Hair Dye

Well, I did it again.  The hair dye thing.  The advertising says "Covers just the grey for a natural look".  Porcupine Road Apples!  It is not blond, It may have covered only the grey.  Unfortunately for me it is black.  I know whenever someone uses the world suppleness, if that is even a word, they are jamming something toward my butt. 

So I have a black beard, mustache, eye brows and just a touch of black where the grey used to be.  Good thing it is HOLLOWEENIE.  I will not need a costume.  I can walk around as a color blind moron with dark eyes mumbling  and drooling,"blond, it was supposed to be blond." 

I could have shaved the entire mess off, and I still may.  I have never been very good with the vanity thing.  I was thinking I should try to look a little better,  feel younger  and be thinner.  Strike one, two and three in five easy minutes.  I should have taken a fast ball to the goiter.  My thyroid has been acting up anyway. 

So, I am at work trying to look lighter shade of pale.  I had the light off but Joe said my teeth were glowing and just drawing attention to my sad self.  I hate Mondays and the holiday season. 

Friday Science: The Human Biom project part II

Most important.


To my surprise, I opened this post to complete the final editing before publishing to the blog and I had not written it yet.  I thought this Friday post would be simple and quick.  The mind is a terrier thing to waste.  The link above may not even work anymore. 

The Human Biom project is a loosely organized group of researchers trying to map out the microbial populations of the human body.  I wrote about this a few months ago.  I am so excited about the remarkable developments in medicine and personal health that will come from this research.  There have been several turning points in human development over the last ten thousand year.  There was the Clovis Point (that is not a surfing movie) giving the hunter gatherer a better life.  There was the Wheel which made it easier for a man to take all his crap with him when he got kicked out of the cave for doinking the neanderthal in the next valley.

Cave woman:  You and that ape bitch getting smelly in my cave, Oh no you Pteradon brained monkey f*^&ker.   Get out and roll your shite with you.

Cave man:  "Oh yeh", and what about you and the red faced Simian I saw you with at the weekly kill?

Cave woman:  Go gnaw on a rock.  His name is Mulk and he makes noises on old logs.  He is sensitive and receptive to my needs.

Cave man:  Sensitive?  And I know, he is only receptive during a rut.

The Plague was very instructional in garbage and pest management.  Benjamin Franklin referred to this pestilence when he developed the first garbage collection company.   The Biom project will be one of those markers in human existence. 

Read the article, it is worth it, I promise.

sleeping in the park

I left work early and went to the book store to get a book and look at butts.  I purchased a book but did not see any butts worth a damn.  I then proceeded to purchase a key lime pie milk shake.  I have lactose issues so I was not sure what the rest of the hookie day would be like.  I stopped at a nice secluded park to sit in the shade and relax. 

This park has a drive through parking area covered with oak trees and a view of the river.  A cool breeze always wanders through like the so many homeless people.  There are already two vehicle at the park and it is 2:30 pm.  One man is standing in the Sunshine with his arm around a well dressed woman.  They remain close and talk quietly.  Another lady drives up in a Volvo followed by a convertible Mercedes.  The attractive woman gets out and walks around to the passenger side of the Mercedes and takes a seat.  The standing couple are still very close, the man still has his arm around the lady.  We now have two couples in a kids park at 2:30 in the afternoon.  A school bus passes the park heading toward the school.

I ease the seat back and get comfortable.  These quite obviously not married couples are stealing time away from work.  I look around to see if there is a camera from "Cheater" watching them.  It seems obvious to me that the men and at least one of the ladies are currently married.  It just seems that way.  I wonder how honest these relationships are and who will get hurt.  Are there kids?  This may be exciting to the cheating couples but not to me and I dozed off.

I woke up with mosquitoes buzzing in my perfectly round ear holes because at night, I sleep with foam ear plugs and they keep my auditory canals nice and symmetrical.  My arm which I had propped under my head on while leaning on the window was completely asleep and vibrating with a combination of dullness and pain.  As the focus returned to my eyes, I could see a squirrel on the hood of my car with a look of wonder as the sunshine filtered throughout the park.

