Across Difficult Country

"You know the curious thing about this is, certainly not to diminish it, I see things like that every day in the newspaper - every day. Somebody fell in their bathtub, somebody pulled out of a driveway, somebody ate a poisoned Mars bar. Who the hell knows?" - Christopher Walken. "He is a most impractical boy . . . often forgetful, he finds difficulty in the most simple things and asks absurd questions, whereas he can understand the most difficult things. He has the most distorted ideas about wit and humour; he draws over his books in a most distressing way, and writes foolish rhymes in other people's books. One is obliged to like him in spite of his vagaries." - A.H. Gilkes, the headmaster of Dulwich, about the then seventeen or eighteen year old Wodehouse. "The craft of painting has virtually disappeared. There is hardly anyone left who really possesses it. For evidence one has only to look at the painters of this century. - Balthus. "This is the ar...

'... do you realize Jeeves, that my aunt says I mustn't smoke while I'm here?' 'Indeed, sir?' 'Nor drink.' 'Too bad, sir. However, many doctors, I understand, advocate such abstinence as the secret of health. They say it promotes a freer circulation of the blood and insures the arteries against premature hardening.' 'Oh, do they? Well, you can tell them next time you see them that they are silly asses.' 'Very good, sir.' - B. Wooster & Jeeves, Very Good, Jeeves . "Yesterday I read the Aspern Papers. No. He writes with a very sharp nib and the ink is very pale and there is very little of it in his inkpot. Incidentally he ought to have proved somehow that Aspern was a fine poet. The style is artistic but it is not the style of an artist. For instance: the man is smoking a cigar in the dark and another person sees the red tip from the window. Red tip makes one think of a red pencil or a dog licking itself, it is ...

"The music industry hasn't connected broadly with fans since the late-1990s heyday of the teen pop performed by the Backstreet Boys, 'N Sync and Britney Spears. "It's almost like we need a new genre of music," says John Sullivan, chief financial officer of Trans World Entertainment Corp., which operates music stores under the FYE and Coconuts names, among others. "There hasn't been anything fresh to get consumers excited in a while." - Silent Night for Music Sales , the Wall Street Journal . Tell Mr. Sullivan I'm working on it.

"I expect the ruins to be monolithic in character, more ancient than the oldest Egyptian discoveries. Judging by inscriptions found in many parts of Brazil, the inhabitants used an alphabetical writing allied to many ancient European and Asian scripts. There are rumors, too, of a strange source of light in the buildings, a phenomenon that filled with terror the Indians who claimed to have seen it. The central place I call "Z" -- our main objective -- is in a valley surmounted by lofty mountains. The valley is about ten miles wide, and the city is on an eminence in the middle of it, approached by a barrelled roadway of stone. The houses are low and windowless, and there is a pyramidal temple. The inhabitants of the place are fairly numerous, they keep domestic animals, and they have well-developed mines in the surrounding hills. Not far away is a second town, but the people living in it are of an inferior order to those of "Z." Farther to the south is another la...

Brokeback Mountain: A love affair between a pair of homosexualist cowboys ends tragically when one is killed by a horse . The actors playing the leads are (supposedly) straight. Includes graphic sex scenes. If you are into this sort of thing stay home and rent the spaghetti western Django Kill...If You Live, Shoot! instead, it's a weird and entertaining film that includes an honest depiction of homosexualist cowboys - an entire gang of them. Memoirs of a Geisha: A trio of Chinese honeys infiltrates Japan by disguising themselves as whores. The potential of the premise squandered, as unlike the homosexualist cowboy film Memoirs of a Geisha is only PG-13. The Producers: A pair of real life homosexualists (Matthew Broderick, Nathan Lane) portray heterosexual Broadway musical impresarios. Notice the pattern. Do you understand 'Hollywood logic' works now? King Kong: I’ve decided the old-style stop-motion animation is better than tedious modern CGI effects. The latter mechanical...

"Marina Abramovic has often been linked to Chris Burden, and with reason. She has staged extreme masochistic spectacles that shock and repel. In "Lips of Thomas," she carved a pentagram in her abdomen and whipped herself senseless...her most famous work is probably "The House With the Ocean View," performed in New York in 2002 (and featured in an episode of "Sex and the City"). For 12 days, the artist lived on three platforms in a Chelsea gallery. She had a bed, a shower and a toilet, but denied herself any nourishment except for mineral water, and any distraction; she could neither read nor write nor speak. Her life was reduced to a minimum, less than the bare essentials. "This piece will be about living in the moment," she said, "in the absolute here and now." But if the piece made demands on Abramovic, it also made demands on the spectators. Upon entering the gallery, a viewer was immediately confronted with a moral choice: did ...

