A Warning to the People of Earth

I got a note from my friend Raoul. It disturbed me:

"Kids, it’s not what you think. We don’t back up at 35 miles an hour into a line of schoolchildren by accident. In fact, we barely go 35 on the damned highway!

When one of us “loses control of the vehicle” and barrels across the lawn, you think it’s just by chance that we ram through plate glass window in the den and come to a stop in the middle of the nursery?

We’ve travelled the same damn neighborhood streets for our entire lives, and all of a sudden we don’t realize there’s an after-school crossing-guard at the corner of Sycamore and Warden? Talk about ducks in a row!

You see a “rash” of accidents; an alarming increase in the frequency of crashes involving what you so quaintly call “elderly drivers” The news reports on it and everybody wrings their hands. What is to be done? Testing? Fines and penalties? Family intervention? “Troubling”, you call it. “Disturbing and yet terribly complex.”

Well, little piglets, in the words of the old song – accidents speak louder than words.

The fact is; we are organized and angry. We live among you – we are your parents, your grandparents, your friends and eccentric neighbors. And we are crashing into your cars, your houses and your children every single day. And you are powerless against us.

Take our licenses. Fine us all you want Test us. Lock us away. Assuming we survive the crash, all you’ve really got for us is the death penalty. But it takes more than 12 years, on average, to get from trial to actual execution – natural causes are going to get us long before Sparky does. Meanwhile, dear friends, you will be joining our ranks by the thousands every single day.

For now, I’d say, kick little Thurber and Kendra out of the van the day they are physically capable of walking the quarter mile to their lacrosse or rowing practice. If you want us off the roads – move us yourselves! It won’t kill you to chauffer us to the pharmacy or the early show at the Cineplex. But it just might kill you if you don’t.”

 

And Then Gumby Died

De mortui nil nisi bonum.


I think it was first reported in the L.A. Times:

Dallas McKennon, an exuberant character actor and voice actor who helped enliven Gumby, Archie Andrews, Buzz Buzzard and many other animated characters, has died. He was 89.

It should mean something, but No! It won’t. No national day of mourning. No flags at half-staff, message from the Pope or weeping in the trailer-park. No solemn-voiced Katie Couric; no earnest Matt Lauer setting up a special fourth hour of the Today show; and no personal remembrance of “that very first interview I had with a much younger Gumby so many years ago” from Barbara Walters.

Mylar balloons? Candles and flowers placed at the feet of Sculpy replicas on make-shift shrines? No, none of it.

Not a peep from Eddie Murphy or the California Raisins.

Truth is I never much cared for his brand of claymation – it was crude, primitive, even inane. He had that annoying way of “skating” instead of running – he’d just strike a pose and kinda slide along the set. And his walk was too contrived – just as unconvincing as his facial expressions.

To sum it up, I guess I never really got the point of Gumby.

Still he was Gumby. Sad.

Don’t it always seem to go . . . .

Eeew la-la

Make mine medium please.

Boy I had a real head of steam there for a while.

Huffing and puffing and holding forth on matters of imminent concern – from bomb-sniffing rodents and the princess who loved them to world of supermodel Russian chess masters.

And then, poof. No note. No posting. No Toast.

One sunny day you push off the pier with nothing but the Atlantic between you and the Continent. Three days later, like poor Charlie Girard, there you are floundering in circles 130 miles off Cape Cod. Too tired – get me the Coast Guard and get me outta here.

Poof! No note. No posting. C’est ca!

Meanwhile a local toll collector turns chef in Walpole Mass. From today’s Herald “A Mass Pike toll collector and his high school buddy allegedly dismembered and “cooked” a cocaine supplier at a Walpole [Mass.] cement plant to wipe out a $70,000 drug debt in a grisly execution that has authorities still searching for the remains of the dealer.”

Poof! No recipe. No leftovers.

And a 21-year-old Oregon woman is charged with killing her pregnant friend, cutting open her abdomen and taking out her baby, which she then passed off as her own. Her friend’s body was found in the crawl space of the “new mommy’s” home. And the infant was found dead.