Reality was back and it was time to leave.  I needed to get to the bank and Wally World.  Ice tea would have made the park visit way, way better.  Maybe next time and there will be a next time.

thousand oaks

"No law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened"

This amendment was first proposed during the Second Continental Congress in the year of our Lord 1789.  It passed ratification in 1992.  I thought that our political system's stupidity and greed was a fairly new deal.  Obviously, congressmen of yesteryear want to have control over raises also.   North Carolina and Kentucky ratified it twice.   I guess they did not have anything else to do during the second century after thinking about it for a century. 

Did the States have it on the agenda at each meeting of the legislature. 

Speaker of the House:  Mr. representative from the Once Great state of Tennessee, how do you vote this time around?

Tenn. Representative:  Tennessee wants to think about it for another decade if you do not mind.  With the football team sucking and the lack of funding for research from the Feds, shit, we just cannot think about moral issues currently.

Did they just forget about it and once a decade the State Librarian would bring it up as "really old business"?  Were there big debates about this amendment?  This amendment must have pissed off the politicians because every since we put "some" restrictions on them, they went pig-shit crazy with graft, corruption, greed and lust only to completely destroy a great and powerful country. 

This was the last amendment to be ratified in our history and the first one to be proposed in our great experiment.  I do not think there be any more "real" amendments because the institution is failing and any changes will be band-aid solutions and really just make it worse.  I believe in the Barney Fife style of management.  Just a few simple rules.  Alcoholic Anonymous uses "KISS", Keep it simple stupid and KISS used AA. 

I am disgusted by the entire mess.  Bye.

thousand oaks

Thousand Oaks, California only has about three hundred oak trees left standing.  There is a place Called Three Meadows and maybe there was a meadow in that area once but now it is just a bunch or goofy looking houses surrounded by houses.  At best it was a swamp and there is no way you can confuse a meadow with a swamp.  Apparently, these types of names of places are called Toponyms.  There are stupid toponyms, bawdy toponyms and just plain descriptive toponyms. 

What if it was a law that toponyms had to be truly descriptive of the area.  There would be developments called Big Dork Estates where everyone  looked like Beaker from the Muppets.  Three Meadows would still have to have three meadows.  Whore House Meadows, Colorado would still have houses.  French Lick, Indiana would still have salt licks for the animals and by God and Country the animals would still be licking them.  It would be a law.   Idiot Swamp would still be the name of the Washington DC area and they would not have to change a single building.

Thousand Oaks, California figured out that they were getting short of oak trees and they passed a law saying that if a developer wants to cut down an oak tree, five other oaks must be planted  and place a bond (money) with the city to insure the trees live to be grown up trees.  I wonder if they had to replace the squirrels and the starlings. 

I saw a sign saying  "You are now leaving Last Chance Metro".  Last chance for what?  Maybe I should have stopped in the town to see what all the commotion is about.  I mean, if it is my last chance, should I not know for what?  I noticed the town had a biker bar, a fancy McDonalds with slides and those plague perpetuation ball pits and a Pizza Factory with the letter "C" burned out.  It was pretty much a one hooker town and she would also have to have a daytime job.

I hear Thousand Oaks has real civic spirit and the Toponym is safe for now.  There is probably a Black Oak Blight that will kill them all off.

Important People

There are important people in the world.  You will not find them on Dancing with the Dim Wits.  I do not figure you will find many of them having anything to do with football or baseball.  There are the unsung associated with these "things" as there are with all endeavor. There are efforts to identify these people throughout the world.  Why?  I have no idea.  If someone has something to offer and they offer it, some will receive it.   Others will want to grab it but hesitate to do so, others will remain suspicious and still others will reject it as "something new."  Important people know this and expect as much.

Apple lured John Sculley away from Pepsi because Apple wanted Sculley to apply his marketing skills to the personal computer market. Steve Jobs successfully sealed the deal with his legendary pitch to Sculley, asking him whether he preferred to "sell sugar water for the rest of your life or come with me and change the world?".  Wikipedia

Important people change the world.  Maybe they only change a small part of the world, say the corner sandlot buried inside a city.  Maybe they only change the hope in one child's heart.  Maybe they say "no, this is wrong" when everyone else turns a blind eye.  Maybe this important person will say "hell yes" just as the fearful crowd runs away shouting "no".   Maybe important people never get noticed, most likely they do not. 

