious scene, a bad guy has his genitalia torn off . Ouch.) (After this movie, no one will ever shake Bruce Willis' hand again. Ever.)

And second, Frank Miller's high-contrast, highly stylized, black-&-white illustrations for the comics aren't real people. There's an extra layer of distancing in the comics; the reader can see the beatings and shootings and killings going on, but you never (quite) forget that these are drawings you're looking at.

Even though the movie tries (mostly successfully) to replicate the look and feel of the comics, even though most of the sets and backgrounds are computer-generated, these are still real people up on the screen. Even if the viewer knows that these are only actors pretending to be beaten or shot or killed (or to beat or shoot or kill other characters), when real people are going thru (pretending to go thru) the relentless, continuous, unstopping parade of beatings and shooting and killings, it's just...

...too damn close to the real thing. It's just too damn much to take for a solid two hours, when you have real human beings acting out these stories.

I don't regret going to see the movie. I think it was worth watching. Once. But if I want to enjoy the Sin City stories, I think I'll go back to the original comics.

- - - - -

While I'm on the subject of violent movies: The most violent movie scene I've ever watched was the final shootout in a gangster movie where both rival gangs, armed with machine guns, let fly at close quarters in a crowded room. Blood and gore go flying, and splashing, and dripping. People are hit in their limbs, their torsos, their heads. They drop like flies, covered and drenched in blood and gore, lying in pools of blood. When the firing finally stops, everyone, everyone, gangsters and innocents alike, is lying in heaps and mounds of blood-soaked corpses.

Then they all get up and do a final song-&-dance number.

The movie was BUGSY MALONE, and it was a children's movie. All the gangsters and other characters were played by children (including a young Jodie Foster). And the machine guns were called "splooge guns" and shot streams of whipped cream. So in that final shootout, all that blood and gore I mentioned was actually copious white splatters of whipped cream.

But... all the young actors, umm, acted as if the shootout was real, as if real bullets were flying, as if they were really being shot and maimed and killed. So, even all these years later, I can't help thinking that the "splooge" in that scene was only a stand-in for the "real" (in movie terms) blood and gore that would have been used in a gangster movie for adults.

And that's why BUGSY MALONE is one of the most violent movies ever filmed.

Guy Cooking

When you're a Guy, you're expected to cook things like roasts and steaks and chops, with a side of something starchy and deep-fried.

So, when a semi-regular foodblogging event announces that its next theme for entries will be "My Little Cupcake", what's a Guy to do?

Here, from Spiceblog, are the instructions for making your own Manly Cupcakes, an intriguing adaptation of Yorkshire Pudding, blood sausage, and a cranberry sauce "icing".

These'll put hair on your chest, deepen your voice, and add inches to your, ummm... your waistline! Yeh, that's what I meant to say, waistline.

- - - - - - - - - -

(As it turns out, a new European deli that opened up near us about a month ago actually makes it's own blutwurst!. So I'm actually planning on making some Manly Cupcakes of my own.)

Wow!

Here is an extraordinarily good piece from a worth1000.com Photoshop contest, combining classical art with robots.

I want to see this on a book cover.

Proof of Evolution: FWMOS&H Develops Spine

The Fort Worth Museum of Science and History has reversed its earlier decision to not show the IMAX film "Volcanoes of the Deep Sea", following numerous complaints and letters. Newspaper articles had reported the film had been turned down for showing after several members of a test showing's audience complained about mentions of evolution in the film.

Full article here. (Registration required, darn it, tho' you can do a search (the top entry, for the Star-Telegram paper) on Yahoo News and get an active link through there.)

The Children's Crusade, 2005

I've tried to keep this blog a Schiavo-free zone, but some things just have to be said.

Child Protesters Show Support for Schiavo

photo

Scott Heldreth has been arrested numerous times for picketing abortion clinics and blocking sidewalks while praying. Now his 10-year-old son, Josh, has followed in his footsteps.

Josh is one of six children - ages 10 to 14 - arrested in the past week for crossing a police line at the Woodside Hospice to take water to Terri Schiavo.

. . .

[Joshua Heldreth] walked up to sheriff's deputies, carrying a plastic cup, and ignored two requests to turn around. Deputies cuffed his hands behind his back and loaded him into a van with 14-year-old twin girls. At the courthouse, the three youngsters were photographed, fingerprinted and released.

. . .

Demonstrators have allowed their children - some too young to truly understand why they are there - to pass out religious fliers and hold signs accusing Michael Schiavo, Terri's husband, of murdering her. The children beat five-gallon buckets like funerary drums and wear shirts declaring them "Youth for Life."

