#170 How to Stand an Egg

I didn't think I'd be able to write another entry until Tuesday evening, because I was going to be away Monday and Tuesday morning visiting my daughter.  But there's snow coming - starting Monday evening we're supposed to get 1-2 inches per hour all night, to about 12 inches, then more snow flurries through Tuesday (and Wednesday, and Thursday, ad infinitum). The worst snow will be to the north of Albany (we're south).  That's according to the TV weatherman.

The same channel's weather site (personalized to my actual address!) says 6 inches over Monday night, mixed with sleet (I guess that's where the other six inches went?)

So I listened to Jay's weather radio (WXL37, US Weather Service) - a last resort because it hurts my ears.  They've changed their reporting format since the last time I listened.  They used to say the towns or counties, then the forecast, then more towns or counties, and their forecast.  But tonight, there was a woman's voice (different), and she gave forecast after forecast without specifying what area it was for.  Somebody's getting 3-8 inches, somebody else is getting 8-12 inches, and a third somebody's getting 8-14 inches.  But I have no idea who. She did say two significant things:  the worst snow will be to the south (!) and east of Albany, and the storm could track further to the east or west than they expect.

My conclusion is that nobody knows for sure what's going to happen.  I can't come home to a foot of snow in the driveway.  So, I delay Daughter-visit again.

=====================================

The West Wing was on in the wee hours last evening.  As the show began, CJ was trying to convince everyone that you can stand an egg on end "at the exact moment of" the vernal equinox, "but not the autumnal equinox".  Some people tried, and couldn't.  CJ insisted she had seen it done.  Others argued that it couldn't be done ever, and besides, even if it could, there's no difference between the vernal and autumnal equinoxes.  At the end of the show, at exactly midnight (Duh?) CJ did stand an egg, but of course there was nobody else there to see it.

There was so much misinformation in that show it was painful.

According to Snopes, eggs will stand on their ends any day of the year.  Technically, I suppose that might be true.  The Snopes article says that eggs are associated with fertility and birth, and that's why they are associated with the vernal equinox (and by extension, to Easter).  Also true, but confusing.  I'm under the impression that wild (migrating) birds don't lay eggs that early or late - anywhere.  Seems like awakening insects should deserve that honor.  Snopes says that standing eggs on the equinox symbolizes the restoration of balance to the Earth.  Now that makes real (intuitive) sense.

I have been standing eggs for more than 25 years.  I have tried at all times of the year.  I can always balance them a few days before, during, and after both equinoxes.  I have never been able to get one to stand more than a very few seconds, if at all, at any other time of the year.

There was a large group of us in Washington DC who stood eggs every spring.  We would stand eggs at home, starting like two weeks before the equinox, and then on the Saturday nearest the equinox we all went to one guy's house, where we stood eggs on every flat surface all over his house.  After a few days or a week or two, the eggs would fall.  It's interesting that every one of the eggs (that didn't get bumped prematurely) fell within a few hours of each other, all over DC, Montgomery county, and Northern Virginia.   Once they fell, neither they nor fresh eggs would stand again, until the next equinox.

So my experience, and that of the egg-standing group, doesn't jive with the Snopes theory.

We could not stand eggs until some point up to around 10 days or a week before the equinox.  Then suddenly, it became easy, and all the eggs went up and stayed up, all pretty close to the same time.  Standing eggs stayed up, and it became easier and easier to stand more as the equinox approached.  Then it all reversed, and all eggs would fall, one after another, all down within a day or two, and it became increasingly more difficult to get them to stand again, until no one could keep one up for more than a few seconds.

I had three eggs (in three different rooms) that stood for more than four weeks one year.

The amount of time before and after the equinox that the eggs would stand varied from year to year.  The vernal equinox is always easier, with a longer spread of time, than the autumnal.  In my experience, the autumnal averages only about three days on either side.

So, quote Snopes, quote science, quote anyone you want.  I'll have trouble listening because I know what my experience is.  If you've never done it before,  you can perform your own experiment, and see what you, yourself think (as opposed to what someone tells you.)

You will need an egg, relatively fresh, raw, with a smooth shell - no big bumps of calcium.  I've noticed eggs seem to be getting rounder - try to find eggs with a definite "pointy" end.  You can make it a little easier on yourself if you let it stand on its wider end in the carton for a day.

You will need a smooth flat level surface, that is not subject to vibration or strong drafts.  I've found that the kitchen counter or a fireplace mantel is best because they are attached to the wall.  If the surface is textured, a cutting board or book will help.  Tables tend to shake too much (the egg will stand, but not for long).

You will need practice, so start about five days before the equinox.  The vernal equinox is March 20 this year, so start about March 15th.

Rest your forearms on the surface, and stand the egg, wide end down, holding it at its center with your thumbs and pointer fingers, the four points of contact equally spaced around the egg.

Make tiny adjustments, until the pressure (weight of the egg) is equal on all four fingers.  When the weight of the egg is equal on all four sides, gently pull your fingers away.  You must remove your fingers all at the same time - one finger still touching the egg when the other three have been removed will unbalance it.  This is what you are actually practicing - developing that feeling of equality in all four fingers, and removing them all at the same time.