I will not be so presumptuous as to think I am one of these important people.   "Hell, he's a natural-born world-shaker. "  I would hope to recognize important people when I encounter them.  I have followed a few I thought may be important.  I was not disappointed, lost but not disappointed.  I think that faith must play a role in becoming an important person.  The guy that jumped on the train tracks to save another had faith in himself to make such a rash decision.   Every day there are crossroads to be negotiated.  Important people have navigation tools that are different from those of the crowd.  The difference becomes apparent in the choices.  As it should be.

 

Friday Science: Malaria

Bill Gates has been dumping his money into eradication of malaria around the world.  I am glad he is doing it.  Although he has been succeeding while playing the drug research game and costing a ton of money.  Jimmy Carter and his group has almost eliminated the Guinea worm around the world with a simple little straw that filters out the worm while sucking up water through it.  Gates and Carter are taking different paths at the eradication of Malaria.  No longer do they drain swamps and indiscriminately spray poison and oil on water.  The disease which has suppressed societies for thousands of years is being eliminated. 

Sickle Cell disease is a natural adaptation to fight the malaria virus and is the poster child for natural selection in humans.  Natural selection is a distraction here because we must use all resources to eliminate disease and keep ignorance out of it.  I remember in the movie "Apocalypse Now" when the soldiers vaccinated the children in a village and then in the next scene, the witch doctors (religious zealots) said the arms of the children needed to be amputated to remove the devil that was injected in them. 

Ignorance and snittyness is not the answer to world anything, whether it is hunger or employment or health care.  Gates and Carter see the bigger picture on the use of science to solve social issues.  Healthy people are more likely to make healthy decisions.  As it should be.

The Player meets the Tiger

The Player pulls in to a rest stop just outside Johns Creek on his way to Doraville, Georgia for the Allman Brothers Day festivities; a follow up to the Masters Golf Tournament.  He grabs a seat at the bar.  The place is full of post PGA golfer types and lots of babes.

"I'll have a White Russian".  The player looks out over the bar like he owns the place.  There is a couple of ladies in white jeans back in the smoke filled pool table area that looks like they need a game.  He likes the way they hold the sticks.  A man at the bar mumbled, "I had a white Norwegian once".

Hey buddy, you play pool? There are some bitches that need a little attention.  The guy sitting next to the player is obviously drunk and is hanging his head low.  His Courvoisier was looking slim so the the Player motioned to the bartender to freshen it up.

The Player:  "What? Oh hey, Tiger, how's the swingin?"

"Fuck, everyone keeps ragging me about that"

The Player:  "Na, I am not talking about the golf, man.  Hey, those ladies look ripe?"

Tiger jerks his head up so fast his hat flew off showing his bald head and the scar on his cheek.  "Aw shit, sorry, I am kinda sensitive about the whore thing."

The Player:   Let's move to the pool table and places some quarters on the rim.  Eldrick, "I never pay for it, I play for it, there is a difference.  Sure I have to buy a few games of pool or a few drinks.  If you want to squeeze it, ya have to treat her like a sponge". 

Tiger mumbles under his breath while picking up his hat"Are you sure?". He and the Player moved off toward the pool tables. 

While looking only into the eyes of the tall brunette the Player said, "Ladies, can we slide our quarters in here, we need some dangerous competition.  I hear your rack is the best in town!

Ladies:  Sure enough, those are our quarters.  Rack em.

The player grabs a stick and slides over to the chalk table up close to the ladies while motioning Tiger to "rack-em".  With some sort of mystic hand signs, he motions to the bar babe across the way to top up the drinks for the ladies. 

Just as Tiger finished the racking and grabbed a stick, Redneck Willie came over and said,  "Hey, that is our table, we are up next."

Tiger:  Only people with a full sets of teeth play on this table.