Let's assume that in some alternate-Earth, young Joshua Heldreth somehow manages to get past the police, the barricades, the metal detectors, the hospice staff and everyone else with his plastic cup filled with water, and makes it to Terri Schiavo's room and bars the door against anyone stopping him from his next step.

Whereupon he, no doubt with a smile on his face, pours the water into Terri Schiavo's mouth...

...and kills her.

Terri Schiavo has such massive degeneration in her brain tissue that breathing (alas for her) is one of the few functions left.

Swallowing is not one of the functions still working. She cannot swallow. This is why that famous feeding tube had to be inserted in the first place.

Had that water been put into her mouth, some of it would undoubtedly have dribbled out the sides and onto the bed. And some part of it might have trickled down her esophagus and into her stomach.

The rest would have gone into her lungs.

And ten-year-old Joshua Heldreth would have murdered the woman he expected to save, by literally drowning her in her bed.

This is not a real hard thing to figure out: Someone unable to swallow. Put stuff in their mouth, they choke. Choke their airway badly enough, they die.

Did Scott Heldreth, Joshua's father, not figure this out?

What kind of parent would allow their ten-year old son to try and do something with a possible end result of killing another person? Is this criminally stupid? Criminally irresponsible? Or criminally insane?

When Mr. Heldreth pickets abortion clinics and blocks sidewalks, it's his own freedom he puts at risk by breaking the law.

When he allows (and encourages, even if indirectly; Joshua didn't drive himself to Florida) his ten-year old son to break the law in ways that, if fully carried out, could have deadly results, then he's crossed a line.

The North Carolina (the Heldreth family's home) department of Child Protective Services should investigate whether Mr. Heldreth's actions (and lack of actions) in Florida constitute parental abuse or neglect, and whether Joshua should be taken from his custody.


Update, 3/27/05: I asked the question, "What kind of parent...?" up above regarding Scott Heldreth.

The answer, it appears is a registered sex offender, listed as "absconded from registration" in the state of Florida.

(Thanks to this post from Daily Kos.)

Update To "Tinfoilage"

Downtopic, in a post titled "Tinfoilage", I raised the question whether Phoenix was being used as a test market for terrorist-attack scenarios.

According to this news item, the answer is apparently "No, but it will be."

Devolution In Action: Spineless In Fort Worth

From The Observer:

In several US states, Imax cinemas - including some at science museums - are refusing to show movies that mention the subject or suggest that Earth's origins do not conform with biblical descriptions.

Films include Cosmic Voyage, an animated journey through the universe; Galapagos, a documentary about the islands where Darwin made some of his most important observations; and Volcanoes of the Deep Sea, an underwater epic about the bizarre creatures that flourish near ocean vents.

In most southern states, theatre officials found recent test screenings of several of these films triggered accusations from viewers that the films were blasphemous.

Carol Murray, marketing director of the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History in Texas, said audience members who had watched Volcanoes had commented 'I really hate it when the theory of evolution is presented as fact', or 'I don't agree with their presentation of human existence.'

As a result, the science museum had decided not to screen the film. 'If it is not going to draw a crowd and it is going to create controversy, from a marketing point of view, I cannot make a recommendation,' Murray told the New York Times yesterday.

Carol Murray is an idiot, and utterly incompetent as a marketing director.

She should have told the complainers (how many, out of how many audience viewers?) thanks for their views, and that they were free to express their views publicly.

Had Christian wackos shown up to picket or protest the film's showing, with attendant local tv and newspaper coverage, it would have drawn HUGE crowds to the museum to see what all the fuss was about.

AND the Museum could have then said, "We feel the public is intelligent enough to think about the views and facts presented in the films. They can't do that if the film isn't shown."

Instead... they caved. Cravenly. Cowardly. Stupidly.

Carol Murray should be fired. And any Museum board members who agreed with her opinion should hang their heads in shame.

(I can't help but wonder about Ms. Murray: What church does SHE attend?)

House Watching

Watched House, a new medical drama starring Hugh Laurie, for the first time last night.

Laurie is very, very good as a brilliant but highly misanthropic diagnostician at a large hospital. ("Obviously, I don't like you. But that's okay; I don't like anybody.")

However, the writing on the episode...

The story centered around a high-strung fashion executive who suffered sudden paralysis and extreme pain in her leg. After numerous tests, dead ends, and further complications, Dr. House is able to deduce that she has congestive heart failure, and needs a heart transplant, pronto.

But... the reason such a young person's heart is failing is that she is a chronic bulimic (and self-cutter), who's been using ipecac syrup to induce vomiting regularly. And the repeated dosing of ipecac has the side effect of causing muscle (i.e., heart) damage. And that behavior means she would be psychiatrically ineligible for a heart transplant.

