The Constitution: Nineteenth Amendment

The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.

Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

The authors of this amendment used the word sex in an official government document back in 1920.  Those scamps.

The word "sex" was used as a state of being, not an act of utter grossness.  Some States let female citizens vote for city council and mayoral things.  Some States let femes vote on laws but not other things.  The entire suffrage thing is strange and I think it is because the name suffrage was used to represent voting rights.  The word comes from fragor, to applaud loudly and from suffragium, a final decision.  Suffering is not the same thing as suffrage.  To me, if something sounds the same, it also must come from the same root words and it is therefore sort of related.  I cannot reconcile suffering and suffrage together so I just forget about the whole thing and chalk it up to some dumb title and never accept it as logical. 

Since our democracy is heading for the trash heap anyway and our way of life will dwindle away over the next millennium, just frag the whole mess.  frag is the actual root word of suffrage.  Now you see why I am confounded.  Or is the conflicted?  Someone stop me....please before rambling old men are denied the right to suffrage not to suffer.

Pencils

Did you ever here the saying "As the pencil goes, so goes the country"?  Well, of course not, I just made it up.  The saying seems to be true.  Have you looked at a pencil lately.  The pen(cil) is mightier than the sword was heard around the world as a catch phrase for peace, intelligence and dignity.  The once mighty pencil was made of cedar and a special kind of cedar.  This special wood was selected because it did not splinter when sharpened with the standard old pencil sharpener.    It was hollowed out and filled with a graphite and clay mixture.  When I was a kid, you could sharpen a pencil with your name on it as sharp and strong as a dagger.  I still have a piece of lead in my palm from a fourth grade misadventure with a pencil. 

Last night, I was sharpening some pencils for my grandkids.  I found three or four different types of pencils.  Some were very light and I am pretty sure some of them were not even made of wood.  Cedar was no where to be found.  They also were thinner in diameter.  Come to think of it, the only place I can find anything that resembles a real pencil is on the golf course.  Those little wooden things they give you with your score card are still a real pencil.  The tees are cheap, fake wood but those pencils are still real.  As I sharpened the pencils for the kids, I noticed the shavings were not spiraling off like they should.  What a joy it was in grade school to sharpen the pencil with one of those little razor blades in a plastic thing and then play with the shavings.  Getting that special edge on the lead was an art form and specific for each person and project.  I put a nice point on the oldest child's pencil.  He can keep from pushing down too hard and breaking the damn tip off.  The other two kids got shorter, stronger points.  They still mashed the paper when they wrote.

At least one of the pencils that I was sharpening got thrown away for being a gigantic piece of crap wood substitute.  It had lead like lipstick and was continuously breaking while sharpening.  I should have looked up the name of the manufacturer of that hunk of hyena poop but I was afraid it would be a US manufacturer and I was not prepared for that trauma at the moment.  One of the other pencils is not long for this world because the wood was so soft and thin the entire stick bent while writing.  Do not get me started about crayons.  They do not even taste the same.

With all of the texting and electronic mail, writing is becoming a lost art.  Spelling is also going the way of grammar and dictation.  I feel there will be a resurgence of being literate soon.  It may still be electronic but there will be none of that texting shorthand nonsense.  The pencil will still be around and our children will still not be able to run through the house with it.  Although as I look at my palm, I do not think a pencil can even break the skin anymore.  It will just smear in my hand like a crayon.  Do not get me started.

Laundry

I love  fresh, clean laundry.  I do not love stinky, wet, grimy piles of fermented cotton and muslin.  In today’s high tech world with all its new deadly germs and inadequate fail safe systems, I would prefer to not sort dirty cloths.  I cannot believe that industry could not invent either color safe bleach that works half a shit worth or colors that can stand up to bleach bleach.  Chuck this one into a conspiracy theory box. 

Anyway, I have shoulder length rubber gloves that I use mostly for sorting cloths.  I also use them for my biological warfare research and sometimes at very private parties with not so private people.  Once the white cotton laundry and bleachable stuff is sorted from the none bleachable stuff, I have to decide which one I put in the washing machine first.  I like to bleach during the rinse cycle when I actually turn the damn cycle off and let the bleach water soak in for about half an hour.  So what is the deal with the "automatic bleach dispenser" that always sits at the front of the washing machine.  I checked the hose leading from it and it runs into the bottom of the drum where the cloths sit.  It does not wait for the magic bleach time established by the Maytag Man, nope, it just dumps it under your cloths as soon as you pour it in.  Not only is it killing your cloths, it is rusting everything out.  Bleach is a equal opportunity oxidizer.  It does not care if it is blood or steel, it will oxidize it.  Most oxides are white (iron oxide is red, rust) but all oxides are water soluble so the water just rinses away the leftover stain. 