Damn.

Maybe Charlie Girard has the right idea. Get me a rowboat and a map of the North Atlantic. I’ll see you in three days.

Rah!

"Simplify.  Simplify."
                                                       - Thoreau

Patriots’ Cheerleader Tryouts

"More than 300 women showed up to compete to become a New England Patriots cheerleader at the Dana Farber Field House on Saturday February 28, 2009."(Globe Staff Photo / Essdras M Suarez)

This made me smile. And for more reasons than just the obvious. Yes they are pretty and sweet and sexy and seemingly healthy. And they dress that way and jump up and down and smile all the time.

But it goes deeper. We need cheerleader tryouts!

Wall St., continues to collapse. The Justice Department releases legal memos actually justifying torture. Torture! Abu Ghraib gets a new coat of paint, some plastic flowers and a new name. And every night, the warning: Beware of ShamWow imitators.

Girl Scout cookies are shrinking. The Sri Lankan cricket team is massacred and Leno has moved to 10:00.

My guided Chakra meditation CD is not going to get us out of this one. No-sirree! We need cheerleader tryouts. Something silly, fun, pretty - that calls us back to a better time. Something transcendental. Cheerleader tryouts.

I’m not saying we need cheerleaders. And I'm not saying we don't. That’s something different.We need cheerleader tryouts. Where the vision of cheerleadering and all it stands for sparkles in the minds of young girls. All that energy and earnest hope. The optimistic gutsiness it takes to suck it up, dance onto the field and yell real loud because you think you just might make the squad if you do.

No entitlements, no Ponzi scheme. Not “hope” like the jingoism of a political professional begging questions about his plans for the country. But the honest dreams of beautiful kids with futures.

“If one advances confidently in the direction of one's dreams, and endeavors to live the life which one has imagined, one will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.”
     - Thoreau

We’re All Boas on This Bus.

Bus-sized boa slithers into record books (from the British-based weekly science journal Nature)

PARIS (AFP) — Stunned scientists have found the fossilized remains of the world's greatest snake -- a record-busting serpent that was as long as a bus and snacked on crocodiles.

The boa-like behemoth, dubbed Titanoboa, ruled the tropical rainforests of what is now Colombia some 60 million years ago, at a time when the world was far hotter than now, they report in a study. The size of the snake's vertebrae suggest the beast weighed some 1.135 tonnes, in a range of 730 kilos (1,600 pounds) to 2.03 tonnes. And it measured 13 metres (42.7 feet) from nose to tail, in a range of 10.64-15 metres (34.6-48.75 feet), they estimate.

Jonathan Block, a vertebrate palaeontologist at the University of Florida, who co-led the work said “The snake that tried to eat Jennifer Lopez in the movie 'Anaconda' is not as big as the one we found."

"At its greatest width, the snake would have come up to about your hips," said David Polly, a geologist at the University of Indiana at Bloomington.

Ants from Mars, frogs the size of Border Collies, mine-sniffing rats, and all of a sudden a boa constrictor the size of a bus has scientists “stunned”?

We fret over Bernie Madoff, Joe the Plumber and Jessica Simpson’s waistline, while “stunned scientists” are uncovering the real treachery. It’s like one of those sci-fi movies from the fifties where only the little kid sees the giant cockroaches in the woods while the rest of the sleepy town mocks him on its way to the Fourth of July picnic. Sure, Hollywood told us, parade the flag down Main Street all you want – meanwhile the Soviets are poised to devour your children, America. Before you know it you’re up to your waist in 40-foot boa constrictors.

But the prize goes to vertebrate paleontologist Jonathan Block. It’s not enough for us to know the damn snake was the size of a bus. Jonathan has to tell us more about himself than we really need to know by comparing it to the snake that tried to eat Jennifer Lopez. Jonathan’s snake is bigger than that.

Good for Jonathan.

I'll Roger That!

Bless me father.