So House lies to the hospital's transplant committee. The girl gets her new heart. (Almost immediately. Yeah, that happens.)

Uhh... no.

Besides being brilliant and irascible, House is supposed to highly, highly ethical. A real prick about the behavior of other doctors and the hospital in general.

So he lets someone technically disqualified from a transplant get one anyway. Which means that some other person, some person who does meet the criteria for a transplant, won't get the heart that was put into the fashion executive's chest.

As written, House let someone else, someone never actually seen or named, die in order to save a person with a compulsion towards self-mutilation and self-damage.

What were the writers thinking?

To be true to the character, the episode should have had House making sure that the executive did NOT receive the transplant. I would have made one of the young doctors training under House (I don't remember the characters' names, so I'll refer to them as The White Guy, The Black Guy, and The Female Guy) be the one trying to save the (young, good-looking) fashionista's life, and end up overruled by House.

The episode also had a subplot featuring a man unable to speak, with an undiagnosed case of spastic dysphonia. So House goes to the man (who is not even his patient!), distracts him, and sticks a syringeful of Botox into his throat!

Any doctor who gave unagreed-to treatment to a patient, especially some other doctor's patient, would be escorted off the hospital grounds by Security, and not allowed back. As the substory was written, House wasn't acting like a brilliant doctor, he was acting like a public menace.

The character, as portrayed by Laurie, has immense potential. But, jeez, what ARE the writers thinking?

Miscellaneous Photoblogging

"Bad, mad, and dangerous to know." 

(taken at World Fantasy Convention 2004)

Updates & Additions

I've updated the blogroll over on the sidebar, correcting the URL for Avedon Carol's The Sideshow.

I've also added some additional blogs, that I've started cruising pretty regularly, to the list: Will Shetterly's It's All One Thing (mostly about writing, with religion and politics on the side), Steve Gilliard's News Blog (self-explanatory; occasionally overblown and strident, but almost always interesting commentary on politics and news), and Rox Populi.

I particularly like Rox Populi, not just because it has decent and intelligent commentary on politics, and a lot of links to interesting news items and websites, but because it has...

...a daily "Write Your Own Caption" contest!

Back when I first started browsing the Web, one of the regular habits I picked up was to submit entries to the weekly "Insert Caption" contest on Moviefone.com, where they posted a still photo from a current (usually crappy) movie and invited browsers to submit appropriate/inappropriate/wildly-inappropriate captions. The week's selected winner got a free pair of movie tickets. (I won a few times, and had some runner-ups.)

But then, without warning, the Moviefone website was reorganized, and the "Insert Caption" contest was eliminated. Now, far be it from me to say what The Bastards! The Dirty, Rotten, Stinking Bastards! can or can't do with their own website, but, hey, I enjoyed that contest.

There are other insert-caption contests around, but the (newsphoto-inspired) entries on Rox Populi are some of the best I've seen. It helps a lot that her readership includes a lot of smartasses backed up by intelligence.

Some samples here and here.

Now if only she gave out movie tickets for the best caption....

Married Life

So it's been a while since I've had a haircut, and it's getting pretty long again, leading to the following bit of dialogue:

Me: "Hilde, is my receding hairline high enough that tying back my hair into a ponytail would look dumb?"

Hilde: "Not yet. Trust me, I'll let you know when the receding hairline starts to meet up with the thin spot."

Me: "The WHAT? The thin spot? I'VE GOT A THIN SPOT? JESUS CHRIST, WHY DID YOU HAVE TO TELL ME THAT? OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD!"

Sporadic, Unpredictable Cat Blogging

Bastet in disguise. 

"In gratitude for thirty years of government service..."

". . .we're giving you this crappy little silver-colored pin." 

(If I make it to fifty years, they'll show me a picture of a gold watch!)

Now THIS Is Just Plain Wrong

Very, very, very wrong:

Inedible Chocolate Bunnies

Catching Up

The household's high-speed Internet line went out last week, and just got fixed this afternoon. So I'm trying to catch up on e-mail, blogging, news sites, and all the other bad habits I've picked up in the last few years.

Other than the curling up into a fetal position under the computer desk, and the occasional high-pitched shriek of anguish, I don't seem to have had any withdrawal symptoms at being off the Net for an extended period.

And -- of course -- the e-mail stack actually contained real news:

I sold a short story. First since I started writing and submitting again last year. To a small-press anthology, REQUIEM OF THE RADIOACTIVE MONKEYS, that will be published later this year.