Ok, so we have toxic biohazardous clothing and metal eating chemicals and a machine that spins things at about a thousand revolutions per minute.  Where is OSHA when you need them.  They are having sex with the people over at Homoland Security.   Now it is time to transfer the clean cloths to the dryer.  An appliance with 240 volts and twenty amps will now receive a bunch of wet cloths and force them to become dry.  They have no choice in the matter.  This machine can melt a Barbie doll's shoe in two seconds spreading the plastic throughout all of your towels.  Dry plastic barbie shoe on towels is like cats claws raking your face.  I found a Chuck Taylor stuck to the drum and the shoe strings were knotted so well, even I could not untie them.  Most of the time shoe strings stay in the washing machine where they were tied to underwear or socks and stuck around the pole thingy in the middle of the washing machine. 

Somehow, dry fresh smelling cloths end up in the dryer.  There is no greater feeling than placing a warm towel on your face in the morning.  Folding cloths is an art form.  I have never mastered the process.  I fold them sort of like leaves in the forest, just as they lay.  Forget the fitted sheet thing, that is a paranormal process.  I think that was one of the charges at the Salem Witch Trials.  "The wench can foldeth a fitted sheet, she is a witch, burn her!" A pile of fresh folded laundry is worthy of sex.  I am not sure what that means  but it sounds good.

We all know laundry dried outside on the line in the fresh sunny air is the best.  I dry blankets on the porch rail and then make the bed instantly and then I want to .....   That is what that means, okydoky. 

I love laundry.

Friday Science: A Place of dreams

"We have potential treatments that make sense with very few side effects, and yet we're not allowed to use them," he said. "People in the rare disease community want to be protected, but they don't want to be protected to death."

There is a department of the National Institute of Health that investigates undiagnosed diseases.  Ones that all other doctors have given up on.  It is all free if you can get in.  They turn away most patients.  They do not have the facility, personnel or the time to look at all cases.  Some they can help with a treatment.  Some they can just give a name to the condition but there is no treatment and some there is no name to the disease but a possible treatment is recommended. 

Remember though, this is a government institution, you cannot just run around trying to cure people with all kinds of advice from hundreds of top doctors around the world.  The treatment may kill them before the disease does.  How would that look on a status report.  Mostly, the disease kill them before they can even start a treatment because the treatment has to be approved by the under managed Food and Drug Administration.  First it has to be classified as a disease and then drug trials have to be done to see if the drugs work.  In a few years and after a thousand rat trials and millions of dollars to a drug company, the drug is ready but never used.  The patient died two years ago.  Oh well, we will keep it around for the next study. 

I hate reading these stories and I hate reporting them.  I hate a lot of things now.  Scientists can be corrupt, governments, well, of course.  They say that Dr. L. Pasteur fudged his science to get a big fat grant that eventually saved billions of people.  The sheep inoculation study has never been duplicated the way Pasteur's notes said to do it.  Scientific thought is incorruptible.  I do not hate that.

Speaking of Government

Nothing is more certain than the indispensable necessity of government, and it is equally undeniable, that whenever and however it is instituted, the people must cede to it some of their natural rights in order to vest it with requisite powers. --  John Jay, The Federalist Papers

If this is the fulcrum of the scale, which side of the balance do you lean toward.  On one side you have the Fascists who feel most people are too ignorant and selfish to govern themselves properly and therefor must be told what to do and what not to do.  This includes elimination of free choice in all personal decisions like Abortion, Education and Integration.  Fascists feel they are the most qualified to make choices for the masses. 

 On the other end of the lever, the Socialists feel that most options should be open to not only discussion but free to a varied implementation.  The choices are viewed as options to be explored and for the masses to experience.  Morality is a function of the majority and choice itself is individual based on a broad majoric definition. 

Most people wander in and out of the two.  An example of ceding a natural right for the greater of society is eminent domain.  We have rights to own our own land and do with it pretty much what we want.  Eminent Domain says that if the government deems your  farm land something they need for the greater good of the society, they can at worst take your land and pay you almost nothing for it.   Fascist take the land because they need it and Socialists take the land to be "shared" by all.   You are screwed either way.  Ask the Five Civilized Tribes about moving off your land.

Government is a tricky thing and only those who really want to sustain and improve the American system should get involved.

The Constitution: Eighteenth amendment

Section 1. After one year from the ratification of this article the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited.

Section 2. The Congress and the several States shall have concurrent power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Section 3. This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of the several States, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the States by the Congress.

This amendment had a implementation time stamp on it and also if the States did not ratify it in a timely manner, it was bust. 

Here is the result of this law.

Following the 18th Amendment's adoption, prohibition effectively resulted in a public demand for illegal alcohol, making criminals of producers and consumers. The criminal justice system was swamped although police forces and courts had expanded in recent years. Prisons were jam-packed and court dockets were behind in trying to deal with the rapid surge in crimes. Organized crime expanded to deal with the lucrative business, and there was widespread corruption among those charged with enforcing unpopular laws.

Sounds like the war on drugs to me.  A good try at legislating morality never the less.  It was repealed because it was clear it was not working as planned.  It only took 13 years. 

Gasoline Prices

Now, we all know that there is very little competition in gasoline prices.  I can drive down a street and pass three gas stations that I know get their fuel from different suppliers.   The prices for regular gas are within one cent of each other.  I wonder about the chains that are twelve cents a gallon higher.  How do they compete?  I will tell you how, morons! 