Redneck Willie: "Who says you burr headed needle dick"

The Player grabbed Tiger and out the back door they went. 

The Player:  "Tiger, there were too many of them and the ladies were married.  Hey, they Players feel you should have your card reinstated as soon as possible.  I do not think you are ready.  Player Reynolds said you do not have a whole bunch of potential but money makes up for that in the short term.  As you are finding out."

Tiger:  "I am pathetic, I know, but willing"

The Player:  The new card is in the mail.

The Constitution: The twenty sixth Amendment

Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.
Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Kids were being signed up against their will to go to war and die and they were not "old enough or responsible enough" to vote.  I think that is slavery.   I do not know how many young people vote because the evil empire is trying to marginalize that age group the same way they marginalize the the minority vote. 

This is my favorite amendment.  The young generations change the world.  Check out Syria, Egypt and Europe for examples.  Our young people protested a war.  We must provide them with the tools like a decent education.  Follow that with the three "L's"; Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness and you have a recipe for credible, lasting change.

Yesterday- October 17

Really, I had nothing to say yesterday.

The "Louder" technique is attributed to Dave Spence.  He was one of those guys that passes through you life and leaves trails of mind dust that float around in your brain for years.    Him and his friend "Stark" used to get drunk and argue in public places.  They have been thrown out of bars, parking lots, all night donut shops and even churches.  I have left them arguing at 2 AM and they tell me the sun came up and they were still arguing.  They will argue about anything.  Sometimes they argue with other people.   They argued with a bunch of Canada dudes about whether or not we Alaska should be Canadian property.  The police had to come break that one up.  There was no violence, just continuous yelling. 

Steve "Stark" and Dave used the technique of repeating their positions over and over again but louder each time.  Dave felt that his particular point sounded more eloquent and clear the louder it was enunciated.   Stark did most of the yelling and Dave just kept repeating it.  I did most of the laughing.  I never took a position in these arguments.  They would get mad at me and call me all kinds of names  but I would not take the bait. 

I do not know what happened to those guys.  Steve got cancer and was cured and moved back up north.  Dave married Margret and I think he is still alive.  Thirty years ago you could argue with someone and scream and holler.  Now it is illegal and someone will shoot you.  I am sure Stark is still arguing with someone.  There was a group of us that spend a great deal of time together in those days.  Mostly playing basketball and golfing.  Being in a group of young people always gave you something to talk and argue about.  As it should be.

NO Thing

I have nothing to say.

louder.

I have nothing to say!

louder!

I have nothing to say!

Friday Science: Cats and Peanut butter

Experiment:   Miss Lenards Ninth Grade Earth Science

I wanted to challenge the physical laws of Newton, Darwin, Dr. Doolitle and Gloria Swanson. 

I can assume for the sake of science that everyone knows that if you hold a cat upside down by his feet and drop it, the feline will contort itself and land on its feet.  This experiment has been an example of spookery for centuries.  Cats always land on their feet even if thrown off a mountain.  They break their legs quite often though.

Everyone who has the mental capacity of a lizard knows that if you place peanut butter on a piece of bread and accidentally drop it, the peanut butter side will flip over and stick to the floor, dirt or homework.  This also is an acceptable excuse for not turning in your homework because every teacher alive knows this is a true physical law.  Peanut butter has some magnetic field that sucks it down toward gravity.  The bread also has some sort of aerodynamic thrust in the process.  Bread with any spread on it, except olive spread will flip over and be face down in the sand.  Plain bread just falls to the floor.




Cat with peanut butter prior to the drop


What happens if you attach a peanut buttered piece of bread to the back of a cat, peanut butter side up and suspend the felius Catus upside down by its feet from the ceiling and let it drop.  It will be the classic battle of spooky forces. 

I tried it and the cat landed on its feet every time.  So, in spite of the cat's objections, I added more peanut butter and after four tries and an ever increasing amount of peanut butter (chunky), about two pounds of it, the cat landed splat on its back.  I wanted to try it again but the cat rolled over, jumped up, broke through the glass window and off it went down the street twisting and rolling all the way.  There was a pack of raccoons hot on its trail.  Coons love peanut butter and they hate cats.