AND... I heard from the fellow who, a few years ago, took out a film option on "Death and the Ugly Woman", a story I had in one of the SWORD AND SORCERESS anthologies. He's (finally) gotten some serious interest on producing a sword-&-sorcery anthology-series for television. So "D&TUW" may eventually end up on the screen. (Or not. "Serious interest", in Hollywood-speak, can be pretty fragile.)

Finish This Phrase: "Men Are . . ."

Scientists at the University of Massachusetts may be on the right track for developing a male birth control pill:

"When researchers at the foundation, its scientific operations merged with UMass in 1997, wanted to better understand how they might be able to prevent men from reproducing, they decided to look at pond scum."

Full story here.

Relationship Advice

Dear Prince Chuck,

I say that if you want to marry an older woman who's been married before, go ahead.

Sure worked out well for me.

Self-Improvement

About two-and-a-half years ago, I found the needle on the bathroom scale edging very close to the 200-pound mark.

I cut back on serving sizes, and on snacks and desserts. I also started putting half-diet, half-regular soda into the big mug I carry around at work, instead of all sugared soda.

Worked pretty well. Over about six months, my weight dropped down into the mid-170's. And it looked like I might progress on to my target weight of 165. (The height/weight charts at my doctor's say my ideal weight would be 155. But the last time I was actually at 155, I was falling over from dizzy spells and thinking things like "Brain tumor; they'll probably amputate.")(That was the summer of 1978; boy, that summer was just one endless episode of Fun and Happiness after another....)

But after that six months of fairly steady weight loss, with no change in what I was doing to try and lose weight, the weight loss stopped and my weight stabilized at about 175.

For about a year. Over the last year, still with no change in what I'd been doing, I've slowly crept back up to about 185 pounds.

My metabolism has apparently betrayed me ("Bad metabolism! Bad!"), shifting to my disadvantage.

So, in an effort to both burn more calories and kickstart the metabolics into a faster-burning rate, I started exercising regularly at the beginning of January.

Progress report for that first month: Weight loss... zip; the scale's still in the 183-185 pound range.

But the good news is that body fat seems to be shrinking: the stomach looks a little smaller, and feels a lot firmer. And doing a pinch-test at the sides of the waist is producing a smaller pinch. So I think an increase in muscle mass is replacing some of the weight formerly known as fat.

I'm not too concerned about the weight, if it goes along with an improvement in body condition. When I was working out regularly at a gym, about ten years ago, my weight never got below 180, but I looked (if I may say so) Pretty Damned Good.

So my goals for the year are: 1) try and get weight down to 175 or less, and 2) get in good enough condition by 2006 to post a beefcake photo here without embarassing myself.

Tinfoilage

"His conclusions were, and are, inclined to be bizarre." -- TNH, 1987

Way back when, in the late 70's, I picked up a new product at the store to try: Electric Fries, a frozen paste of mashed potatoes and binders, formed into a deeply ridged slab which went into one's toaster for heating and browning; one broke apart the slab along the ridgelines, and, voila!, you had "French Fries" out of your toaster.

Electric Fries ended up as one of the exhibits at The Museum of Failed Products, probably because they tasted like paste and tended to scorch badly along the high spots. Very few people ever saw them. The reason I got to try them out is because the Phoenix metro area, with a large diverse population, is one of the most popular places for manufacturers to do test-marketing for new products.

Back last year, a main-transformer fire at one of the Phoenix area's electric substations caused about a 20% loss of the city's electrical supply for several weeks. About ten days after the first fire, a second transformer, at another station, also caught fire. Residents were asked to cut back and conserve on their use of electricity.

Also last year, a break in an underground gasoline pipeline caused Phoenix to lose a third of its gasoline supply for about a week-and-a-half. There were hours-long lines at the few gas stations that still had anything in their tanks after several days; police were posted at some stations to prevent arguments and fights.

Yesterday morning, it was announced that recent heavy rains had contaminated Phoenix water treatment plants, and that Phoenix water needed to be boiled before drinking or washing dishes, etc. This is supposed to be resolved in a day or two, but in the meantime all the major stores have sold out of bottled water, etc.

And here (Fair Warning!) is where I find myself starting to reach for my tinfoil hat:

If I were running a country that had experienced a major terrorist attack several years before, I'd want to prepare for future possible attacks. I'd want to know how the public would react to a (partial) loss of electricity, a (major) loss in gasoline supplies, a (full) contamination of its water supplies.

Is Phoenix being used as a test-market for possible terrorist-attack scenarios?

This falls into the "If I were writing a story..." category, I think. For a paperback thriller, the idea of the government cutting electricity, gasoline, water supplies to a particular city, to see how the populace reacts, would be a great plot element.