At midnight tonight the State of Washington’s vindictive and senseless ban on smoking in all bars, restaurants, nightclubs and within 25 feet of any public doorway goes into effect. How did such a revolting and absurd state of affairs come about? The philosopher Roger Scruton explains : "The emphasis on life-style also explains the extraordinary war now being waged against tobacco. Smoking belongs with those old and settled habits—like calling women "ladies," getting drunk on Friday nights with your mates, staying married nevertheless, and having babies in wedlock—that reflect the values of a society shaped by the clear division of sexual roles. It is a symbol of the old order, as portrayed by Hollywood and Ealing Studios in the post-war years, and its very innocence, when set beside cocaine or heroin, gives it the aspect of discarded and parental things. Furthermore, tobacco advertising has specialized in evoking old ideas of male prowess and female seductiveness: even...

In the wilds of Borneo a team of scientists led by the biologist Stephan Wulffraat, may have discovered a new species of mammal. 1 The animal “ is bigger than a domestic cat, dark red, and has a long muscular tail .” It's believed to be carnivorous, and thought to drop down from trees on humans and then use its muscular tail to strangulate its victims while viciously gnawing on the unfortunate person’s ears and neck. Once its prey is unconscious (or dead), the nasty creature somehow drains the body of blood. (None of these details are being mentioned in the popular press, in order to avoid setting off a panic. Luckily I have my own reliable sources in Borneo). This truly is an amazing find. As the head of the “species programme” at the World Wildlife fund Callum Rankine observes "You don't find new mammals that often, and to do so must be extraordinary”. 2 I hope to journey to Borneo soon in order to capture one of these rare animals. If I do I promise to let everyon...

The president of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev has been re-elected, receiving 91% of the vote. This despite (or perhaps because of?) his squandering the Kazakh people’s wealth on the building of a giant glass pyramid. Regular readers may recall my visit to Kazakhstan, my reflections on the idiotic Great Pyramid of Astana project, and my observations of the often confusing Kazakhstanian nightlife: Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan – all admittedly have their peculiar charms, but for me of all the countries in the world with names ending in ‘stan’ none compare to Kazakhstan. Kazakhstan! A vast and rugged country (1,049,150 sq miles) populated by descendents of Mongol and Turkic tribesman, it can be found on your map in the unfortunate position between Russia and China. [ more ]  When I announced I was going to Kazakhstan in an attempt to persuade the Kazakhs not to build a giant glass pyramid, in a city with less than 500,000 inhabitants i...

One reason for the lack of material here, lately, is that I’ve been busy in inventing a new kind of music. I’m not talking about half-assedly combining two existing genres (i.e. “Country-Rap” or ‘Disco-Death Metal) to produce something less listenable to than its components and then dishonestly claiming it to be new, I mean a style of music that is genuinely original. To do this I’ve assembled an eclectic group of musicians: Gerhard Spitteler, a Swiss Alpenhornist; Donald and Stefan Tanguy, the famous identical twin Bombard players; Candi with an ‘i’, an exotic dancer who produces various percussive tones and rhythms by slapping her nude buttocks while gyrating wildly; Arthur Hines, who plays the Celeste in a free-jazz manner despite having no arms or legs; child Crumhorn prodigy Billy Nertz (age 8), DJ Gleep on the ‘Wheels of Steel’, Rod Price on slide guitar, and Melvin Barnes, PhD, a homeless man I discovered in the park subjecting innocent bystanders to loud, improvised rants abou...

A violent gang of Russian squirrels attacked and killed a large dog : "Squirrels have bitten to death a stray dog which was barking at them in a Russian park, local media report. Passers-by were reportedly too late to stop the attack by the black squirrels in a village in the far east, which reportedly lasted about a minute. They are said to have scampered off at the sight of humans, some carrying pieces of flesh." That story also notes: "...in a previous incident this autumn chipmunks terrorised cats in a part of the territory."

Source: PASSPORT TO MAGONIA UFO SIGHTINGS DATABASE, compiled by Jacques Vallee . Commentary added. ___________________ We’ve come a long way, and we could use a little water: Apr. 22, 1897. Josserand, Texas. Frank Nichols, who lived 3 km east of Josserand and was one of its most respected citizens, was awakened by a machine noise. Looking outside, he saw a heavy, lighted object land in his wheat field. He walked toward it, was stopped by two men who asked permission to draw water from his well. He then had a discussion with a half-dozen men, the crew of the strange machine. He was told how it worked but could not follow the explanation. May. 06, 1897. Hot Springs, Arkansas. Two policemen, Sumpter and McLenore, were riding northwest of Hot Springs when they saw a bright light in the sky. About 7 km farther they saw the light again coming down to the ground. One km farther the horses refused to walk. Two men were seen carrying lights. The lawmen took their rifles, called the strangers, a...