I received a grade of C minus for my science fair project.  They said I lost points for cruelty to animals.  I never saw the cat again which is not surprising, it was not my cat.

Columbus Day - October 12

This day morphed into an independence day in South America where they needed a boost in freedom.  I am pretty sure that Columbus not only did not know where he was because he thought he was in India but I can reckon that he did not know what day it was.  The Caribbean is smack dab in the middle of hurricane season around the time he was discovering naked nubial wenches with coconut dinnerware.

Some holidays, important ones like Thanksgiving have been designated a specific time of the month, like the fourth Thursday in November.  The fact is John Smith was poking Hontus long before the fourth Thursday in November.   Rumor has it Jesus was actually born in the summer.  Holidays are mostly in the winter (in the United States) because our masters thought that our mental health would be easier to control if we had something to cheer about during the suck ass cold winter and soggy spring months so they broke up the monotony of bowling and curling with holidays.  Hell, in Russia they just get drunk and commit suicide during the long winters.  I had the urge to emol myself when I watched "Dr. Zhivago for cripes sake. 

Some say Columbus brought sexually transmitted diseases to America.  Now there is something to have a holiday about.  Those sea fearing dudes had high boots and lots of farm animals on the ships.  I think Venereal Diseases were quite common in old Spain prior to 1492.  Don Quixote was not chasing windmills for nothing.  The Saint Anthony's Fire was quite common throughout Europe. 

My company does not celebrate the holiday by giving us a day off.  As a government contractor, we come to work while the government takes the day off.  We get about three days of work accomplished in that eight hour period or we do absolutely nothing and leave early.  Christopher Columbus was a brave dude, kind of effeminate but brave.  His crew was about a week away from mutiny because lets face it, Nina, Pinta and St. Nick were lost.  Sea serpents (alligators) were everywhere chasing the mermaids (manatees) and the crew was more interested in the sheep than swabbing the deck.  He got lucky in the Bahamas but so did I for that matter and that was an expedition for the ages.  Thirty five drunken Rugby players and an Ice Princess.  Well, I am glad we celebrate events in history.  Accurate or not, it gives us some use for grade school  history classes. 

The Constitution: Twenty fifth Amendment

From Wekipedia:

The Twenty-fifth Amendment (Amendment XXV) to the United States Constitution deals with succession to the Presidency and establishes procedures both for filling a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, as well as responding to Presidential disabilities.

We all know that Vice Presidents are expendable and unpredictable.  Presidents on the other hand are tough old birds.  Take Regan for example, even when his cabinet was wondering if he had lost his mind and because erratic behavior for him  was normal, they all hesitated to invoke the twenty fifth.  They watched him closely for two days but he got all excited that everyone was gathered around and asking him simple questions that he snapped out of his dementia and not one person could tell the difference from the normal old Ronnie.  When he was shot, he could not write a letter to invoke the Twenty Fifth Amendment and VP Bush was flying in from Texas so he could not write a letter to invoke it (because the lawyers and the writers in the White House were not with the Vice President) so Ronnie is unconscious on the operating table and the United States did not have anyone at the helm.  It has been that way since.

To fix the Vice President thing requires the president to appoint someone and a majority of both houses needs to approve the appointee.  Most times that would be a simple order for congress but not now.  We need an amendment dealing with congressional disabilities.  We could call it "The Final Resolution".  It would basically state that if congress cannot be nice and accomplish something important, they are open season for the bow hunters. 

Band-Aids

Adhesive bandages.  A great invention from the early part of the twentieth century.  The adhesive bandage was originally used for and by soldiers.  Your dried blood no longer has to hold the gauze on the cut.  The basic bandage is still the same as the original.  There have been some improvements, modifications and failures.