I remember when gas was twenty three cents a gallon.  When I was in High School it was fifty cents a gallon.  My 1965 Chevy Impala with its ten miles per gallon engine pushing around six thousand pounds of steel and teenage might could drag main street about 5 times on that fifty cents.  A three or four cent difference at a gas pump even on the other side of town was worth chasing down.  If I bought a dollars worth of gas, I could make the loop through town ten times and still have a mile's worth of gas left to get home.  Of course, I could hear my dad yelling in the morning because the car was on empty.  If he was in a really bad mood, he would wake me up and make me go get him some gas.  He ran out of gas on the way to work one time and since it was my sister who had the car the previous evening, I did not have to listen to most of the yelling.

Gasoline prices are regulated by the "Bergemiesters" which we all know is the secret society that runs everything in the world.  It consists of a few Arab Sheiks and a couple of people from the Hapsburg dynasty.  Bill Gates may have joined the group.  Queen Elizabeth attends the meetings.  Rockefeller and Joe Kennedy used to switch off attending.  Hitler wanted to be part of the group but the Bergermeisters made sure Stalin got reinforcements and Hirohito who was a member did not move into the Sakhalins.  Hitler was too whiny.  OF COURSE GASOLINE PRICES ARE FIXED. 

Review

I have been reviewing my blogs and some of them are pretty good.  There was the one about the Player and the one about the lawyer.  I think the Friday science is going pretty well.   The Constitution review is tedious but needed.  I was afraid that I would write for a year and not really accomplish anything.  At least I could say I read the Constitution that year.  I think the Tiger episodes are very creating and I find them amusing.

I have been running out of time to write.  My desktop computer is broken, work has been busy.  I just have not made the time to create a coherent sentence.  I say I am out of time but I did watch Lavern and Shirley yesterday.  It was research. Lately, the blogs have been getting longer and the paragraphs are better organized.   I think that is a good trend yet I have to be careful that it is not just babble and bore. 

It had been a long hot day as I snatched my clean underwear off of the cloths line on the way in from the field.  With wild fresh air, the sun warmed to perfection all of the cloths, towels and bed linens.  I walked slowly and held the briefs to my nose with my eyes shut to prevent any distractions while enjoying the moment of clean cloths taken from the line.  I moved through the house with my eyes covered in cotton subconsciously navigating to the bedroom where a neatly made bed of clean muslin sheets awaited. I slid the jockeys under the comforter to prevent the warmth and smell from escaping prematurely.  I would make my shower quick so I could return to a warm cotton universe.

I wrote this paragraph a while ago for no particular reason.  I have rewritten it several times.  This time, it seems like it is a finished paragraph.  It could be a lead in to a story or just out with the trash.   I will look at it again in a few weeks to see if it is worth a damn after all.

Friday Science: A big deal

From USA Today:

In an upcoming report in the journal Gastroenterology, researchers relate that they have successfully mixed human muscle cells with mouse nerves, and then grown them on a circular mold to make replacement sphincter rings.
After implanting the lab-grown circles into eight mice, the new structures were successfully colonized by blood vessels and performed their intended function, says the study.

"In essence, we have built a replacement sphincter that we hope can one day benefit human patients. This is the first bioengineered sphincter made with both muscle and nerve cells, making it 'pre-wired' for placement in the body," said senior author Khalil Bitar of Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center's Institute for Regenerative Medicine.

This is not growing skin from stem cells which is not to say that is not cool and important, this is bioengineering a body part when it is needed.  It is plug and play with this stuff.  It can be made from the host's own tissue and it will not be rejected.  I think it will be a plausible option in ten years.  In twenty years it will be eyes and heart valves and a new pancreas that works great.  The drug companies will have to shift to this stuff and they are heading that way.  That will slow progress down once the technology is at our fingertips.  The morons that run corporations would rather be filthy rich during their tenure instead of helping people and making their company thrive for a century.  Check out General Motors, Enron or Carter Medicine Company. 

Bio-engineering does not mean anti-God zombies will be running around. It is nothing more than selective breeding of plants of the 1900's.  Dog breeding is a good example of the dangers of ignorant people trying to make money.  Good stuff comes from decent hardworking thinkers and none of it should be restricted or delayed.

Spelling

I admit it.  I cannot spell very well.  I have lousy punctuation.  I have talked about this before.  The last few days I have been writing and feeling pretty good about myself because upon running the spell checker, it points to an improvement in my spelling, grammar and punctuation.   I over use commas if that is possible.  I pause all the time while I talk, so I throw in a comma.  See how that works.  Some times while typing wildly, I spell "of" as "ove" so anything can happen.