Live in Switzerland . Inventions stolen from the pastoralist Karamojong people of Uganda include a better mousetrap, a fashionable sandal made from recycled tires, and a distinctive haircut. Minor design flaw discovered in Seattle monorail . The Greek satirist Lucian (c. A.D. 120-180) describes visiting the moon : "Moonmen have artificial penises, generally of ivory but, in the case of the poor, of wood...The diet is the same for everyone: frog."

Source: PASSPORT TO MAGONIA UFO SIGHTINGS DATABASE, compiled by Jacques Vallee . Commentary added. ___________________ A haystack? Dec. 07, 1872. Banbury, Great Britain: At King's Sutton an object resembling a haystack flew on an irregular course. Sometimes high, sometimes very low it was accompanied by fire and dense smoke. It produced the same effect as a tornado, felling trees and walls. It suddenly vanished The physical description and behavior of the being described in the following encounter are eerily similar to accounts of my Norwegian grandfather: Apr. 17, 1897. Williamston, Michigan: At least a dozen farmers saw an object maneuver in the sky for an hour before it landed. A strange man near 3m tall, almost naked and suffering from the heat, was the pilot of the craft. "His talk, while musical, seemed to be a repetition of bellowings." One farmer went near him and received a blow that broke his hip. Possibly the first account linking UFO’s and cattle mutilation. ...

I am in Friedrichshafen , Germany, or, to be precise, above Friedrichshafen and Lake Bodensee, floating in one of the Zeppelin company’s fantastic new airships (seats 12, maximum speed 77 mph). I relax in my seat as the airship climbs to an altitude of about a mile. The puffs of smoke from my cigarette are miniatures of the puffy clouds outside my window. The time when smoking is outlawed everywhere (what I call ‘The New Dark Age’) is nearly upon us, but I imagine myself in a Zeppelin, hovering over cities in defiance of their punitive and barbaric smoking bans, forcing the stupid, non-smoking ground wretches to see a giant flying phallus every time they look up. The stewardess brings me a drink. She’s a Teutonic vixen. I contemplate challenging her to a wrestling match, but that can wait until after we land or after I’ve had a few more drinks, whichever comes first. When I last flew on an airplane my stewardess was a homosexualist man. What a contrast. A delightful feature of the Ze...

Not satisfied with menacing us by the threat of avian flu , birds now seem to be interfering with our Guinness World Record attempts. Is it me, or is Nature becoming increasingly hostile? Speaking of bird divination, Laudator Temporis Acti discusses augury and auspex. UPDATE: More on birds - Tom Bethell dissects the avian bird flu hysteria.

The Angraecum sesquipedale Thouars orchid, native to Madagascar, is notable for having a " nectar tube of 10-12 inches in length with only the distal end filled with nectar ". After studying this orchid, Charles Darwin realized there must also exist an insect equipped to fertilize it, and in 1862 Darwin wrote : "It is, however, surprising that any insect should be able to reach the nectar : our English sphinxes have probosces as long as their bodies ; but in Madagascar there must be moths with probosces capable of extension to a length of between ten and eleven inches !" ( On the Various Contrivances by which British and Foreign Orchids are Fertilised by Insects ) The moth predicted by Darwin was finally discovered 41 years later . Named Xanthopan morgani praedicta , it has a proboscis which unfurls to a length of around 10 inches. In a similar manner, after I read about a newly discovered giant ape Gigantopithecus blackii , who was 10 feet tall and weighed up to...

A Mutual Suspicion Grows in Denmark , Jeffrey Fleishman, November 12, 2005, LA Times: "I believe integrating a large number of Muslims can't be done. It's an illusion. They don't have the desire to blend in with other people. We've been a Christian country for 1,000 years and we are the oldest monarchy in the world. I want to get married and have a lot of kids who can walk around in a society not influenced by Muslims." - Martin Henriksen , 25-year-old legislator for the Danish People's Party .

An unconfirmed report claims Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri is dead . There has been speculation that the Iraqi al-Douri (the King of Clubs, for those keeping score) could be connected to the Al-Queda terrorist and fellow flame-top Mustafa Setmariam Nasar .

Chekov, Kafka, Keats, Stevenson, Camus, Bernhard.

Lichtenberg, Leopardi, Pope.

Have you contracted the deadly bird flu yet? If not, it’s only a matter of time - at least according to the experts it is. 1 I’m not one to go down without a fight, so last night I set up an anti-avian defensive perimeter in my yard. 2 My hope is that after an infected bird lands and proceeds his way across the lawn to my front door in order to barge into my home and infect me, the winged nincompoop will be tempted en route to sample the toxic liquid from one of the bowls and die. This morning on the grass I found two dead cats and a comatose hobo. Obviously I need to use some stronger stuff. 1 I’m told that these aren’t the same experts who prophesized the ‘Y2K bug’ apocalypse, but I’m not sure I believe it. 2 About a dozen medium to large bowls of poison.

IN CHINA, HUNT ON FOR LOCH NESS MONSTER Underwater camera photograph some claim is image of 'Nessie'.