But even if the (innocent) explanations for the transformer fire, the pipeline break, the treatment-plant contamination, are true, I would want the government to study how the Phoenix public reacted to and coped with the various shortages. Because someday we might have to deal with real and deliberate attacks on utilities and tranportation systems.

"I deeply resent the way this administration makes me feel like a nutbar conspiracy theorist." -- TNH, 2003

Last Minute Addition: A letter-to-the-editor in today's Arizona Republic raised the idea that the treatment-plant contamination was the result of terrorist action. Jeez, that guy's wacko!

Like American Idol, With Knives

PBS is producing a new reality/competition show, Cooking Under Fire, which will reduce entrants to 12 finalists, who will then be pitted against each other in cooking competitions until only one remains. Open auditions in a number of cities, or audition via a 10-minute videotape. The winner gets a job as a chef in a Todd English NYC restaurant.

Premiere April 27th. Details and application forms here.

Long Day

A thirteen-hour work day is too damned much.

Following the MLK holiday, went to work Tuesday morning to find not only multiple tubs of magazines, catalogs and other flats (not unexpected), but also multiple 2-foot trays of letter-sized mail.

Since the Postal Service introduced DPS (Delivery Point Sequencing) some years ago, where most of the letter mail is now sorted by machine, only about a foot of letter mail (unmachinable for one reason or another) needs to be sorted by each carrier in the morning before taking mail out to the street for delivery.

So, besides having the (expected) larger-than-usual volume of machine-sorted mail, we also had all these trays of letters to be hand-sorted and routed for delivery, in volume I hadn't seen since before automation really got going. Which meant the time spent in the office before going to street delivery was hours longer than usual.

So I'm much later getting out to the street, and with the heavy volume, the street delivery time also keeps stretching out longer and longer. The 8-hour point, 3:00, arrives and I've only done about half the route's deliveries. I call in for assistance, only to be told none's available.

I keep going. Lunch is (finally) at 5:00, then I start deliveries on the final group of streets, usually a little less than two hours work.

At 6:30, I've still got two streets left. The sun's down, my headlights are lit, and the cabin and cargo-section lights are on so I can see the trays of mail. I head for the next-to-last street, Julie, and I see...

...another mail truck!, just turning onto Julie itself. The station managed to send some assistance after all! Yay! I've been working twelve hours at this point, and I am so glad to see some help arrive. Quickly, I pull up behind the other truck where it's stopped on Julie.

And the other truck...

makes a quick U-turn...

and drives...

the fuck...

away.

There's only one suitable thing to say in that situation:

"VORGA! I kill you filthy, Vorga!"

It's Official: Civilization Ends

William Shatner, at the Golden Globes Awards yesterday, won an award for his acting.

Addendum, 1/18/05: Well, duh... After posting the above, I find out that Shatner actually won AN EMMY for portraying the same character LAST year (on The Practice, before Boston Legal was spun off of it).

I know, between the election and the Red Sox, there was a LOT of unlikely stuff happening in 2004, but still... how in hell did I completely miss any notice of THAT?

Think Like A Terrorist

I started to write this post in the form of two memos between employees of Terrorists-R-Us.

The first memo was from an eager, lower-level employee in the Planning Department, submitting a brainstorm to the Vice-President of the Terrorists-R-Us Operations Department. The second was the VP's response, explaining the facts of life to the over-enthusiastic youngster.

On consideration, though, I've decided to dump the first part. The "brainstorm" was a bit too good. (Not that I'm particularly worried about some terrorist surfing the Internet, stumbling across this blog, and exclaiming, "Wow! What a neat idea!" But if the US government has, as rumor opines, web-crawling software that flags phrases like "trck bmbs" and "ngrtn" appearing close together. . . well, I'd rather skip the FBI interrogation, thanks.)

But the second part, the VP's response, still merits posting:

From: J.W. Booth, VP, Operations Department, Terrorists-R-Us

To: A. Berkmann, Planning Department, Terrorists-R-Us

Dear Alex:

Thank you for your memo. But there's a reason your own department
head passed the idea over.

I can tell you're young, and eager, and want to make a mark in this
business. However, you need to realize that killing innocent
people is not part of our job.

They got most of the publicity, and virtually all of the outrage. But
the thousands killed in the attacks on the WTC on 9/11 were irrelevant. They were collateral damage, pure and simple.

Our goal, what we've been hired for, is to destroy and cripple the
US economically. The goal of the WTC attacks was, for a
relatively small cost on our part, to cost the US hundreds of billions of
dollars in primary and secondary costs from the attacks. It's worked,
spectacularly, and is still working.