I just found out, oh Lord, my spell checker was set on Cyrillic and you cannot spell anything wrong in some languages.  If you get too many vowels, just throw in a symbol or a consonant to balance it out, who will notice.  It is my Island speak.  I was in Singapore and there was a street named Patuzcriputautamataputzacrepiipoul.  It was know by that name.  It has 19 syllables and it means, "The road used by the Emperor's manservant to walk his dog in spring time."  Even the locals just call it "Dog Shit Street"  which is "putzacrepiida". I asked a nice lady on the train to pronounce the street name and she said, "No, her teeth were loose".  I saw a UPS postal guy crying while parked at the intersection of  Patuzcriputautamataputzacrepiipoul and Patuzcriputautamatacrepii (which means "where the Emperor's cat was eaten by a peasant").  The guy in the Brown truck was checking his translator on the web but it kept giving him directions to a Pizza Hut in Buktar. 

I think spelling is kinda silly but grammar and punctuation are like fine art.  Well, it is not like fine art, it is a fine art.  If you read the masters, you will notice impeccable grammar.  If you remove the text from a verse and just leave the punctuation on the page, it is like music.  It has meter and balance.  Yes, I did that with Poe, Steinbeck and others.  I was dancing.  I did it with my writing and I tripped and stumbled over a dangling participle and cut my eye.  When I write, I do not correct spelling but I try to punctuate properly.  I run the spelling and grammar checker later before I publish.  If it is not working, I may lose the two Ukrainians that visit my blog.  I would then have an average of 1 visitor a week.  So, spelling is important.

The Constitution: The Seventeenth Amendment

The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, elected by the people thereof, for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote. The electors in each State shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the State legislatures.

When vacancies happen in the representation of any State in the Senate, the executive authority of such State shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies: Provided, That the legislature of any State may empower the executive thereof to make temporary appointments until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct.

This amendment shall not be so construed as to affect the election or term of any Senator chosen before it becomes valid as part of the Constitution.

I think this is where the political fine tuning or as I like to call it, the Bend Over America Transition started.  Based on this amendment and the one reason it was created, I think the Minnesota State Legislature will be having an amendment soon.  I guess back in 1855ish, several states failed to elect a senator and the seats was left vacant.  This somehow was a protest to the elimination of slavery and laws to facilitate slave freedom.  I did not feel like reading the whole thing but basically, there was a change in the way the senators were elected that made it harder for anyone to screw with the election.  Someone is always trying to keep someone down.  Whether it is the Cast system in India, the "which God claimed this land first"  in the Middle East, (Here is some news, it is all the same God and they are all cousins 40 generations ago)  or the Protestants are more advanced than the Catholics bull shit in the English speaking areas, people just want to feel superior to someone.  Your penis may hang down farther but mine is stiffer.

I myself know for sure what I am more superior than, mayonnaise and/or pork.  Either way the proof is in the pulling.  Other than that, I am not too sure and will try not to judge.  The Seventeenth amendment was fine tuning the way States interacted with the Union.  That is a good thing.

Scary moment in Golf?

I have played a ton of golf in my life and I think I was in a dangerous position once if you do not count the beer girl and the poison ivy.  I was chased by an alligator, that was scary.  I did not read the article in the paper last week on the "scary" situation with Rory Whateverhisnameis.  I began trying to think of something dangerous or scary that could normally happen on a golf course. 

There are the golf carts running around at seven miles an hour.  Most of them cannot even get through a decent flower bed or sand trap.  I guess falling out of one or literally getting run into by a speeding hunk of plastic could be dangerous.  Rory, his caddie and the other members of the PGA walk the course so even if he was drunk he could only fall off the tee box which in most cases would not be scary. 

Getting hit by a golf ball will hurt, I know. Just ask the dancing bear, well, that is another story.  It would be scary for some old dud who can not see the ball coming but not scary for Rory.   He is most likely three hundred yards away and would not even know it is happening.   Now, I throw golf clubs.  I even give lessons in throwing golf clubs effectively and safely to keep down the injuries to people and the clubs.    I remember I was out about ninety three yards from the pin and I missed the green with my Jack Nicholas wedge by at least 50 yards to the swampy left of the green.  The club was blamed for the miss hit and I threw it ninety one yards with the dangerous but accurate underhand pendulum swing throw.  Jack would have been proud seeing his famed "G series" wedge pegged only inches from the hole.  It was a lousy shot but a hell of a throw.

Maybe Rory hit a root and turned his wrist.  Maybe the ball hit a tree and came shooting back at him.  Maybe Oh my Lord Jesus, the wind blew sand trap dirt in his eye.  Maybe I should read the article, but I just can not.  Now, Tiger trying to pick up a hooker on the second tee or even watching him try to hit a fairway  is weird but not scary.  My friends nine iron head came off one time while he was swinging.  We never found that ball.  My cousin hit is big brother square in the face with a driving wood and he did not die or anything.  He yelled a lot for a while.  I never remember anyone being scared.  I jammed my hand in the golf bag and got poked by a golf tee, man was that scary.  I almost had a hole in my finger and everything.  Rory won a match a few weeks back and he made at least $800,000.00 for it.  Even if he did hurt his wrist, it is not scary.  He will eat and sleep nicely.  Scary is being hungry, or bleeding profusely.  Some people's golf swings are scary.

I can say that Golf is not scary, nothing in golf is scary.  Ugly, lonely but not scary.