Are impure thoughts really still a sin? I am at the point where I welcome and celebrate almost any coherent thought. Must I confound it all with worry about my soul and all of eternity?

And is that really the standard? Impure? You don’t even have to get to fanciful, mischievous or lascivious or anything? Just saddle up your Ivory Soap thoughts (only 99.44 percent after all) and ride them straight to hell.

Anyways, this is all about car insurance, factual impossibility and  rabbits. There may be an age discrimination problem here too, but , . . .

When Snoopy started trying to sell me life insurance, I was good. Why would anybody buy life insurance from a cartoon beagle, however beloved? And disability insurance from a duck with Gilbert Gottfried’s voice? You’d have to be crazy. Geckos, cavemen, even Charo? No, no and no.

But this Erin Esurance babe has me reviewing my policy for all the wrong reasons I am sure.  I hate to seem shallow, but she's younger and perkier that Jessica, and probably more fun on a date. I Googled her and apparently I am not her first admirer -- certainly not her strangest admirer either, judging by the collections of "fan art" out there.  (She does look good naked.)

Today I heard her voice on the Country Music radio station.  For a moment I imagined that they took her into the studio, sat her down and had her read ad copy. And I am definitely hoping she comes through with something big on Super Sunday.

Now, where is the princess with the abscessed tooth?

Top Stamp Seeks Prince Charming

She needs my help. I just know it. But I am at a loss.

So let’s keep it simple. Like many of you, I have set a Google alert for Xuxa. Sadly it is a mixed bag. Today’s news was bad:

Apparently there has been a release, either on line or on DVD of a movie, starring her, called Popstar. The plot summary tells the whole story:

Plot Summary: Top stamp decides to retire as anyhow as functions give assistance to Brazil, following a brilliant international career, inside bid to join up her Prince Charming, in addition to whom she spoke on the Internet. She accepts an give to execute since an executive inside the bureau where she commenced as anyhow as has to set wide awake in addition to the intrigues of the construct world, making sole her virtual colleague for the grounds that support. For the whole story, go to http://stonewebs.com/2009/01/popstar-2000/

I don’t know what to make of it. A cry for help? Is she in distress? I would gladly ride to her rescue, but I definitely do not want to barge in if I’m not wanted.

She hasn’t returned my calls since the incident at Breckinridge and I never actually moved for a dismissal of the restraining order. Meanwhile, my spelling and grammar check actually let that plot summary go by with only one edit. So sinister forces are surely at work. For now I guess I can only pray.

Maybe I’m the one who needs help.

Don't Squawk for Me Argentina

More distressing news from the animal kingdom.

The Associated Press tells us today that:

“A Queens politician is drafting measures to protect Brooklyn's wild Quaker parrots, whose nests have caused power outages. Councilman Tony Avella wants to make it illegal to capture the parrots and wants the city to relocate their nests when necessary.

The green parrots also are known as monk parakeets. They're native to Argentina but have been in Brooklyn for about 30 years. Flocks of them have settled at Brooklyn College.

The utility Consolidated Edison says parrot nests built in electrical equipment have caused at least seven fires in Brooklyn.

. . . Animal lovers say the parrots are part of the neighborhood and bring life to the skies.”

Feral Argentine Quaker parrots cutting off the power and setting fires in Brooklyn. And they are defended by folks who insist that they “bring life to the skies”. Life to the skies and chaos to the streets of Brooklyn. What’s not to like!

So the Religious Society of Friends recruits volunteers from Argentina to liven the skies of Brooklyn. After three decades in the city, they start taking a torch to the place. Probably not the kind of “inner light” their original sponsors had in mind. Time to go meeting.

Relocate the nests? How does Somalia sound? Match them up with some of those Somali pirates that seem to be thumbing their noses at us all. The birds’ penchant for sabotage and arson will probably come in handy when the pillaging starts

Do you suppose they squawk with that annoying accent?