Don't get discouraged at the first five, or fifteen, or fifty unsuccessful tries.  It will get easier and easier the more you try, the more you train your fingers, and especially as the equinox gets closer.

Once you have an egg standing, lay something around it so if it falls it won't roll to the floor and make a mess.  A bit of wet and pinched paper towel makes a nice moat.

You can prove to yourself that it can be done.

Once you have a lot of experience, it gets really easy.  Very close to the magic dayI can just set the egg down with one hand, on almost any kind of surface.

Now, after the egg falls, reset it every day.  Does it get more and more difficult?  Can you refute Snopes?

#169 Ten Unusual Things I’ve Done That You Probably Didn’t Know About

There are two challenges going around AOL Journals that I find interesting. One is to list ten things you have done that you think very few others might have done (the originator says you’d be surprised how many other people have done it too), and the second is to list things "you don’t know about me". I’ve decided to combine them. So:

Ten Unusual Things I’ve Done That You Probably Didn’t Know About

1. I spent a week at a retreat with Trudy Bell (editor for Scientific American magazine(1971-78), founding senior editor for Omni magazine (1978-79), a senior editor for IEEE Spectrum magazine (1983-97)), Isadore Adler (worked in extraterrestrial Geosciences, utilizing remote imaging from satellites, played a major role in the Mariner, Viking, and Voyager missions, consultant on the VLA project), and Isaac Asimov (who doesn’t already know Isaac? BTW - science fiction is a minor part of his CV.), and about 20 other people.  We worked on a project for the feds, between fun activities.  Isaac autographed a book for me, “To the top banana with the great pear.”  The book is packed away in the basement at the moment, so I can’t check whether he spelled it “pear” or “pair”, but the meaning was unmistakable.  That was my Dolly Parton phase, before Mae West moved in.
2. I am trained as a Masters & Johnson-method sexual surrogate.  Before you get all excited, a) the training was in impotence, in which it is important to stress that there is no pressure, which means that one does NOT “do it”, b) it was 30 years ago, c) it was in Missouri, where it was illegal for a “surrogate” to be anyone other than the wife or fiancée of the subject**, so if a man had a "problem", the wife got the training and d) after all that training, I never got beyond session 2 of the treatment because my subject kept falling asleep. 
3. The term “nibble” for half a byte was coined expressly for me in 1968 by my classmates in The Company’s basic programming school.  A bit is one tick, a byte is eight bits, but it’s always written with a space between the first four and the second four bits, which confused me into thinking a byte was four bits.  The intermediate term “nibble” made it clear for me.
4. I’ve seen EFVs (UFOs to the rest of you), as you learned in a prior entry.
5. I’ve read some original unexpurgated Project Blue Book files, also in a prior entry.
6. I had a Company VP stand in my office and shout at me because I refused to sign a particular letter.  When I still refused to sign, all my projects were taken away and I was stuck in a backwater while they searched for a reason to fire me.  Six months later, I won a significant monetary award for having refused to sign the letter, and was promoted to technical assistant to a third-line manager.
7. I was offered a “mistress contract”.  I’ll do a whole entry on that sometime.
8. Sony owes me a few million dollars.  I’ll do a whole entry on that sometime, too.
9. I do believe that there is a lot more to reality than we can sense.  I hate to mention ESP and precognition, because weirdoes have spoiled the terms, and others have an idea in their head that doesn’t match the definition in my head.  However, my parents reported that as a child I could count fingers held behind my head with 100% accuracy, on several occasions I have had repeating dreams that later came true in minute detail, and ... some other stuff I won’t go into.  No, it doesn’t happen on command, and it doesn’t happen if I think about it.  Too much of a concentration on the real seems to block it.  It happens spontaneously.
10. I can stand a raw egg on end.  Lots of people have seen me do it, and they are mostly convinced there’s a trick, but there isn’t.  Anybody can do it.  Details in the next entry.

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** Missouri considered a paid surrogate to be a prostitute.  The state stipulated that the "surrogate" had to be the spouse or fiancée of the patient (and therapy was to be undertaken at home), which of course made him or her no longer technically a surrogate.  In fact, since there were already likely to be heavy issues between the two, it also rendered the therapies pretty much doomed.  But one couldn't be sure of that until one tried.

#168 Suicidal Governments Revisited

Back in entry #149, I mentioned the danger posed by fanatical suicidal governments.  One could think I was referring to one or two particular Persian Gulf countries.  

I wasn't.  I need to clear that up.

I was thinking mainly of theocracies, any and all.

Theocracies in general tend to be more willing to sacrifice people to a belief than democracies, or autocracies.  Democracies and autocracies (and almost any other form of government) are more interested in their own perpetuation than in ideas or principles.  They'll talk ideas, ideals, principles, but in the end self preservation rules - and that's good for the rest of us.

People and governments that are ruled by ideals above self preservation are scary.  They will sacrifice everything, themselves and us too, for an idea.

The US has been moving along the line closer and closer to a theocracy.  