The damn thing will not stick to my skin but it will stick to the wound.  I was a major user of these types in the 1960's.  My wounds were usually the oozing kind from scrapes and road rash.  Any other kind of cut usually involved a trip to the doctor for stitches and a tetanus shot.  the band-aid would stick until the next first sweat and then it fell of in the sand or something.  Once the wound started to dry, the band-aid would be stuck to the wound yet the tape ends would be flapping in the breeze creating pain and anticipatory worry.  This drama led to the next invention.  The gauze was coated with some kind of non-stick shit.  It was probably some sort of Teflon.  Americans were not getting enough Fluorine in our diets from the water and toothpaste so the Sith Lord Drug Companies decided to inject it directly into our cuts with a pad that would not stick to the oozing wound.  Now, as all great improvements eventually end up, the band-aid had achieved its goal of not sticking to the wound so when the next first sweat came along, there was no drama, the little bastard just fell off painlessly.  I never used a band-aid of any brand from those years that stuck to the skin like advertised.

In the 1970's, Johnson and Johnson set out to make a better bandage.  The tape would stick to the skin, the pad would not stick and they even added stretch tape.  One thing is for sure, the tape was sticky.  If you stuck it to dry skin, it was going to stay there.  Sweat and dirt would never release it, EVER.  Hot glue could not match the holding power.  I think J&J developers received help from the Duct Tape guys.  The tape also bounded irreversibly to itself also.  Once you pulled those friends of Satan, the tabs, you better have a quick place for the bandage to go.  If the tabs wrinkled or blew in the wind sticking to itself, you were done.  You needed another bandage.  Do not try to un-stick it, you are like a tin horn dictator at a Cesar Chavez Conference, you are toast.

The tabs are another thing entirely.  Friends of Satan?  Most likely.  Minions of the dark underworld? Certainly they must be.  Have you ever tried to "throw" them away?  How many times did you pick them up before you realized there was a force field around your trash can that only your hand could penetrate.  Even if your hand was directly above the trash bin, that tab was not going in.  Even if your hand was below the rim of the trash bin when you released, somehow, mystically the tab would float up against gravity and then stick to the floor.  I tell you this to save your soul.  Physically place both tabs in the bottom of the trash bin.  Place a one pound weight on the tabs and release them slowly. Back away cautiously and never look back.

For reasons I am not quite sure about, someone, J&J or Bristol Meyer came up with the string idea for opening a band-aid.  The string was supposed to be pulled from a safe distance and the bandage was supposed to jump out and land on your boo-boo like an inflatable life raft.  Usually, I ended up with a string in one hand and a jumbled up mess in the other hand.   At best, the string would tear half way down the paper and then release leaving me with the option of trying to open the existing package with a sharp knife ever fighting the urge to end it all, getting a new one out of the box and trying to throw the remaining mess in a trash bin or lighting the box on fire and heading for the local pub with a trail of blood following like a Hansel and Gretel story.

I love band-aids now.  Even the generics are good.  They have medicine in them and they stick to wet skin.   The tabs still haunt my dreams and only old first-aid kits have the ones with strings in them.   Thanks, Earle Dickson and your accident prone wife.  I was accident prone also and your invention has soothed many other kids along the way.

Hair

Today my hair looks like something out of an Ace Ventura movie. 

Why, I do not know.  I think it was because I combed it while wet.  Some of you can stop laughing now.  I combed it before I jumped in the car to go to work.  The weather was cool so I kept the windows down most of the way.  I brushed it out once I was at work but it flipped up and dug in its heels. I can see my reflexion in the computer and my hair is possessed. 

Let us ponder hair for a moment.                         That is enough.  The bad thing about the picture is that I despise Jim Carey.  Jim and his sister Mariah are not some of my favorite people to talk about or look at.  It is a personal thing and I am not bashing.  Both have hair issues.  Too much of it most likely and I am sure some of it is growing inward into the brain stem. 

Of my potential hair looks, the flat head is probably the worst look on my semi elongated head.  Flatness make my eyes look sort of froggy.  Beaker comes to mind.  Now that I have these fat jowls, the puffy full head is quickly becoming dangerous.  To look like a Q-tip at any stage of your life should not be a goal unless you are named Gulliver.  By the way, Mariah is the name of the wind; maybe she will blow away and become a tropical depression out on some deserted island.    Lastly, the out of control free look is silly on me.  I am not a young dude with bright eyes and lots of testosterone.  The out of control hair reminds me of any adult riding a bicycle.  I seems like a good idea but it just does not fit any scenario of cool. 