Clouds and the internet fog

Whenever you see an article about the benefits of the Internet and your wonderful life connected to it, you will hear the gong "cloud computing".  It is a sham.  It means you will not longer own your software or your storage space or your computer processing.  You will still pay for it though. 

You see, to make the Internet work efficiently which actually is a sneaky word for profitably, they need to make some changes in the way we use it.  Currently, we access it like a drawer, we get information out of it, look at it and close the drawer.  We pick something, look it over, if we want it, we buy it.  It may be information that seems free but we have to view those annoying pop ups or we have to watch a 15 second commercial before we see the YouTube video.  There are things that seem completely free like email.  I think it is possibly free but that will not last too much longer.  I am old enough to remember when TV was "free" except for commercials.  I remember people saying, "I will never pay to watch TV".  Now, only thirty years later many people never see what is left of free TV.  I do, I am cheap but Big Brother will close that loophole soon. 

Just like cable TV as I call it, needs different gadgets like DVR and tuners and modems and contracts, the Internet is heading the same way.  Gadgets will be required and then and only then will you be gifted for a fee to "Cloud Access."  There is very little technical difference between a cloud and fog.   One looks all dreamy and soft and floats like heaven's gift up above us.  Fog makes our lives miserable and wet.  It keeps us lost and moving slow.  What happens when the fog gets thick?  Agents Of the People in Charge, the Po Po's block off the roads and warn  us of the fog.  An hour ago it was a cloud sent from heaven.  I have a database somewhere in the cloud.  I think it is with my mortgage lender.  It is out there somewhere.  I asked the mortgage company to show me a copy of my mortgage agreement with my signature.  They have yet to provide a copy of it.  The system is clouded by fog. 

I am not sure where the Internet, phones and clouds will end up but they will be pointing at my butt hole.  That is for sure.

Friday Science: Publishing

What you say!

The graph is a representation of science papers submitted for publication to Science Magazine.  The key word is submitted not to be confused with published.  It turns out that whenever you give an individual cash incentive to submit publications(green), the rank and file do just that.  Many of the submittals are garbage, weak or plagiarized science. 

Many countries around the world are paying their scientist the equivalent of $2000 for a published paper in a major journal like Science.  There is a direct economic incentive to become a scientist and dive into the most basic science research.   Our country does some of that but mostly it is our mythical friend, big business and the tickle down rich.  There are tax incentives for sponsoring research.  There is greater tax incentives through in some of the loopholes so exactly how much will go to  "basic" research is not know. 

If the United States does not support and fund lower education and the importance of learning in children and there is less funding for the universities and very little contribution to publication of science, then the fascist who need an ignorant populace will win, pencils down.  In the US there is an vast portion of a entire generation that is composed of uneducated dolts who are completely unable to vote intelligently on any subject.  How do you think that our elected officials got elected?  By telling lies and distorting the truth.  Until recently, the politicians were educated and could manipulate effectively.  Now even they are stupid and we all know it.  Well, at least the portion of the people that can think and judge objectively, scientifically.  I am not talking about "Intelligent design" or "Creationism" as an alternate theory to evolution.  If you cannot think objectively or creatively in the first place, these issues are not debatable because you probably do not understand either position anyway.  Just poking your finger in the air is not a decision.  My dad always said, "Watch where you poke that finger".  That is for another day and time.

Lets encourage thought, science and research of all kinds.  It will pay off.

The Day the Earth Stood Still

For me, after seeing  "The day the earth stood still", I was never quite the same about any invaders, space or aliens.  I could never figure out what all the commotion was about.  My drunk uncle has done plenty more strange and dangerous things around us than a flying space ship could ever do.  There was a day in my life when after that moment, I was completely different.  I am fortunate because there are two days that I look back on as truly pivotal in  my walk forward.  Even though they are not seemingly related, enlightenment is a step to further enlightenment. 

I had just sat through a lecture by Dr. Mike Sweeney about IgE initiation in graft-host rejection scenarios when I started to laugh.  Luckily I was now walking to my car.  I laughed out loud, I threw up my arms and declared to the universe, "This is great, all I have to do is sit there and just let it soak in."  I was actually skipping.  I had not skipped in a few years  and as the exact rhythm and agility of skipping returned I moved faster and faster.  I was still laughing and I was now skip running.  The sun was brighter than I ever remembered.  The January air was crisper than when I got up that morning.  This air tasted "sweet" not like sugar but the emotion of "sweet".  Knowledge no longer had to be jammed into my head.  I did not have to concentrate, it was just the opposite.  All I had to do was accept it and it flowed in.  The new stuff did not flow as much as it was sucked in by the vastness of billions of chemical interactions just waiting to be fired off.  (What a feeling) My grades were only slightly better after that hour but learning was now painless.  It took energy to keep my mind open and receptive and I no longer wanted anything to interfere with learning.  It could be exhausting.  Reading was now more interesting than TV, listening had become a drug that I must have.  Old people's stories became worth all the time spent listening.  How a butterfly lives through a migration across this vast country is now important.  Why I acquired the Mumps twice instead of just once now had a mechanism to be investigated.