Religion has been used in a cynical way to get votes, and it worked, and I'm afraid it will expand beyond control.

So it wasn't one or two countries that worry me - it's the trend.  If it leads to a repeat of the Crusades (in which, incidentally, religion was cynically used by poor countries to sack rich countries), that could be .... serious. 

#167 EFVs

I think I saw some extraterrestrial flying vehicles (EFVs) once. (I don't like to call them Unidentified Flying Objects.  I had a little brown bird nesting under the deck that I couldn't identify.  It flew.  That's a UFO.)

When I lived on the Sage base, on the mountain, I spent a lot of time in the woods and field, or riding my bicycle on the highway.  I didn't have a watch, so I kept track of the time by the commercial airliners passing overhead.  There were certain flights in certain directions at certain times of the day.  So when I was outside, I was very conscious of the sky.

One morning I was alone at the rifle range behind the base, and caught the glint of sunlight on metal in the sky.  There were three airplanes passing directly overhead, in a tight triangle.  It couldn't be commercial flights, of course, not together in formation, so I figured they were probably Air Force.  We got a lot of USAF flyovers -sometimes guys from the base getting their flight time in - sometimes just because.

I immediately realized there was something odd about these planes.  They were exceptionally long for their widths - like darning needles.  Second, they were going VERY fast - from directly overhead to over the horizon in less than 10 seconds.  Third, they were VERY high.  With my index finger at arm's length, they were the width of my finger.  So, if I underestimated their height, if I put them low enough that their speed made sense, then they were impossibly tiny.  If I assumed a reasonable size, then they were impossibly high.  If they were that high, they were impossibly fast.  I braced for the sonic boom, and it never came.  There was no sound at all from them.  No trails, either.

I still had the clearance for the towers, so I went to the Sage tower and asked the airmen on duty, how fast were those planes going?  They didn't know what I was taking about.  The radar had not picked up any airplanes. 

That night at dinner I mentioned it to my father.  (He was the base commander.)  He got thoughtful, and as soon as he was finished eating, he went back up to his office - something he never did - and didn't come back before my bedtime.  Somehow, I knew not to bring it up again the next day. 

So, you're thinking - SSTs!  Yep, right shape, height, speed.  But  nope.  The year was 1960 or 61.  The first discussions about the SST were in the summer of 1961.  The first flight of an experimental miniature SST was in 1964, in France.  And even if it were a fold in time, and those were SSTs I was watching, SSTs never fly in a close formation.

Satellite?  Echo was the only satellite that could be seen with the naked eye.  It went up in 1960, but I had seen it a few times, and this wasn't it. 

Falling pieces of satellite?  There wasn't anything up there big enough, and since satellites were so new, one falling would have been all over the news.  Plus, my father would have been aware of it.

So.  That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

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A kind of corollary to this story:

In 1964 into '65 my father was "stationed" in the hospital at Wright Patterson AFB while they tried to figure out what was wrong with his heart.  He was allowed to leave the hospital on weekends,  so he came home occasionally.  I was in college then, and sometimes I was also home on the same weekends.  He was going crazy with nothing to do while the doctors were watching him and waiting for a heart attack, so Wright Patterson gave him something to do.

He worked on Project Bluebook.

He brought files home with him.  He'd leave them on the diningroom table, "Top Secret" stamped across the covers and on every page.

Could you resist?  I couldn't.  I learned enough about the Air Force "investigations" that I take everything they say with a grain of salt.  When they say that an incident was proven to be such-and-such, what they really mean is that they found some possible explanation, therefore that must be the explanation.

That's their story, and they're sticking to it.

#166 Mine, Mine, Mine! Go Away!

I have been quietly following several journals, and one by one, they've been disappearing - they go private, or the owner just stops writing.  Those who have given reasons usually cite the nasties, the crazies (in two cases, ex-spouses using multiple screennames), people who won't allow the writers their opinions, their lives (real or imagined), in short, the trolls. 

Several other journalers have stated angrily, or sadly, that "this is MY journal!  I'll do what I want with it!" in response to commenters who have set out to "expose" them, to tell them they are bad or stupid or liars.  That bugs me.  Why are some people so nasty?  So bitter?  Who takes joy in throwing rocks?  Why does it matter to them anyway?

I have solved part of the problem by not allowing comments, thus denying the crazies a billboard.   They will get no publicity here.

I also want to make it clear that all opinions express herein are MY opinions.  Only opinions - not necessarily statements of fact.  Keep in mind that they are opinions of the moment.  I might change them tomorrow.  In fact, it may not be my real opinion at the time I write  - I may be just "trying it on for size".  I am not now the same person I was five years ago, and I am not now the same person I will be in five years.  So relax.

If you don't like anything you read here, if you get nasty, if you "argue at" me - well, I have this obstinate aspect.  You'll only make me dig in my heels.   However - remember - alternate views respectfully offered for my consideration are appreciated, and will be considered.

If you don't like that, well, go away.

(P.S.  Yes, the previous entry is true AND a bad pun, both.)