You probably heard Somali pirates attacked a luxury cruise ship over the weekend (you probably don’t recall that in October Somali pirates captured two UN food ships ). As the Sunday Times reports: “There is growing concern that neither governments nor the shipping industry are doing enough to protect crews and cargoes and that ships are vulnerable to terrorists as well as pirates.” Unfortunately, as the above article notes, nothing much is being done to counter the pirates. Therefore I hereby urge Congress to exercise its power to "grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal , and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water" ( United States Constitution (Act 1 sec. 8)), in order that interested private individuals may legally seek and destroy pirate vessels that threaten ships in the Indan Ocean. The shipping industry could offer rewards to sucessful privateers. Not only would this be an efficient solution to the piracy problem, it would also be all kinds of fun. Which is pr...

Practical Ventriloquism, 1904 by Robert Ganthony. An excellent guide to the art of throwing one’s voice that is delightfully free from the political correctness that permeates more modern works on ventriloquism.

Given the abundance of Iranian taxicab drivers in New York City, when I read the following story I was shaken by the feeling it presages the tragic fate awaiting poor Maureen Dowd if she doesn’t come to her senses in the next few years: Tehran, Iran -- A 52-year-old Iranian has been sentenced to death for killing his 70-year-old lover when she asked to marry him, a newspaper reported Monday. A court report in the Etemad daily said a taxi driver, identified only as Hamidreza, became furious when his elderly lover Setareh proposed marriage. "I went to her house and she said she had deep feelings for me and suggested we get married," he told the court. Hamidreza explained he already had a wife and children. "She then got frustrated and slapped me," he said. The man knocked her unconscious and suffocated her with bed-sheets before making off with her jewelry.

I’ve finally discovered a politician I can enthusiastically support. His name is David Irons , he's running for King County Executor, and while I have no idea (or care, really) what he believes, I greatly admire the fact he once knocked down his mother (from what I’ve heard she had it coming, not that it matters). If there’s one thing we need right now in politics it’s a man who refuses to let anyone block his way, especially bossy old ladies. I hope all those eligible to do so join me in voting for David Irons.

A parrot in the UK has died from the lethal H5N1 strain of bird flu . It occurs to me a cunning plot for the Al-Qaedians would be to intentionally infect birds with deadly bird flu, then ship them (or convince the birds to fly on their own) to Western countries to spread disease. I wonder if anyone who knew this parrot ever heard it say “Allah Akhbar” or “Death to the infidels” or anything similar that might be suggestive of a link to Mohammedan terrorism?

Posting will be sparse (if not non-existent) until after The Breeders' Cup , the biggest day in horse racing. Three cocktails inspired by the sport of kings: Whirlaway , named in honor of the 1941 Triple Crown winner (or was it the other way around?). Turf Cocktail . Suburban , an excellent drink, this obscure and unusual cocktail was named after The Suburban Handicap.

James Ricalton and the Cashmere Giants More: The Cashmere Giants with dwarves . The Cashmere Giants and friends in the Durbar Amphitheatre.

There was no music and there were no flashing lights or flickering screens in the pub, just a few people gathered around small tables, chatting and having a quiet drink. Only an occasional burst of laughter rose above the sociable murmur. I cursed the electricity that produces so many little hells of electronic stimulation, until I recalled that I like my drinks cooled. No music! That its absence should strike me so forcefully, rather as the heat when you step off an air-conditioned aircraft into a tropical country, demonstrates how insidiously pervasive it has become in our urban environment. It is like a poisonous gas that a malign authority pumps into our atmosphere, whose doleful effect, and probably purpose, is to destroy our capacity to converse, to concentrate, to reflect. It agitates us, keeps us constantly on the move, makes us impulsive and lacking in judgement. - Theodore Dalrymple , on why the Baroque is superior to Rock . Like Dr. Dalrymple, I too despise the omnipresence ...

"Steered west-southwest; and encountered a heavier sea than they had met with before in the whole voyage. Saw pardelas and a green rush near the vessel. The crew of the Pinta saw a cane and a log; they also picked up a stick which appeared to have been carved with an iron tool, a piece of cane, a plant which grows on land, and a board. The crew of the Nina saw other signs of land, and a stalk loaded with rose berries. These signs encouraged them, and they all grew cheerful. Sailed this day till sunset, twenty-seven leagues." - the journal of Columbus in his voyage of 1492 . It’s become unfashionable to celebrate Columbus Day. The campaigners against Columbus Day hate Columbus because they hate Western Civilization in general, but they also despise him for a more specific reason: Columbus risked life and fortune to sail across uncharted waters and discover The New World. The achievement of greatness through daring and adventurousness is intolerable to the various mediocrities...