 I just had a hair cut a last while ago.  Maybe I should go see Joe for a trim.  My hair feels nice for two days after a good haircut.

Friday Science: Green Cats

By Julie Steenhuysen

Chicago — U.S. scientists have developed a strain of green-glowing cats with cells that resist infection from a virus that causes feline AIDS, a finding that may help prevent the disease in cats and advance AIDS research in people.

The study, published Sunday in the journal Nature Methods, involved inserting monkey genes that block the virus into feline eggs, or oocytes, before they are fertilized.

The scientists also inserted jellyfish genes that make the modified cells glow an eerie green color — making the altered genes easy to spot.

This kind of stuff has been going on for a while, gene insertion and color marking I mean.  When I was in college we tagged proteins with glowing chemicals and watched them move through worm digestive tracts.  Cool stuff I know but lets get back to the point.  Here is research using furry little cats.  Of course I do not know the living conditions of these cats but I am sure it is better than living in the rocks at the Port and fighting for your every meal.  The rats I was associated with for research were breathing filtered air, drinking plenty of filtered water and always fed well.  The got the Guillotine at the end but most were very well treated. 

Research is cool and does not have to be hard on animals.  I think animals have to be used some times just because you need a living mammal.  There are no other good choices.  Science and research are vital for future development as human beings. 

Andy Rooney

Andy Rooney is retiring from his spot on 60 Minutes.  He is ninety two years old and probably tired of having to explain why he says what he says.   If I had an idol  in the television world it would probably be Andy Rooney.  I have never "read" much of anything he has written.  I suppose he had a reporter's job and wrote a weekly column for the Times or some such rag.  Well, I did read a little of a book he wrote.  I would read it out loud and sound off just like him.  I had an uncontrollable urge to get up on a soap box and poke holes in the air with my finger.  I feel that old people, and I am quickly becoming one of them, can do and say just about anything they want.  There was a ninety year old lady that was caught selling drugs from her pigeon feeding bench.  She would feed the birds, sell some dope and even smoke some weed.  That is how they caught her, someone reported an old lady smoking at the bus stop.  Who cares?  She is not going to break down the immoral fiber of our nation so forget about it.

Andy Rooney gave the average Joe a voice though I never thought of Mr. Rooney as average.  He had a gift, not just of writing but of communication.  He said things that were buried in our brains or stock on the tips of our tongues.  Lots of things bothered him.  His eyebrows bothered me.  I found myself concentrating on them and not listening to him.   He made me jealous of all the books he read and all the old timers he met.  I figured he was a great grandpa  always using swear words so the parents would frown at him.  The grandkids would laugh hysterically.   I had a terrific grandpa myself.  I am a grandpa but not a very good one yet.  I hope to be one sooner than later.  Love ya Andy.

The Constitution: Twenty fourth Amendment

Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax.
Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

It took one hundred years for the congress to ban slavery and all things like it.  It took another one hundred years for congress to ban all forms of discrimination related to treating all people like human beings.  Whitee just did not want the Darkies to have a voice in their own self determination.   The reasons are simple.  Free and voting minorities will expose the shameful, vulgar treatment and repression.  Freedom will also cost the Man some of his power and maybe money but mostly his dignity and honor.  I can understand wanting to keep my honor, my dignity my money and my power but not at the expense of some one's Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.  At least I would hope not.    I know that there are large groups of people that do not fit the normal bell curve and confuse Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness with doing whatever the hell they want.  These people are not judged by the color of their skin or the number of teeth they have, or even the size of the rats under the trailer; no not even by the quality of the choices they delineate.  They would not pay to vote unless they just made a batch of meth and still had some money left after weed whacking the entire highway system of Brevard county. 