#165 Poor little thing

The snowthrower seems to have a tummy-ache.  I'm hoping it will make it to the end of the season.  It runs ok when it's actually pulling itself and throwing snow, but when it idles, when it's supposed to say roooommmooooommmmmoooommm..., it's actually saying ahroom ahroom ahroom fart ahroom ahroom ahroom fart....

I gave it good gas, but it sounds like it's got bad gas.

#164 Stupid Mensans!

In the previous entry, I mentioned that Mensans can be pretty stupid.  My first introduction to Mensa was pretty stupid.  It should have been a clue.

I signed up to take the entrance exam in the late '70s because of an article in Readers' Digest. (Mensa got their largest burst of membership applications from that article, and the snootier folks are still embarrassed by that fact.)  The test was given on a Sunday, in a huge Washington DC high school.

When I entered the building, there was a sign on a tripod: "Mensa Testing in Typing Room".  No arrow, no room number.  Many corridors branching off the center corridor.  No people visible.  Silence.

First I looked at the bulletin board by the office.  There should be at least a floor plan somewhere showing exits and fire plans, right?  Nope.  So I wandered.  Put your left hand on the wall, and walk.  That's how you handle a maze.  Eventually I'd have to find the room, or a person.

When I finished the first corridor and got back to the doors, there were two more people scratching their heads at the sign.

While we were talking, two men rounded a far corner (they looked like coach-types) and walked toward us.  We asked them where the typing room was, and they thought a bit, discussed it, and finally assured us that the typing room was in the basement.  "The basement?"  "Yeah, stairs are over there."  So the three of us went to the basement.  We searched the basement.  Nobody anywhere.  Some labs, but no typing room.

Back upstairs, we found two more people at the sign.  They had already checked the corridor I had checked, and one to the right.  The five of us fussed a bit - "Anybody see a room with typewriters in it?"  "Nope."  "Trails of crumbs anywhere?"  In an attempt at humor, I said "Gee.  Maybe this is the test."  They all stared at me, like there was a possibility it was true.

We decided to split up and each take another corridor.  By now it was already 20 minutes past the scheduled test time.

A few minutes later, four of us regrouped in the center corridor, having found at least two rooms with typewriters, but no people and no notes on the doors.  We waited, but the fifth guy, who had taken the farthest corridor, didn't show.

And didn't show.

Silence.

Lightbulb!

Either the corridor the fifth guy went down has a black hole at the end, or it has the typing room and he's a sniveling #$%^ !!

Sure enough, he had found the room, and had completely forgotten about us.  Didn't even mention us to the test proctor.  (And over the years, I have found non-think to be widespread among Mensans in general.  It's worse in England.  Ask me about the 50th Anniversary gathering in London.  I demanded my money back from that one!)

In typical Mensa fashion, it wasn't "the" typing room.  The proctor had decided the typewriters in the first room were in the way (duh...), so he had moved, also typically leaving no forwarding address.  The people who had "found" the right room were there only because they had arrived and joined him while he was in the office getting the room assignment and keys.

They were already 1/2 hour into the first 1 hour segment (there were several parts to the test), so we refused to start late.  We went outside until that part was over, then made the proctor stay late to give us the first part.

What on earth was the proctor thinking?  He had a list.  He knew he was missing at least five people.  Didn't he wonder why?  Was he thinking?

===================================

Ok.  I twisted my arm.  I'll tell you about London.

There are many examples of Mensa non-think from the London gathering - I'll give you one:

There were few organized activities in the hotel, the program was almost all prepaid separately-priced field trips around London by chartered bus.  The return to the hotel from one trip and departure for the next were scheduled about 1/2 hour apart.  Each trip had a trip leader who checked off names and distributed entrance tickets as you got on the bus(es).

Jay and I had signed up for a trip to a science museum, followed by a trip to the zoo.

The trip leader had difficulty pulling people out of the museum**, so our bus was 25 minutes late getting back to the hotel.  No problem - we'd pull in behind the zoo-bound buses with 5 minutes to spare, right?

We forgot this was Mensa.  The zoo buses had left early, because, and I quote the programs director, "as of five minutes to departure, only like 20 [of the probably 250] expected people had shown up - so they left."  (Insert drum riff here.)  "So they left"?  "So they left"?   Nobody wondered where the missing people were?  Duh?

There were some very angry people left standing on the curb.  Were our tickets left at the Mensa hospitality desk?  No - the trip leader took them with him.

Most people wandered off to get drunk.  Jay and I took public transportation to the zoo.

Were our tickets left at the entrance booth?  No.  The trip leader still had them, and he was (insert drum riff here) inside the zoo.

The usual Mensa non-think.

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I see it all the time locally - when the organizer of a restaurant dinner arrives 15 minutes before the scheduled time, finds the restaurant closed and a few other people in the parking lot, so they all depart for a different restaurant, without waiting for anyone else to show up, and without leaving a note on the restaurant door.

Or when the organizer of an event to occur an hour's drive away sends an email canceling the event to everyone who had said they would attend - 1/2 hour before the scheduled event time.

Or when the organizer says it's not necessary to tell him you'll be there - just show up - and a new member arrives at the public place, and there's no way for a new member to identify the Mensa group/table.