Is there really a taint shrinkage crisis caused by phthalates? Trevor Butterworth of STATS has written to reassure us there isn’t, and provides a link to an article on the STATS website: On Tuesday, the Wall Street Journal launched a carefully-crafted attack on phthalates, a family of colorless oil-like substances that prolong the scent of perfume, make nail polish flexible, and prevent children’s toys from cracking under the pressure of being chewed among other uses. This follows on an activist-driven campaign over the past year to have the chemicals banned in the U.S (see STATS earlier article “A Health Care that Stinks” for more background). Without directly endorsing the studies claiming a link between phthalates and male genital deformation, the WSJ suggested that we should be nervous: Phthalates are everywhere, and male infertility is on the rise. Stop the production and distribution of materials using phthalates, so goes the reasoning. Only there’s a problem: the studies cit...

I usually don’t get alarmed about the dangers of toxic chemicals in the environment. The risks are all too often exaggerated, and inadvertently ingesting a little arsenic in a glass of water or accidentally breathing in a few particles of benzene from the air can hardly compare to the amount of toxins I get from all the cigarettes and alcohol I ingest on purpose. But I have become alarmed about phthalates. Phthalates are industrial chemicals found in all sorts of ordinary household products - adhesives, cosmetics, some types of wallpaper and flooring, many kinds of furniture, even toys. Scientists have discovered that boys whose mothers were exposed to high levels of phthalates while pregnant are likely to be born with shrunken taints . I truly wish I were joking about this, but the link between shrunken taints and phthalates appears all too real . 1 Why is no one speaking out about this? Must there be the tragedy of an entire generation of men born with tiny taints before somet...

Orion in December "My instinct has always been to shut off all means of self-expression except the brush, so that its product might be all the more intense." - Charles Ephraim Burchfield. More paintings here and here .

I often wonder if the city of Seattle could be any more boring. It turns out the answer is yes: Seattle Considers Lap Dance Ban ...the City Council is planning to vote Monday on some of the strictest adult-entertainment regulations of any big city in the country. No lap dances. No placing dollar bills in a dancer's G-string... Under these rules, dancers would have to stay 4 feet away from customers, private rooms would be barred, customers couldn't give money directly to entertainers, and the minimum lighting would be increased - think parking-garage brightness. If Jesus can have his feet washed by a whore, why is it wrong for an ordinary man to have his lap danced upon by a stripper? Obviously it isn’t. Sadly, arguments based on the Scriptures carry no weight with the God-hating Leftist types that run Seattle. That these regulations will force many girls, most of whom are capable of little else , into ‘other work’, is of no concern to these people. The zealots of the Seattle C...

I had to read this story twice before I could understand it: Smoking Seems To Increase Brain Damage In Alcoholics Alcoholics who smoke appear to lose more brain mass than alcoholics who don't smoke, according to a study at the San Francisco VA Medical Center. It is already well-known that the brains of long-term alcoholics atrophy and shrink, the study authors say, but the new findings are the first evidence that cigarette smoking might contribute to that atrophy, particularly in grey matter of the parietal and temporal lobes. And as far as I can tell there’s nothing a reasonable a person can do to avoid it either. The only hope is to be one of the lucky exceptions, like James Joyce, whose mind never exhibited any sign of deterioration despite a lifetime of excessive drinking and smoking.

Remember my warning of dark forces attempting to destroy Tom DeLay? As you probably know, the Left and its allies in the Mainstream Media has launched a hate campaign of lies combined with bogus legal charges in order to destroy Majority Leader Tom DeLay. I have become so sickened by these attacks I decided to do something about it: at Café Press I created this thong panty emblazoned with the (or should I say ‘our’?) rallying cry: Free DeLay ! Your crotch region is a most personal area, and the personal area is political, get the word out. Well, as you surely know by now, a monomaniacal prosecutor has indicted Tom DeLay , on the flimsiest of pretexts. But it is not too late to do something, and in fact now more than ever it’s imperative right minded people show support for our Majority Leader. I can think of no better way to do this than by purchasing one or more pairs of Free DeLay! thong panties. The panties are designed for women, but there is nothing to prevent homosexualists ...

"In 1932, Shirley Temple made her film debut in What's to Do? , the first in a new series of comedy shorts called Baby Burlesks , created to compete with Our Gang. But here, instead of three- and four-years old child actors playing smart-aleck kids, they played adults in adult situations. A friend of mine, Daniel Riccuito, who happens to be a film scholar, first called my attention to the films. He describes them as such: "Shirley plays a variety of sexually out-there characters. The one I own ( Polly Tix in Washington ) isn't the most outrageous of the bunch, but it has her playing a whore whose mission is to seduce a new senator and get him to sign The Castor Oil Bill. The all-child cast appears in diapers, mostly topless, with top hats, cigars, flesh." Another film in the series, he tells me, has a diaper-clad boy squeezing a cucumber that shoots juice out of one end, striking Temple in the face." - Jim Knipfel

Select the answer which best completes the following sentence. What's depicted in this scene is _____: a) perfectly normal. b) odd. c) insane. d) something I've done (or would like to do) myself. Judging by the look on his face, he's as mystified as I am as to why he's being presented with a platter of fruits and vegetables. He also appears to be wearing a collared shirt.