We've even gotten free assistance toward our goals from the US
government, which seems totally oblivious that this is economic warfare, not
military. We couldn't do better even if we were running an inside
job.

Your plan is spectacular and outrageous. But we're not looking
for outrage; we're looking for cost-effective.

We want ideas that will make Americans afraid to use their own national
infrastructure. Not for the sake of terror itself, but because their reaction to that fear will cost them money and cripple their businesses.

We've already managed to make air travel even more hassle-prone and bothersome than before, and put most airlines into deep and continuing financial straits. In the next few years, we want to conduct operations that will make Americans afraid to drive on their own highways, afraid to ship anything by rail, and afraid to trust their own water or electrical supplies.

If you have any brainstorms along those lines, submit them to your
department head. If they're promising, they'll reach my desk
eventually.

(And don't go over his head to me again. You'll be fired. Out
of a cannon.)

Sincerely, J.W. Booth

Disclaimer: Just in case there might be a "J.W. Booth" or "A. Berkmann" somewhere out in the blogosphere who might take umbrage at their names appearing as employees of "Terrorists-R-Us", be it noted that I've used the names of John Wilkes Booth and Alexander Berkmann, well-known 19th-century assassin and attempted-assassin. No resemblance to living persons is intended, blah blah blah. . . .

The Shirt

Planned Parenthood is selling an "I Had An Abortion" t-shirt on their website.

Bad move, I think. The point, says the t-shirt's designer, is to bring abortion out of the shame closet and state it as being a safe, legal medical procedure.

But the very bluntness of its wording gives anti-abortion voices the opportunity to label it as callousness. (And considerably stronger words.)

Let me propose an alternative, somewhat longer but less attackable, t-shirt message:

[ ] safe legal abortions

[ ] dangerous illegal abortions

CHOOSE ONE

Smart Women, Dumb Men

Here's a news story about a recent British study that found that for every sixteen-point-rise in a woman's IQ, her chances of getting married dropped by 40%.

A high IQ is a hindrance for women wanting to get married while it is an asset for men, according to a study by four British universities published in The Sunday Times newspaper.

The study found the likelihood of marriage increased by 35 percent for boys for each 16-point increase in IQ.

But for girls, there is a 40-percent drop for each 16-point rise, according to the survey by the universities of Aberdeen, Bristol, Edinburgh and Glasgow.

The study is based on the IQs of 900 men and women between their 10th and 40th birthdays.

"Women in their late 30s who have gone for careers after the first flush of university and who are among the brightest of their generation are finding that men are just not interesting enough," said psychologist and professor at Nottingham University Paul Brown in The Sunday Times.

Claire Rayner, writer and broadcaster, said in the article that intelligent men often prefered a less brainy partner.

"A chap with a high IQ is going to get a demanding job that is going to take up a lot of his energy and time. In many ways he wants a woman who is an old-fashioned wife and looks after the home, a copy of his mum in a way."

I note that the male professor quoted above essentially puts the blame onto smart women for finding men "just not interesting enough". (Is the subtext here that smart women will turn out Lesbian, or am I reading too much into it? And what an interesting argument, that intelligence causes Lesbianism, that would be.)(Come to think of it, I'm hard-pressed to think of ever meeting any really dumb Lesbians. . . .)

Whereas the female writer quoted says that a man wants "a copy of his mum". (Ummmm... let's not get too far into that....) (And perhaps, just perhaps, I should rephrase that last sentence....)

I think the study's results, as reported, though, are flawed. It would mean that a woman with an IQ of 140 has a statistically ZERO chance of ever finding a marriage partner. And I've known some women who are probably that smart or smarter, and seem to have found satisfying mates and had happy marriages for years. (Usually, I admit, women who've found men whose intelligence is close to their own.)

But the most important factor in finding such a mate, I think, isn't intelligence by itself. Indeed, I think the article is right in that a wide disparity in intelligence between partners can be an obstacle or hindrance in starting or maintaining a relationship.

More important, by far, is the "emotional IQ" or people involved in a relationship. Pulchritude, good looks, is nice, but it's surface. Intelligence, pure brain smarts, is good, too. But the quality that I've always found most attractive in women has been... competence.

By "competence" I mean an ability to cope with life. To deal smoothly with both the day to day stresses and problems of life, and with the sudden and major disasters. To work through them, and come out the other side either unchanged or improved.

I was lucky (luckier than I deserved) and ended up with a woman high in that emotional IQ. (How lucky Hilde was, to end up with me, is *ahem* *koff koff* a discussion best left for some other time.)

Recommended Reading

John Scalzi's Seven Maxims For Non-Believers.

Devin Ganger's Seven Maxims For Believers.