Toldja I notice patterns....

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**"Leading Mensans is like herding cats." - Mensa Boutique T-shirt.

163 Abilities and Deficits

In a phone conversation with Daughter Tuesday, we were talking about abilities, and how you can think of them as forming a sine wave, in that you are high in some areas and lower in others.  The higher your IQ, the greater the amplitude.  And since standard IQ tests measure only certain abilities, if the IQ score is low, either the line is closer to flat (dull, but happy) or the highs occur between the tested abilities (the person has "other" abilities).  In any case, the greater your abilities, the more likely you are to have serious deficits, and you have to use your excess abilities to compensate for your deficits.

The greater the amplitude (the positive and negative variation from zero) the more likely one is to notice and be distressed by the deficits, especially because IQ tests stress analysis and synthesis.  Genius, analyze thyself.  That's why so many "high IQ" people have low self-esteem.  They may walk around bragging about their scores, but in their private moments, they are painfully aware of what they lack.  (I'm allowed to say this.  I'm a Mensan.  I score above the 99.5%ile, and Daughter's untimed! score is 10 points higher.  But you won't see more stupidity than in a room full of Mensans.  Their individual "lows" are abysmal, and painfully obvious.)

I am aware of some of my lows.  I have difficulty differentiating between left and right, especially if I think about it.  If I don't think about it, it can be an advantage - if I don't notice right off that printing is backward, I can read it instantly, as easily as left to right.  I have great difficulty remembering proper nouns.  It happens all the time, the extreme example being the time I called the school to tell them I would be picking up Daughter early, and I couldn't remember her name, or when I flat out could never remember the name of the street one door up from our house in St. Louis.  I own about 5,000 books, I read a lot, all classifications, but I feel stupid because I can't discuss my reading because I can't remember the names of books or the authors, or quotations, and I get the plots all mixed up.  I frequently don't respond to social cues.  I can't remember formulae.  I can't cook.  Etc., etc.,etc.  Sigh.  I've got a lot of deficits.

But I do have some surprising and seemingly isolated abilities, too.

If I know the general layout of the land (relationship between mountains, rivers, highways, populated areas) I never get majorly lost.  I can find my way out of woods, I can find my way around in large unfamiliar cities.  When Daughter and I went college-shopping, I found every school right off, no fumbling, no address, no information other than the town name.  The University of Scranton was an impulse stop on the way to Bucknell, and I went straight to it.  I have no idea how I do that.  (And yet, if you ask me to put in order a list of major businesses on route 9 between Poughkeepsie and Fishkill, I couldn't do it.)

I am very fast at Freecell.  Every so often, when I need a boost, I go to a computer store and play Freecell on the demos, and people will actually stop to watch me.  I can gather a crowd.  I'm pretty good at Super Boggle, too.

The first time I heard that casinos hate card-counters, I turned to Ex#2, and said "How do you NOT count cards?"  He looked at me like I was crazy.  I'm serious.  How do you avoid it?  I mean, there're right there.  You know what exists, and you know what has shown, so how do you NOT know what's left?  And when you see how the cards go into the stack, and how they are shuffled, then you know generally where certain cards are likely to be within the stack.  How can you not know?  How do you not count cards?  It's not even an active thing - it's just there.  Isn't it?

Well, I had a "bingo" moment the other night.  Somebody was counting cards on a cop show, and the smart cop said "It's pattern recognition."  Bingo!    Pattern recognition!  That's what I'm good at!  It's probably pattern recognition that made me such a good code and hardware tester, too!  Wow!  Here was this HUGE pattern, and I didn't recognize it for what it was....

#162 Pretty Lady

There was a discussion program on PBS while I was washing dishes, so I wasn't paying attention, and I'm not going to look up what it was, but they were discussing the furor over the comments made recently by some guy at Harvard (I think) about how the paucity of women in math and science might be due to "innate differences", and I'm not going to go look him or the comment up, either.

Anyhow....

One of the women interviewed was Virginia Valian, of Hunter College.  I glanced up and saw a woman with beautiful pure white shoulder-length straight hair, and whoa! the proud and powerful hard face of a stereotypical male indian chief!

I was fascinated, especially that she had obviously made an effort to be feminine and pretty, what with the gorgeous hair, the red beads, the lipstick, rouge, and contoured blue and pink eyeshadow, and the smooth well-modulated voice.  But Oh! That stern strong male face! 

And then she smiled, and she was suddenly pretty.  Amazing!  I never get over what a smile can do.

(I confess I still wanted to tweeze her eyebrows, though.)

#161 Earthquake in Iran

Major Iranian earthquakes since 1972:
· Feb. 22, 2005: Central Iran, Zarand, magnitude 6.4; hundreds killed.
· Dec. 26, 2003: Southeastern Iran, Bam, magnitude 6.5; 26,000 killed.
· June 22, 2002: Northwestern Iran in the Qazvin province, magnitude 6; at least 500 killed.
· Feb 28, 1997: Northwest Iran, magnitude 5.5; about 1,000 killed.
· May 10, 1997: Northern Iran near Afghanistan, magnitude 7.1; 1,500 died.
· June 21, 1990: Northwest Iran around Tabas, magnitude 7.3-7.7; 50,000 killed.
· Sept. 16, 1978: Northeast Iran, magnitude 7.7; 25,000 killed.
· April 10, 1972: Southern Iran near Ghir Karzin, magnitude 7.1; 5,374 killed.