The earth did not stand still that day but time did.  It was redefined with an subroutine for knowledge, not yet a need for understanding, that would take a lifetime but just to free up the mind and soak it all in.  It does not get any better than that.  Here I am thirty five years later and I remember that lightening bolt like it was yesterday.  I still sit back and laugh whenever knowledge just gets sucked into my brain synapses.  I am wore down now and the stress and aggravation of life has weakened my ability to keep the door to my mind open.  Now, most of the time, God props the door open and when the sucking begins, I just sit back and laugh. 

The Constitution: Sixteenth Amendment

"The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration."

This says that the US Government can charge income tax to any source of income.  I guess they could not consider rent and share cropping and things like that taxable as federal income because it was generated from land ownership and that was a State's right to tax.  I guess. 

Now, if you make money you have to pay tax on it.  If some one forgives a debt, that is income.  If you buy something for $8 and sell it for $9, that is income.  If you receive lunch and a whore at a business meeting, unless everyone else gets that similar service, and even then maybe, that is income.  A value will be assessed at the current market value at the time for the IHOP and the SHEHOP and taxed accordingly. 

Even George Washington felt taxes were needed and he was a stinking rich land and slave owner.  Of course taxes are needed.  The tax rates during the Middle Ages were random and could be 100 percent one month and 40 percent the next.  George wanted to buy some shoes and coats for his fighting men and replace the horses they had to eat the previous winter.   That takes money. Congress said that since most taxes were collected fairly randomly and in some cases only voluntarily and never volumentally, something had to give.   As our great country came on 100 years and the turn of the century was near, something had to be done to close some loopholes in the system.  Rich people were not paying a lot of tax by hiding it in land and land adventures which was not considered taxable income.  Can you imagine, hurting our countries ability to function by letting rich people have even more money.  I can imagine fascists rich people keeping money needed by the country and keeping it for a rainy day but how many of those could there be?  Well I can think of at least 600 of those bastards. 

I do not think there will be any more amendments to the constitution.  Malcom Gladwell's tipping point has been reached I think.  I know the lunatic fringe thinks that violent overthrow is coming.  It is not an overthrow, it is a spiral into chaos.  There are not six people in the world who have the "unmitigated gall" to save this country.  Our peculiar institution will not  last 300 years.  I am sure of that.  My great grand children will have to fight for property.  Not because the government will usurp us on it like in a socialist state but because land ownership will resemble the Missouri land grab and only guns, death and bravery will sustain us.  It is sad to ponder that the Meth heads next door have a much better chance of survival than my family does.  It has been said that  being fat, drunk and stupid will not work forever!  Only in America. 

 All that from a straight forward paragraph about taxes. 

Pregnacies

Having seen my share of pregnancies and child births, I am completely surprise that the population growth of the world is greater than zero.  OK, so there are people that do not understand or have access to pregnancy prevention.  Why would a sane woman want more than one child.  Of course babies are puppy dog cute and of course they are amazing to watch grow up.  With the physical hardship, anatomical rearranging and financial black hole sucking the entire family closer to the event horizon, common sense should over ride any urge to have another one.  

I am completely against women having children.  I think it is a dumb idea.  I know a lady that wanted to have a second child because she just did not feel complete with only one child.  I stopped laughing long enough and with only a little bit of thought, to proclaim "That is the stupidest thing I have ever heard."   Now, two years later that second child appears to be a fire breathing hellion and I reminded her of her proclamation of incompleteness.  While downing her third Valium before noon she stated calmly but with confusion, "I am not sure what exactly I was thinking."  She was dreaming of fairy godmothers and pumpkins and the prom being the most important event in her life.  She was not thinking, she was living a fantasy. 

In the female, there is some trick that erases the memory of the experience.  It is similar to post traumatic stress disorder.  It was a war but now it must have been a video game because why else would I want to throw up constantly and move my bladder to my shoulder area again.  Why would a woman want to destroy her body to the point where she cannot use the toilet properly. She cannot even sit down safely.  The changes may be permanent also.  The doctors and books never tell you that the hips and the spine and the coochie may not go back together properly.  Not only is she screwed, she may never do it painlessly again.  Her completeness is overwhelming.  This detached bladder thing is not OK no matter how cute the little vampire is. 

We do not need any more kids, we are unable to raise them properly and they grow up to be teenagers where they trade their brain for sawdust and spackle.  So, in summary, to feel whole, you rip you spine, insides and outsides to shreds so you can raise an ungrateful child who in the best of families makes you worry until you pop a vein, cry and pray until your knees have growths and wonder what in the hell you were thinking.  Sounds bad but it really is worse.

Rude - Ruder - Rudest

Out of all the different iterations and uses for the cell phone, all but one is not rude and adding to the pussifying or our country.  Pussifying of America is one of my greatest causes of alarm.    Anyway, lets stick with the cell phone for a few moments.  I am still startled most of the time when a cell phone rings.  I am some place that does not have a phone normally, like the bathroom at the local Piggly Wiggly and I hear a completely random and unfitting noise.  I never think it is a phone but it usually turns out to be one.  Who answers a phone in the bathroom, a lot of people I guess.  I do not like any sound except singing in the bathroom.