No Shuck, No Jive, It's Two Thousand Five!

And how the hell did I ever end up there when I live in the present? 2005 has always been part of the future, one of those dates you only see in some of those crazy sci-fi books.

Looking back at 2004... not a bad year, for Hilde and me. Hilde's health stayed fairly stable, with no major flare-ups or surgeries. (Unusual, and welcome.) My own comprehensive checkup at the Mayo Clinic showed no major problems (though my shoulder problem might eventually require surgery if it worsens over time). We were pretty comfortable financially, and even got a few unexpected windfalls at the end of the year that let us pay off one of the credit cards. I revived my old personalzine, UNDULANT FEVER, as this weblog. And I finally started writing some fiction again, and sending the stories out to markets.

On the non-personal front... 2004 wasn't so hot. The biggie, Bush's election, of course. (I may do up a list of predictions of what I think is likely to happen over the next four years; it won't be pretty.) The tsunami disaster, and ongoing crisis, in the Indian Ocean nations. And other charming and alarming news across the nation and world.

Addendum, 1/2/05: As it turned out, after posting the above, 2005 got off to a bad start, when a slight headache turned into a BIG headache, and nausea, and vomiting, etc. I went back to bed a couple of hours after posting, and have been there until this morning. (I'm starting to feel a bit more normal.)

Capitalism In Action

Russia has announced that, beginning in 2006, there will be no more free rides for American astronauts to and from the International Space Station.

So here's what you might see on TV about that time:

ESTABLISHING SHOT -- SPACE

A Russian Soyuz spacecraft approaches the International Space Station and docks with it, the curving horizon of a beautiful Earth in the background.

INTERIOR -- SPACE STATION

There are two astronauts, RUSSIAN and AMERICAN, in the space station. The Russian is seated at a console. The American hovers over his shoulder, an anxious look on his face.

RUSSIAN: Docking is complete.

The American breaks into a broad smile.

AMERICAN: Whoo-hoo! My ride home! Finally! Lemme just get my bag!

The American floats across the space station's interior and picks up a small suitcase. He turns around and moves toward the hatchway.

However, the Russian has left his seat and is now standing in front of the doorway. He holds a hand out, palm first.

RUSSIAN: Not so fast, comrade. Have you forgotten? Today is January the first. Russia's new policy has gone into effect.

The Russian shifts his hand to flat out, palm up. He rubs his thumb across his fingers.

RUSSIAN: Payment for goods and services. Is that not the American way?

The American looks aghast and stunned. He glances frantically around the statioon for several seconds, then stops, looking suddenly thoughtful. A smile breaks out on his face.

The American opens one of the many pockets on his uniform, and pulls out...

CLOSE-UP SHOT -- AMERICAN'S HAND, EXTENDED OUT

... an American Express card.

MEDIUM SHOT -- THE RUSSIAN

The Russian's face breaks into a pleased smile as he reaches for the card.

EXTERIOR -- SPACE

We see the Soyuz capsule heading back towards Earth. We hear the American's voice, fading as the Soyuz grows farther away.

AMERICAN (OFF-SCREEN, FADING): Whoo-o-o-o-o-hoo-o-o-o-o-o-o!

NARRATOR (VOICEOVER): American Express. Don't leave home without it.

END

Unprofessional Jealousy

Sometimes you come across a phrase so wonderfully evocative that it makes you gnash your teeth and proclaim, "Damn, I wish I'd written that!"

A phrase like:

"Deep in your heart there is a sunlight so hot that it makes you love people."

And to add chagrin to jealousy, realizing that it was written by a six-year old girl.

Outwritten by a six-year old. Sheesh.

There's only one thing to do: We have to get that young lady interested in horses, as soon as possible.

Doing The Numbers

In an AP article, George Bush was quoted from an announcement regarding the tsunami disaster in the Indian Ocean:

Bush said the catastrophe had "brought loss and grief to the world that is beyond our comprehension," and he pledged a multifaceted response from the United States that goes far beyond the $35 million initially pledged.

The current estimate of fatalities from the tsunamis is 76,000 people.

And that's "beyond our comprehension."

The current estimate of civilian casualties in the Iraq war is 100,000.

And that is beyond our willingness to comprehend.

Food For Thought

Our friend Anne was over tonight, and one of the subjects the conversation wandered onto was: why were Irish immigrants in the 19th century regarded as "dumb"?

Beyond the obvious, that many immigants came from peasant backgrounds with little or no formal schooling, Anne conjectured the lack of things like, oh, food in Irish diets of the time might have prevented proper brain development in children. Or even before the Potato Famine, that the overwhelming preponderance of a single food item in the diets may have caused a nutrient imbalance with similar results.