(Sources: AP, Reuters - via AOL News)  

Look at the numbers killed!  Unbelievable!  I'm reeling!  I'm still having trouble grasping it.  

Iran is on a major fault line, and the article (here) says they experience a minor quake or two somewhere in Iran every day. 

#160 Bits and Pieces

If the picture doesn't show in the previous entry, try clicking the "reload" in the box.  For some reason, that usually works.  AOL is having all kinds of problems with journals lately, and fixing one thing seems to break another.

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I've had a terrible headache all day - back of my neck and curving around to under my ears on either side.  It's probably because I fell asleep with the pillow under my chest and my face in the puzzle book.  I hate when I do that.  That leaves nose prints on the book and the mechanical pencil rolling around in the bed with me.  One of these days I'm going to wake up with a pencil in my ear.

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A funny thing happened yesterday - I got stuck to my van.  Not stuck in - stuck to!

The front seats are on platforms to raise them to regular height above the dropped floor of the van so you can unlock and roll the seat and platform out to put a wheelchair in its place.  So the floor between the seats is waaaay down.  I was sitting in the driver's seat, and had dropped some mail between the seats.  I had to lean waaaay over to retrieve it.

My favorite "clomping around in" shoes have velcro closures, and when I leaned over, a shoe was pressed and rubbed against the door - which has fuzzy carpeting on the lower half. Somehow, the velcro caught the carpet and wouldn't let go. When I sat up, my left foot was glued to the door, high up. There wasn't enough room between the seat and the door and my arms weren't long enough, and don’t curve that way, to reach down, and there wasn't enough space to pull the foot away, and I couldn’t get my foot out of the shoe.  I was well stuck.

If I opened the door I’d get the space I needed, but if I opened the door, given how high the seat is (I have to clamber in by stepping on the door frame, and jumping and heaving, pulling on the steering wheel and seat), if I fell out with my foot stuck to the door, I’d hurt me real bad. Probably dislocate a hip or knee or something.

When I stopped giggling, I got smart. I put the seat belt back on and wrapped my right arm around the steering wheel, then opened the door. Scritch! Freedom!

=================================

Spring is coming!  When I got Saturday's mail out of the mailbox yesterday, there was a newly hatched baby wolf spider running around on the letters.  The outside temperature was only 31 degrees, but I guess the sun on the black mailbox was enough to prompt hatching.  So, the sun is trying hard.  It'll get through soon.

=================================

Why do commercials still use the phrase "save up to xxx dollars"?  It must work, some people must still think it means something, or they wouldn't waste the time and money to say it - especially when it's the entire thrust of the commercial.   Don't people realize that it has almost no meaning at all?  "Up to" defines only the maximum you can save.  A savings of zero dollars is still "up to" xxx dollars. 

So when they say "save up to $600 dollars on your car insurance", all they're saying is that you won't save more than $600.  They aren't saying you will save anything.  Maybe they just want to ensure they get only stupid people for their customers.  Stupid people make less trouble.

=================================

A quote from May, who made me laugh yesterday - she's been having trouble with nose congestion lately, "really bad.  You know, like when you blow your nose in a tissue and throw it in the waste basket, and it goes 'thunk'."

#159 Drum

Snow again today.  I got to bed very late (like 6 am) again last night (reading and working a logic puzzle), and was awakened at 1:30 pm by the sound of the town snow plow down on the road.  He hit something - I hope it wasn't my mailbox again! 

The snow had stopped falling.  It looks like several inches on the drive.  By the time I was together enough to go out and clear it, I'd have had to choose between clearing the drive or going to dance class (I can get down the uncleared drive ok to go to class, I think, but I wouldn't be able to get back up).  So, of course, being me, I did neither.  I'll clear it tomorrow.

This is something like the fifth or sixth class in a row that I have missed.  And I will miss next week because I'll be visiting Daughter.  Is someone trying to tell me something? 

The photo is my new drum.  It's beautiful, has a great voice and convenient size (knee high on me).  It's not technically a mideastern drum, but it still sounds the "dum" and "tek", and will serve to learn on.  It was handcrafted in Ghana, Africa, of one piece of Tweneboa wood, a kind of cedar named after a skilled master drummer, Tweneboa Kodua. The head is hand-shaved goat skin (it still has hair around the edges), with double iron ring construction.  "Excellent sound. Certificate of Authenticity included."  I managed to get it for $30 including shipping.  

Now I need lessons. 

#158 Leaders

Be very wary of leaders who act like government is the spoils of political warfare.

#157 So I break the rules...

There are all kinds of "How to" hints out there for writing journals.  Almost all of  them recommend that you keep entries short, as most people don't have the patience for reading long (and especially long-winded) essays. 