Before we go to far I would like to talk about the satanic billing practices of the phone/internet companies.  I remember in the 1980's when the stock market morons were saying that the long distance phone carriers were in trouble because there was no way they could continue to make unconsciously huge profits off of telephone service.  Pay phones cost more to keep up than they bring in.  So what did they do, they put all their efforts in to cell phones where they can not only charge $100 a month but thousands if you are a moron yourself.  So for poor service, ridiculous contracts and high prices, we got a small convenience and and an even smaller credit rating.

Lets see, if I am stranded in the ocean I can call for help.  Wrong, no towers in the middle of the ocean.  Most phones need a tower every ten miles or so because of the curving of the earth.   If my car breaks down, I can call for help.  Oh my God up above, how did we ever get along without a cell phone.  When I am at the store and I cannot tell if I should by Sahara tan brown or Chocolate Moca blonde hair coloring for my wife.  Shit Scooby, what will I do?  Dare not go home without the correct color!  I am in a meeting and I need a smooth exit, so have someone call me during the meeting.  Fabuloso!  "Sorry guys I gotta take this call, my wife just hit a camel that escaped from the zoo while she was looking at her Chocolate Moca blonde nightmare on her big ole head.  Text the minutes of the meeting to my phone."

So, for that emergency that occurs less frequently than emergencies occurred three decades earlier you pay at least $ 50 a month, and you have a house phone also $35 a month and you need to buy the stinking phone in the first place.  Now lets get back to rude.  I do not want phones ringing everywhere.  When I am having a private meeting with someone whether it is at work or in public, I do not want them answering a phone, turning off a phone or reading a text message while I am talking to them.  HOW ABSOLUTELY RUDE.  In all cases it is rude.  IF someone does not want to pay attention to me while I am talking to them, fine, conversation over.  It is like the phone message from these really busy companies that says, "Your call is important to us, please stay on the line and lube up because the longer you stay on the more we know we can screw you."  Did you ever notice, the larger and richer the company, the less human interaction you get.   Rude.

Rude people are everywhere anymore.  the Rude amendment  is going to be a Constitutional Amendment.  Rude smokers, rude drivers, rude phones and rude parents that breed rude children.  Walmart, has made a fortune off of rude people.  The halls of the Big Box is actually a magnet for rudeness.  It is OK to be rude in Walmart, they have to accept the behaviour.   They even give you the opportunity to show how rude you can be.  You can jam you shopping cart in the bushes or leave it in the street.  They will send someone to put it in the rack which they have every ten feet for you.  Sam Walton learned early on that rude people had money.  The more welfare, WIC and the more disability money these malformations possessed, the ruder they were.  And here is the true genius of Walmart, Rude people waste more money on Big Box shit than people that are not rude.  The slide to societal breakdown is greased with rudeness.  We are picking up speed. 

Friday Science: Driveway cleaner

Laundry soap --    a big scoop should do.

Powdered bleach  -- a cup will mix nicely.

liquid wrench or any thin, clear oil.   A 1/2 cup is all you need.

paint thinner    any solvent will do.  maybe a pint.

water, a gallon of it.

saw dust  To absorb the mixture.  Sand will work.

Mix it up good and use quickly.

Place this on the oil spots like you would pretreat clothing.  Use a stiff brush to spread it out around the driveway.    It may start smoking so keep the animals off of it.  It will generate heat so use a metal can to mix it.   If you use sawdust, it may flame up a little bit.

You can etch concrete with this stuff.  Driveway art is possible.

Don't mention it.

The Constitution: The Fifteenth Amendment

Giving slaves, indentures the right to vote.

Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.^[1]

^{No longer is the black man a fifth of a vote or a part of a man, he has a vote if he can get his butt to the poles without being killed or shot or both.   He also must make sure since he cannot read, he is registered and goes to the correct polling place which keeps changing.} 

^{The amendment says the black man can vote.  Some of the tricks used then to deny that vote and still used today are redistricting the concentration of black votes to a large white majority area so the vote does not really matter.  Locating the voting booths a long distance from the black communities will keep the black vote low.  Complicating the voting process to confuse lower educated voters.} 

^{The creativity is endless for those fascists that want to keep the masses down.}

Cats and fear

Cats are all about fear.  They think they are so cool with the posture and the yawning.  They are constantly in a state of fear.  If you are lucky enough to sneak up on a cat and thump it with a rubber band, it will jump at least three feet staraight up. 

Nature photographer Curt Fonger took this picture.  Now, is that a sensible animal to climb 40 feet up a spiny cactus?  I think not.  We in Florida have the equivalent tree, it is called the sorry ass messy excuse for a palm tree.  Like the cactus, it has spines on its trunk.  For some reason, cat logic only, the cat climbs all the way to the top when chased by a dog that can not climb trees at all. 