Then if India is given a seat, and it is already a candidate for it, doesn't that mean the escalation of the degree of challenge with Pakistan, the nuclear state? Is that in the interest of world peace? On the contrary, it is a dangerous threat to world peace. And if Japan is given a seat, and it is a candidate for that, doesn't that mean the escalation of the challenge for North Korea that has a nuclear problem, and for China and Indonesia? If India and Japan are given a permanent seat, does that not mean the escalation of the boiling degree of the Chinese hydrogen kiln? Is it really for the benefit of world peace? - from the curious mind of Col. Muammar Gadafi

In the past, when I’ve criticized oldies (see here , and here ) I’ve received hate-mail, not just from the powerful oldie lobby but also from otherwise rational people who can’t understand my antagonism toward the aged. These critics almost always justify their favorable view of oldies by invoking their own, mostly fond, childhood memories of grandmothers. I too remember grandmothers as being kindly and harmless figures, liked for their skill at baking pies and other goodies. Would that were still the case. Sadly, modern grandmothers are a debased as most of the rest of society, as exemplified by a group known as The Raging Grannies , who describe themselves as being “independent women” dedicated to “activism, social justice” and “politics”, which is a nice way of saying they are horrible, meddling old crones who enjoy annoying normal people. How bad are these hateful hags? A recent article describes how they’ve written a rap about hurricane Katrina: "A Granny New Orleans Rap...

Apparently not content with the vast abundance of native wildlife (fish, grizzly bears, whales, Eskimos, etc.) in their state, the silly people of Alaska have imported a a 23-year-old female African elephant named Maggie to gawk at. Naturally, the elephant finds the frozen climate disagreeable. Worse, Alaskans are forcing the poor pachyderm to work out on a gigantic treadmill , because they have decided the unhappy elephant is fat . Which she is, of course, because all elephants are fat . I wonder if the Alaskans will figure this out before the exercise and diet regime they've imposed manages to kill her?

It seems the Hindoos are harnessing women to ploughs and making them till the fields. If fads originating in India as silly as Yoga can become popular in the West, is it too much to hope one of their sensible practices might be adopted too? In other news, in a fascinating interview former President Bill Clinton reveals that "many people" in his administration believed the United States government had recovered a crashed alien spacecraft. Clinton also describes how he personally helped advance 20th century science: "we had succeeded in sequencing the human genome...now you know that we cloned Dolly the sheep".

[Ottonieri] observed that irresolute men are sometimes extremely persistent in their intents in spite of all difficulties; and this is as a result of their very irresolution, for if they relinquished their deliberation, they would have to resolve a second time. Often they are extremely prompt and efficient in executing what they have resolved because they are afraid to abandon their decision at any moment and regress to that torturing perplexity and mental vacillation in which they had dwelt before reaching a decision, and, therefore, they hasten the execution of their intents and apply to it all their energies – stimulated, as they are, more by anxiety and by the uncertainty about mastering themselves than by the aim of their undertaking and by the other obstacles they must surmount in order to attain it. ____ …he was listening to a passage of Diogenes Laertius’s Lives of the Philosophers, according to which Chilo, being asked in what way the learned differ from the ignorant, answered...

Since 2001 the British have traditionally celebrated Jewish Holocaust Memorial Day on January 27. From its inception, many have complained the holiday excludes other, non-Jews who were also subject to systematic and planned extermination. A simple solution would be to set aside a day for each victim group: whether Jewish, Gypsy, Mohican, Tutsi, Carthaginian, Armenian, Canaanite, or what have you. But that would mean too much vacation for everyone, victims and non-victims alike, and idle time can not be tolerated in our modern age where efficiency and productivity are everything. Instead, advisers to the insipid Tony Blair have recommended scrapping Jewish Holocaust Memorial Day and replacing it with the generic Genocide Memorial Day. This attempt to please everyone will only please no one. Americans can testify to this, having undergone the combining of Washington and Lincoln’s birthdays into President's Day. It not only cheated everyone out of an extra day off, but worse, merging...

Filippo Ottonieri – some of whose memorable observations, partly heard from his own lips and partly related by others, I will commit to writing, was born and spent most of his life in Nubiana, in the province of Valdivento, where he also died a short time ago and where there is no record of anyone having ever been insulted by him, either in word or deed. He was commonly hated by his fellow citizens because he seemed to find little pleasure in many of the things which are greatly liked and sought by a majority of men... _______ He used to say that the most real pleasures in life are those produced by false imagining and that children find everything in nothing and men find nothing in everything. _______ It is certain that truth is not beautiful. Yet even truth may sometimes bring some pleasure; and, if, in human affairs, beauty is to be preferred to truth, whenever beauty is missing, truth is preferable to anything else. Now, in big cities you are removed from beauty, for no l...