It's probably good advice, because even I will roll my eyes and hit the "back" button when I see screen after screen of blather in someone else's journal.   The thing is, although I am interested in what others have to say, I'm frankly not that interested (except in Jeannette's Jottings - she can write a novel about her ancestors and countryside, and I'll read it). 

Oops.  Sorry.  I have broken the rule and written some humdingers. 

Well, oops again.  I'm not sorry.  I'm not writing this for readers.  I'm writing it for me.  Sometimes it takes a lot of words to kill whatever demon has taken over my head.  I don't care if it bores anyone else. 

I'm not writing for anyone else.

I will do what works for me.  You do what works for you. 

=======================================

Similar topic - what will make me hit the back button?  What should you avoid if  you do want (people like me as) regular readers? 

• Black backgrounds, especially with a fine font.
• Too glopped-up with tags, animation, cutsy-poos, and especially music.
• Long dense paragraphs.
• I'll quit reading after the third "chatroom"ese ("u" for "you").  I don't much care what you have to say if it's painful to read it.
• Too many errors in fifth grade grammar, punctuation, and spelling turns me off.  Ok, so I'm a snob.  But I'm an intelligent snob.
• Religious blather, especially condescending or threatening religious blather.  I don't mind if you mention your beliefs as a part of your life - that's different and ok and even nice.
• Photographs that take too long to load (except if they are as interesting as those of Jeannette and JerseyGirl - they're usually worth the wait).
• Highfalutin' prose of the "It was a dark and stormy night" variety.  Especially the use of big words when the writer obviously didn't know the meaning or connotation of the word, but used it only because it was big.

How 'bout you?  Remember, now, I can commit all those sins, 'cause I'm not looking for readers.

#156 The Severed Hand

There's been an interesting news story out of Guilderland, up near Albany.

A man found an object poking out of the plow snowbank at the edge of his yard.  It looked to him like one of those fake hands people will hang out of the trunk of the car for fun.  He didn't want his little kids to find it, so he threw it into the field behind his house. (Which of course bugged me - he throws garbage in his neighbor's field?)

He got to thinking about it overnight, something about it bothered him, so the next day he retrieved it.  It wasn't plastic at all.  It was a real severed hand, bruised and bloody, in a surgical latex glove.  He freaked, and called the cops.

Next scene:  Cops sifting through the rest of the snowbank, state police strung out searching the field, backhoe digging up his front yard, helicopter hovering over the field looking for disturbed areas, and (to quote "Albany Eye", link below, who borrowed it from Arlo) presumably, eight-by-ten color glossy photographs with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one.  Practically every town, county, and state cop within 50 miles searching, talking to reporters, or milling around in the driveway.  The hand was sent to the state police lab for analysis.  One theory was that the body was somewhere near, and that the hand had been found and transported by a dog or other beasty.  (My personal theory was that it had been tossed out a car window.)

It was the lead story on every local newscast, a few days of morbid speculation.

Finally, the report came back from the lab.  It was a bear paw, skinned and declawed, and placed in the latex glove to look like a human hand.  I saw it on TV.  It really did look like a human hand - long fingers, thumb, and all.  (Yes, lots of  animals have thumbs - it's only the degree of opposability that makes the human thumb special.)

There was a brief panic when the lab had determined that it was not a human hand but had not yet identified it as specifically a bear paw, so the spokesman said that the police lab had determined that it was "an alien hand".    I'll bet that frightened more folks than a human hand would have.  (By "alien", they mean only "not human", but lots of folks didn't know that.)

Again my theory:  Bear season was a few months ago.  Some joker made up a paw to look like a hand, and had it in his car to scare and entertain his friends.  We've recently had a warm stretch, and it started to smell bad, so somebody threw it out the car window.

The other thing that annoyed me was that on all four channels, every newscast, probably ten or more newsreaders, they all referred to it as "a bear claw".  It was a PAW you idiots, not a CLAW!  Do they really not know the difference?  Or are they confusing it with a pastry?

(No word about whether the guy who found the object was cited for littering his neighbor's field.)

======================================================

Links:  http://albanyeye.blogspot.com/ , entry for February 19, 2005

http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=334648&category=ALBANY&BCCode=HOME&newsdate=2/19/2005

Photo of the "hand" - warning, very yucky! http://wrgb.com/news/local/local_news.asp?selection=article_29016

Note that the print story has the man throwing it into the woods, but the tv said a field, and the cops were shown searching a field.  Also, print has him calling the police and they retrieved it from the woods, TV had him retrieve it from the field and then call the police.  Other print stories have other versions.  Sigh.

#155 (P) More on Ricketts Glen

Warning - sales pitch ahead!  Big effort to persuade you to join me (see entry #154).

The water level of the falls can vary enormously from a trickle to a torrent, and it can change within minutes.  Here are some high water photos (Daughter, these photos were taken on October 8, 2003.  I believe that's the very weekend that you almost got washed down the creek!)  These are low water photos - click on the thumbnails to enlarge them.  Find beautiful photos of frozen falls at this site.  To see good pictures of almost all the falls from different angles, go here and click on "photographs".  Official park information (check out the park advisory from 12/15/2004).  "Nature Photographers" online magazine describes Ricketts Glen as "Waterfall Heaven".