This amendment assured that if a person was eligible to vote and wanted to vote and could get to the voting booth without being smashed in the gut with an orange, then his or her vote would be cast without having to pay anything monetary for it.  We as a country are still trying to insure that votes are cast without any cost, financially or dignitarily.  (I do not care if it is a word)

Dreams

I never though much about dreams.  I never had any good flying dreams.  I did have a falling dream once and then realized I just fell off the bunk bed and landed on a fishing box.  I know people that have dreams of melting scenery and moving trees.  I had a dream where I was hiding from aliens and I hid under their rocket ship.  They got tired of  looking for me and jumped in the rocket and blasted off.  I was smashed like a lizard in a door jam.  My daughter had a dream about animals with heads like dogs with cat bodies and they walked on their tongues.  We still worry a lot about her.

I was trying to think of a word for my dreams and that word would be "boring".  Most of my dreams are about eating lunch with a librarian or going to the grocery store and seeing Ronald McDonald buying chicken nuggets. My dreams contain lots of good conversations about the dangers of couponing and how two-for-one is really mostly two for three times the amount normally.  I wake up from these dreams as if I just watched a decapitation with a chainsaw.  "I can not get the checkout beeping noise out of my head; Oh the humanity".  Blue light specials cause flashbacks to South East Asia rice fields. 

I had a dream where I was looking for my kids and a young lady knew where they were but would not tell me.  I was angry with her and insisted she tell me.  She would not so I threatened her physically.  She was walking backwards and continuously saying "no", "no" in a monotone voice.  I told her, "Tell me where they are or I am going to break your skinny little legs".  She seemed scared but still drummed out "no" and then I had this horrible, terrible thought (in the dream) of what I was going to do to her next.  It was so shocking I woke up from the dream.  I was so startled and ashamed of what I was thinking inside that dream, I could not get back to sleep.  I started wondering how I could have such a thought as that awful thought.  

I do not remember ever having a thought while in a dream.  I have made plans in dreams, told jokes in dreams (always boring stuff like "If Dotty West married Conway Twitty she would be Doty Twitty) and I even fell asleep in this dream.  I had several recurring dreams when I was young, they were about Tarzan and running throughout the jungle.  Indiana Jones had nothing on these dreams.  Now the repeat dreams are about going to a university.  I have actually completed a few classes in these dreams and I may graduate one day.  I seem to be keeping my cloths on in these new dreams.  Those evil thoughts in the dream are third degree thoughts.  Dreams are second degree thoughts.  I am not sure how many degrees of thought there are in dreams.  I have never gone past the third degree.  Anyway, I am bored with these thoughts and the writing is suffering.  Dream on!

Not Enough Rich People

I read an article the other day about a fancy  golf development that was having trouble staying out of bankruptcy.  "There are just not enough rich people any more" was the buzz line from the owner.  Actually, there are more rich people than ever and those rich are much richer.  The problem with the four hundred million dollar playground was that his place was not nice enough for the new super rich. 

Super expensive housing prices are rising and sales are up.  Small personal jets are not selling but big ole private jets are doing great.  The large boats are selling like hot cakes.  With the rich getting richer and the wages of the workers not increasing, rich shit is getting to be a great value for the uber rich.  Telsa is selling its $100,000 electric car like water flowing under any bridge.

Lets all give the rich a rousing applause, they have won this round of capitalism.  The next round, anarchy, will have about half of them jumping out of their office building windows and landing on their carbon fiber cars.  Angry mobs will string up another third of them.  Then we will not have enough rich people to go around.  As for the owner of the resort, why not just lower your prices and let the less rich in for a few days.  Less rich people are not as demanding and probably actually pick up after themselves.  I know you can not charge $30 for a $4 bottle of wine but just do not change the labels and sell it for $8.  The semi-rich will feel like filthy rich and they will not spill the beans.  They like the feel.

What the rich need is more poor people that will lower themselves to any gutter craft to keep from having to sleep in the bushes of these nice resorts.  These working class poor will work for less than minimum wages and with no benefits.  They will take cash so the companies do not have to pay for the capitalists biggest nightmare, workman's compensation.  Imagine having to guarantee that if a person is injured working for your billion dollar company; he will be covered until he can find another job. It truly is a frikin nightmare.  So let us review silently.  That's it, reduce the number of poor through forced labor and then the percentage of rich will go up even more.  No wait, someone tried that already.