You may have thought I was kidding.  I do not kid about cats.  They are entrusted with Lucifer's booty.  When a dog licks a sticker out of its fur, they eat it removing it from the gene pool.  Cats flick it on the floor and you step on it letting out the Florida sticker shout.  It is similar to the fire ant yell but the sticker shout has an added little hop to it while yelling,  "MOTHer Fu, shit, (hop) what the fuck, damn!.  The fire ant yell  starts with a praising of divinity and then a wave of disbelief that such pain does not result in any loss of limb followed at the end with the universal ending for pain, fuck.  It goes like this "Sweet Jesus Mary Joseph, Ahhhhhhhhh, God Damn, For Nic Ation."

That is what cats do to you.  I wise man said, "If your cat weighed 90 pounds, she would eat your while you sleep."

Now, back to fear.  Vacuum cleaner, yep. weed whacker, yep.  Blender, yep.  Vibrator, no, not until it tries to rub against it and its hairs get caught in the spinney thing.  The electric can opener creates fear and lust, a bad combination in any mammal.  My cats have never been alive to hear a manual or electric can opener yet they all must be in the kitchen instantly when use one to open some old can of corned beef hash.   It must be a genetic memory passed on from some previous Satan reincarnation.  Foot steps, yep.  Marbles, yep.  Roll some marbles across a tile floor and the cats will live on the ceiling for a week.  It is all or nothing for them.  Either the top of the tree or no tree at all.  Either the claws go all the way to the bone or don't even bother to show them.  Someone told me that de-clawed cats cannot climb trees.  I discovered that they actually can but they can not get down.  I think that is funny. 

Eating

My eating habits are the type of conquests that legends are made with.  My brother was equally blessed but with lasagna only.  He could  step up with the wide variety of pizzas, hot dogs and Big Macs.   I had no boundaries to my range and no limit to my ability.  I am not talking about desserts or flu flu stuff.  I am talking about main course meaty things. 

I ate 21 pieces of pizza at an "all-you-can-eat" place in Vail, Colorado.  I was traveling with a baseball team and we had not eaten in about 8 or 9 hours.  It was the off season for Vail so the owner figured he could use the business.  He was very happy when we left, mostly because we were getting ready for round 4.  I think he saw us coming on the return trip because the establishment was closed when we passed through Vail.

One other time while leaving Henderson, Nevada, my brother and I stopped at a MacDonald's to fill up.  We were in Henderson visiting Odis in the good ole  boy lockup.   My brother Mike spent $6.53 on two Big Macs with cheese, two large Fries, some kind of apple thing, a large Coke, and because he was not sure how far we had to drive, two Quarter Pounders for the road.  I had a Big Mac, a quarter pounder, two fish sandwiches, a large fry, medium onion ring (a veggie to keep it healthy) and a large root beer.  ($5.20 something)  The lady behind the counter kept looking for the rest of the crowd that was going to eat this stuff.  We were the crowd.  Precious memories flood my soul.

While in college, I tried to convince the local Subway Sub Shop to sponsor me in a sub sandwich  eating event.  I said I could eat a one foot long sub every hour for twenty four hours.  I must have just seen Cool Hand Luke or something.  Actually, my roommate (Roy)and I were trying to figure out how to make some money.  I my case, money was free food.  I demonstrated my ability to the Subway manager by eating two subs, a tuna and a veggie in five minutes.  Although he seemed impressed, and even though I gave him the card of the college radio station for an advertising event, he did not go for it.  He said it was impossible.  I said "So what, that is not even the point."

I entered a hot dog eating contest at Kings Island Park north of Cincinnati.  I worked in the food service warehouse.  I was actually delivering more hot dogs for the contest.  The Kahns hot dog festival  had already started.  I was just watching and I noticed the contestants were slowing down and the leader was on 8 hot dogs.  I said to my buddy Bob Viox, "Shit, I can eat eight dogs in my sleep."  I sat down and quickly caught up to the leader who was now at ten.  Big whoop, I was finishing my twelfth and I was informed that employees were not allowed in the competition.  The mutant bum who won the coupons for free Khan hot dogs ate fourteen hot dogs.  BFD.  I had three more on the way back to the warehouse.  That makes fifteen.    "I could have been a somebody!"

Some may ask, "what is this blog about today".  I was driving to work and I had purchased two breakfast burritos from MacDonalds.  They are quite edible.  I noticed that I ate the one quickly.  I eat ravenously while driving.  I do not want to be distracted so I slam it in and swallow.  Anyway, I ate the first one in four bites, and roughly one minute.  Normally I saved them until I get to work and eat one at my desk around 8AM and then eat the other one at 11AM for lunch.  I ate the second one in three bites.  Since I had nothing else to do now and since I have been making the same drive for thirty years, day dreaming took over.  "If I can eat one burrito in one minute and I am driving sixty miles per hour, how many breakfast burritos can I eat on my way to work?"   I thought "could I eat 23 of these things, Luke ate 50 eggs in an hour."  For the number freaks who are not reading this, yes it is 23 miles to work.  My sons cannot eat volumes of food, my daughter has potential but watches her waistline.  Well, my one son is still young and a teenage boy can eat.   I hope he learns the physical joy of eating.  The filling of the stomach, the stretching of the esophagus, the distending of the colon.  It just does not get any better than that.