And while we’re talking about queens; hairdressers are vying for the chance to become the new first lady’s stylist. The One can’t leave the White House for a cut and blow, so somebody has to be summoned. It’s a gig worth fighting for. They are going at it “hammer and tong” – actually more like “gift basket and styling gel”. For all his talent, I am not sure that salon owner Barry Fletcher helped himself when he told AP. "This would pretty much validate all of my hard work and effort to get to a level where I could handle a powerful queen like the first lady." Watch out Barry.

Maybe we should send a few powerful queens to Brooklyn to dispatch with the parrots. It worked well in To Wong Foo. They’d almost certainly want to style their own hair thank you. And the First Lady can always call the people at Harpo.

Bad Luck in Lagos

Understated like a Fox.

Item: Police Raids Reveal Alleged Network of 'Baby Farms' -- Fox news.

Police raids have revealed an alleged network baby "farms" or "factories" in Nigeria, forcing a new look at the scope of human trafficking in the country.”

The doctor in charge, who is now on trial, reportedly lured teenagers with unwanted pregnancies by offering to help with abortion. . . [but] luck ran out for the gynecologist, said to be in his 50s, when a woman to whom he had sold a day-old infant was caught by Nigeria's Security and Civil Defence Service (NSCDS) while trying to smuggle the child to Lagos, the security agency said.

How upsetting for the good doctor. He probably failed to forward his chain letter to at least five people on his mailing list and that’s how it goes.

His crop comes in after all the careful luring and imprisoning – not easy business that. And then a clumsy customer undoes it all. Probably not clumsy, though. More likely stupid! Something tells me that what really killed the deal was the woman’s failure to bribe the security officer from NSCDS.

Once upon a time when you consulted on-line tech support, if you missed something thought to be obvious, they used to say RTFMS – for “read the fucking manual, stupid".

I think when you get a baby in the US they include instructions for the proper use and installation of infant car seats. Cause that’s what we do – drive babies around in cars.

From what I gather, what you do in Nigeria is get out with your valuables. I don’t read Yoruban but I’ll bet that in the small print of the transaction there were some pretty specific user instructions - “Transporting Your New Baby out of the Country". In her haste to get out she probably didn’t bother to read the manual.

I wonder what Fox would consider a “lucky” day for a Nigerian gynecologist.

Rats!

More disturbing news from the Animal Kingdom.

TOFO, Mozambique, Aug. 3 (UPI) — A few enterprising Mozambicans say they might be able to turn their rabbit-sized, land-mine sniffing African rats into a tourist-attracting oddity.

The rat handlers let their rodents poke around at the end of thin leashes until they scratch at the ground. That’s the sign they’ve discovered an explosive device, The Georgia Straight reported in its travel section July 31.

I don’t know what disturbs me most about it all. Is this really the best that enterprising Mozambicans can do? Training rabbit-sized, mine-sniffing rats on leashes? Is this truly the dream of the Junior Achievers and 4H’ers of Twenty-First Century Africa?

That there are people known to the UPI as “rat handlers” piques the curiosity though. Are there rat groomers? Rat farmers? Maybe scientifically-formulated rat food in eight enticing flavors? Perhaps I underestimated the grandness of the entrepreneurial spirit here, but I can’t imagine that rat husbandry, supplies and accessories (exercise wheels? rhinestone leashes?) do much to sustain the nation’s economy

And the tourists! No more giant sea turtles? No white sand beaches? Have the safaris become tiresome? Is it no longer enough to take snapshots of the “colorful locals”, post them on your blog and then and show them off at the happy hour back at the Marriott? It strikes me as déclassé to travel halfway around the world to see a “tourist –attracting oddity” that is in fact just a bunch of rodents on ropes.

Of course they are cheaper than dogs and certainly require less security and general fussing and fawning over than royalty or even celebrities. So there is probably virtue in that. Although I just might travel halfway around the world to watch a tethered Paula Abdul and Matt Lauer tiptoe through a minefield.

Where are the PETA people on this anyway? Is a rodent really more expendable that a right whale? Or a princess?