"I think that is what is going on, poor evil Kathy with no blog, no design on the cover of a magazine regardless of weather it is good or bad, no classes to teach, no books to edit or write. Granted yes she has stuff in a book and good for her, but I'm sure that it must rankle, why her and not me? I'm just as good if not better. Must attack when she complains about something, must pull the princess out of the castle. Except there is no castle just someone who works hard at something she loves and is really lucky to be able to share it with the world. That's all it is luck and a lot of hard work. I feel sorry for poor evil Kathy so bound up and twisted it must be hard for her on some days to think straight. But to put it into perspective it is after all knitting ..." Also highly recommended is " Knitters can be bitches ": So, it's ok for you and your friends to follow people sureptiously at fiber arts shows to take photos of their sweaters for the exp...

In a surprising break with tradition, The New York Times, or Grey Lady as she is known, has announced plans to enliven her dull pages with a funnies section. True to form, the newspaper promises the comics to be published won’t be funny , instead the tedious and pretentious doodles of "graphic novelists” are to be featured.

An article in Slate today by an authoress named Meghan O'Rourke begins: A man who doesn't want to watch his wife give birth is a jerk. This was the overwhelming consensus reached by a host of respected blogs after the publication last Tuesday in the New York Times of a piece by a therapist noting an unhappy trend: A number of his male patients have reported that after witnessing their wives have babies they no longer feel attracted to them. "I mean, how are you supposed to go from seeing that to wanting to be with …?" one husband asked, unable to finish his sentence. It made no difference that these men were patients in search of help, not Neanderthals who'd ditched their wives; the bloggers—many of whom are usually temperate—were outraged. "Would it hurt if I call you a big pussy?" one woman queried, adding, "Luckily for me, I didn't marry a total asshole, so I didn't have this problem." According to one post, a husband who finds hi...

Watching the 5:00 local news on the television today I saw two stories (one about a hit and run accident, the other about high gas prices) featuring interviews with men sporting a beard and a goatee at the same time (similar to the illustration at left). Did I witness something improbable? Or is this an increasingly popular style in facial hair that I've hitherto not noticed?

Swaziland, of all places, is in the news again: The king of Swaziland's daughter was whipped by a palace official at a party of teenage virgins ahead of a festival where more than 50,000 maidens are available to become her father's 13th wife, media said on Sunday. Princess Sikhanyiso, 17, told the Times of Swaziland a palace official whipped girls, including beauty queen Miss Swaziland, at the party as a punishment after they refused to turn down the music. Can you imagine our democratically elected President having a government official give a whipping to his obnoxious daughters the next time they misbehave? Of course not, and their lack of manners indicates neither can Bush’s daughters. While disappointing, it is not surprising. Unlike Kings, who are instinctively concerned with custom and decorum, in a democracy not only is there no incentive for a leader to promote manners, doing so is actually a liability, as in order to be elected a head of state must grovel before th...

There’s been minimal content here lately as I’ve been focusing on doing the world’s business. Herakleitos once said “Even sleeping men are doing the world’s business and helping it along.” Indeed. Herakleitos also said “The sun is one foot wide”. He was a little off with that one. Speaking of the sun, if the sum of my heart’s ambition were a single, foil-wrapped pat of butter (and it is), the sun, whatever his width, has succeeded in melting it. So don’t expect me to make pancakes for breakfast tomorrow. By ‘make pancakes’ I mean ‘do anything useful’. Which includes making actual pancakes. Another thing Herakleitos said was “My favorite size for a pancake is one foot wide”. Now that I think about it it might have been some fat guy sitting behind me on the bus who said that. I can’t remember. But either him or Herakleitos. Despite my lethargy, I’m cheered (and surprised) by the following news: 1) The media is finally noticing the immigration problem . 2) The box office for summer movie...

The above photo of a UFO was taken in New Hampshire in 1870. If you look closely you can see a swastika on the side of the UFO. The swastika is an ancient Hindu symbol. Could it be a photo of a Vimana Aircraft ?

According to WFMY News 2: Wealthy People Allegedly Conned Out Of Millions This is news? Really, what else would you expect? If you tried to con poor people out of millions you would either have to con a dollar or two from millions of poor people, or else con a dollar or two a day from one poor person for millions of days, neither of which is practical. In more interesting news, a giant baby the size of a man has been terrorizing the UK.

"The owner of an ostrich ranch is planning to shut down after losing a lawsuit against hot-air balloonists he says panicked his birds into a lethal stampede ." In other news, tiny hairdresser and sometime actor Ezzy Dame has admitted to lying about being one of the original Ooompa Loompas .