"Ah," I said. "Then perhaps grits explains Red States election results."

Anne thought that over for a moment, then said, "No, I think you're committing a logical fallacy. You're making an add hominy argument."

"As You Know, Ged..."

Hilde and I watched Sci Fi Channel's Earthsea last night.

My old scriptwriting finger got itchy. It's been thirty years since I read the Earthsea books, so I don't remember enough to say how much, or how badly, the producers changed LeGuin's work. But I felt it certainly needed somebody (even me!) to give it another rewrite (or three).

The dialogue was clunky and (particularly in the first hour) filled with awkward expository lumps. The direction was... pedestrian (and actively bad in some spots, such as Ged's leading the soldiers over the cliff). The CGI effects were mostly of several-years-behind-the-development-curve level, and jarred with the real characters and settings. And despite a few bright spots like Danny Glover and Isabella Rosselini, the acting was mostly... again, this word... pedestrian. (And a special plea to the guy playing Ged's father: If you have a day job, please please please, go back to it.)

Could have been worse. In a bad fantasy movie, Ged would have been six-foot-three with rippling abs, and taking off his shirt at every opportunity. When he picked up a sword for the first or near-first time in his life, he would have beaten the well-trained villain. And there would have been a scene with the young priestesses relaxing in the communal baths. (We did have the villain and the traitorous priestess in bed together, but for a bad movie, you have to have lots of young women in a state of undress at the same time.)

I'll give it a "C". I'm thinking I'll re-read the Earthsea books; I may down-grade the movie after that.

HAGAR! The Film That Never Was

At Film Crew Online, the MST3000 geeks riff on various ideas for comic-strip based movies. One of which is for a film version of Hagar The Horrible.

Oddly enough, back in the early 90's when I was trying to follow up my episode of ST:TNG by pitching movie scripts to studios, my agent actually represented the Hagar strip (and a bunch of others) for a short while. This seemed serendipitous, and I worked up a short pitch for a possible script.

My concept for a Hagar movie was that it was basically a love story between Hagar and his wife. Hagar, incompetent Viking, gets into trouble, and more trouble, and still more trouble. Eventually placing his own family into peril. Which, of course, in grand movie tradition, motivates him to actual competence, and enables him to rescue the people he loves.

The Hagar dynamics are quite similar to The Simpsons. If you traced Homer Simpson's family tree back far enough, in fact, you'd almost certainly find Hagar bending down one of the branches.

Alas, shortly after working up that outline, I found myself having to take anti-depressants -- thanks to a Toxic (highly Toxic) Boss at my dayjob -- which had the rueful side-effect of removing any desire or need to write. By the time I was able to get off the meds and try writing again, about a year later, my agent no longer represented Hagar, and was shortly to be cut off from financial support by the patron who'd been keeping him afloat for several years.

And I never quite managed to regain what feeble momentum towards a scriptwriting career I'd had. (A not untypical Struggling Scriptwriter career trajectory, I'm afraid. *sigh*)

Werewolves of Christmas

For most of the year, at my workplace, the radio stays turned off. Too many people had too many arguments over which station to listen to. The old hippies objected to country. The Harley riders objected to classical. The pickup-driving crowd objected to hip-hop.

Every December, though, the radio gets turned on and tuned to one of the stations carrying Christmas music. Not particularly for the employees' benefit, but because the speakers also broadcast into the customer lobby, and Christmas music at Christmas season is, y'know, traditional.

The particular station tuned in this year hasn't ramped up to full Christmas content yet, so about half the songs they're broadcasting are still their usual classic rock.

So this morning things are going as usual, and then the speakers bring forth the pounding DUM-DA, DUM-DA, DUM-DA-DA-DUM of...

...Warren Zevon's "Werewolves of London", in that voice that even back then was rough and gravelly, but strong and powerful.

And the first AWWOOOOOOOO! comes, and by god if a couple of people listening don't join in.

And the second AWWOOOOOOOO! comes, and even more of my co-workers join in.

And the third, even more.

And by the time the song ends, about a quarter of the employees, 25 or 30, are all going AWWOOOOOOOO!.

It was probably a good thing this took place before the lobby opened to customers. Normal people waiting to buy stamps or mail packages, if they heard a bunch of postal employees howling en masse, would probably reach for their cell phones and call 911. ("They're going nuts down here! Send a SWAT team as fast as you can!")

Werewolves for Christmas? Works for me.

Weirdos On The Rooftop

Scariest. Santa. Ever.

from Victorian Trading Company

More News From Alternate-Earth

Canada Declares Victory In Battle of Toledo

from counterpunch.org