1926 The porchlight coming on again, Early November, the dead leaves Raked in piles, the wicker swing Creaking. Across the lots A phonograph is playing Ja-Da. An orange moon. I see the lives Of neighbors, mapped and marred Like all the wars ahead, and R. Insane, B. with his throat cut, Fifteen years from now, in Omaha. I did not know them then. My airedale scratches at the door. And I am back from seeing Milton Sills And Doris Kenyon. Twelve years old. The porchlight coming on again. - Weldon Kees

"What can I do in Rome? I never learnt how to lie." - Juvenal , Satire III

The next time you hear someone arguing the youth of America are too slothful to compete in the global marketplace bring up Arup Manna of India, arguably the laziest boy in the world, who has been asleep for 11 months . His parents have been unable to find a way to wake him. I would advise them to try a bear . Not only are bears great at waking people up, they are also inspiring motivators .

Even though Man has explored her for centuries, the briny cesspool known as the ocean still has her secrets. I’m referring, of course, to recent events in Ningbo City of Zhejiang Province, China, where the ocean, perhaps as a joke, but more likely as an insult, sloshed the enormous remains of a (possibly) hitherto unknown creature onto Ningbo City beach. The Chinese media reports : ...a fisherman for over ten years, said “I have never seen such a monster; it was larger than a whale.” It was first seen by villagers on July 20, according to Mei who breeds fish nearby, and is nearly 12 meters long and weighs around 2 tons, according to district sea and fishery bureau staff. The animal reportedly has a long thin head and a snout nearly one meter long. ...it has been impossible to identify, but has been described as having some hair, and orange stripes across a three to four-meter wide belly. The skull, which alone weighs over 100 kg, and coccyx of the creature have fallen from its body....

On the Fifth of July, 1884, the racing yacht Mignonette, being sailed from Southampton, England to her new owner in Australia, sank in a storm after being battered by large waves. The ship’s four man crew, Captain Thomas Dudley, first mate Edwin Stephens, able seaman Edmund Brooks, and seventeen year old Cabin Boy named Richard Parker, found themselves adrift in a small dinghy with no provisions other than two tins of turnips. The turnips were soon eaten, and as they drifted day after day the crew resorted to drinking their own urine. At some point the necessity of cannibalism was brought up. Richard Parker was the weakest, and unlike the others, had no dependents. On July 25th, in an act of terrible desperation, Captain Dudley murdered Parker, stabbing him in the neck with a pocket knife. Then, for the next four days, he and Stephens and Brooks feasted on the body and drank Parker’s blood. Five days later the men were rescued, by a ship called The Montezuma (Montezuma, you may recall,...

"Before my eyes a large spherical mass, about 8in in diameter, emerged from the vagina and quickly placed itself on her left thigh while she crossed her legs. I distinctly recognised in the mass a still unfinished face, whose eyes looked at me." - A description of mediumistic teleplastics, from The Phenomena of Materialisation , an account of the scientific investigations and hypnotic experiments of psychiatrist and physician Baron Albert von Schrenck Notzing .

The interminable Israeli-Palestinian conflict takes a darker turn : it appears that young followers of Hamas are now engaging in Minstrelsy . A Palestinian boy in blackface sings ‘Swanee'. Will the world ignore this situation? Or will the UN and the international community do what’s right for once, and dispatch a multi-national team of diversity consultants to the Gaza strip to conduct a series of workshops about hurtful stereotypes? Sadly, probably the former.

A team of scientists, led by (the now unsurprisingly) oddly named Dr Siobhan Abeyesinghe, have discovered that chickens worry about the future . I imagine the birds’ unease is caused in part by all the fear mongering in the media about things like global warming and the social security crisis. So to the list of media sins which include sensationalism, obsession with celebrity culture, and leftwing bias, we can now add animal cruelty. Not all chickens are melancholy, one group of plucky hens has gone into show business in order to provide humans with “ spiritual encouragement and educational entertainment .” In other animal news, the lazy police in South Bend, Indiana have called off their search for a kangaroo that no one is sure really exists after only one month.

Renowned journalist Hector Duarte Jr. informs us of an African gray parrot who has been taught the concept of zero . How long before this parrot knows more about numbers than the typical American junior-high school student? Interestingly, the parrot is able to do this despite having a brain the size of a walnut. It’s thought that the massive dinosaur Stegosaurus also had a brain the size of a walnut, but most don’t think Stegosaurus understood the concept of zero, or even the concept of easy numbers like three. Which may be why Stegosaurus went extinct – he refused to use the powerful walnut sized brain God had given him to it's full capacity. In his article, Mr. Duarte jr. casually remarks: ...while the language of prairie dogs was found to contain a word for humans. I was astounded by the implications of this. Since when did prairie dogs have a language? Is it possible, I wondered, that the normally reliable journalist Hector Duarte Jr. was perpetrating a hoax? After exten...