Also, go to virtual tourist, scroll down to the bottom, and lick on "things to do" and "dangers and warnings". 

Something I learned from these photographs - you really need a person or something in the picture to provide scale.  They're larger than they look.  When you see a fallen tree across the waters, remember that the tree is probably a few hundred years old.

Here is a description of the trails (see the map in the previous entry):

We'd be taking the Falls Trail (gulp!), about 3.2 miles of it, but we'd take it from the top down (a drop of about 1,000 feet over the middle 1.8 miles), so it's really not that bad.  It's not so much difficult as dangerous if you don't follow the rules.  We WILL follow all rules!

If you'd want to stay overnight somewhere, there are standard  motels in Wilkes Barre and Bloomsburg (both about 30 minutes from the park, in opposite directions.  Get yourself a Pa map).  The park does have cabins, but they get booked up awfully fast - it's probably already too late for a weekend stay this year.  For closer to the park, see virtual tourist and Sweet Valley Cottages (sleeps four people for $75 a night).  (Daughter, I can't find anything online for the B&B we had stayed in - wasn't it "The Blue Heron", in Sweet Valley?) 

Do look at the pictures.  Juggle your calendars.  Meet me on my mountain.  May 21, 2005.

==============================================

Sites referenced above:

High water:  http://www.carolinarvpark.com/kayak/ricketts-glen.html

Low water photos:  http://www.kgcphoto.com/ricketts_glen_2002.htm

Frozen waterfalls:  http://members.aol.com/ayakus/ricketts.html

Multiple views:  http://www.bsg-inc.com/ricketts_glen/

Official Park info: http://www.dcnr.state.pa.us/stateparks/parks/rickettsglen.aspx

Nature Photographers" mag:  http://www.naturephotographers.net/rb0801-1.html

Accommodations:  http://www.sweetvalleycottages.com/

Accommodations:  http://www.virtualtourist.com/vt/d2419/3/

#154 (P) Trip to Ricketts Glen

An announcement for all within the sound of my voice (or within ken of this writing) - I am going to Ricketts Glen on Saturday, May 21.  I may go the day before and stay over, or that day only, or stay over Saturday night, but on the day itself I will be on my mountain.  This is the mountain with the creek tumbling down the side in more than 20 beautiful falls.  If I go alone I will be able to visit only Jay's falls, near the bottom, and maybe one or two further up.  With company in a second car, we will be able to start at the top and walk the whole trail down.  So any and all are invited.  Mark the weekend now.

I missed my annual visit last fall.  My knees hurt, and I kept putting it off until it was too late to go (once it gets cold the trail gets icy from the spray, and it's dangerous).  I think late spring is a better time to go, anyway, so maybe it was good that I missed it. 

I couldn't remember when the mountain laurel blooms, so I looked it up online.  It blooms through May into early June in the mountains of Virginia, so on Red Rock mountain it's probably late May into late June.  I figured the last weekend of May would be ideal - mountain laurel started, snow gone, no school kids yet.  But when I checked the calendar, that's Memorial Day weekend!  Agh!  So, the 21st it is.

Friends and relatives, join me if you can.  You won't regret it, I promise.

Oh- almost forgot - When I looked at the calendar, I was surprised to find that May 21 is Armed Forces Day.  If you know my history, you'll know why I will be pleased to be on the mountain on Armed Forces Day once again.  Serendipity!

#153 How Puppy Saved a Baby from an Ogre Attack

"Johnmscalzi" at By The Way... has requested journal stories about Amusing Animal Attacks.

I'm so proud of Puppy I can't resist telling this story.

I first discovered her as a six or eight week old abandoned pup, living in my garage and eating my garbage.  I lived in a cabin in the woods at the time, and I thought at first it was raccoons.  I lured her close enough to capture with a hotdog.  I didn't name her because I was absolutely in no position to keep a dog, and didn't want to get attached, so I just called her "Puppy" while I searched for a suitable home for her.

A year later, I discovered I had an extraodinarily intelligent 70-lb all-black Australian Kelpie best friend, named Puppy.

Several years later, mother-in-law (Ex#2) hosted a party to introduce her newborn grandbaby (by Ex#2's sister) to the family and community.  From the first moment Puppy saw the baby, she was wildly in love.  Her nose was never more than six inches from the baby.  MIL had set up chairs in a circle for all the women, and they passed the baby from woman to woman so they could all cuddle her and coo.   This was fine with Puppy, but she wanted to climb into laps and lick the baby, so I told her to sit.

So she sat in front of the woman holding the baby, with her chin resting on the woman's knee,  and as the baby was passed to the next woman, Puppy scooted on her behind to sit in front of her. 

The baby finally arrived back at the MIL, who was sitting with her back to a door, about 10 feet behind her, that led to a landing for the narrow "service stairs".  (This being a big old farmhouse, there were beautiful curving "guest stairs" at the front of the house that no one ever used, and steep narrow back stairs from the kitchen).  MIL was   holding the baby at her shoulder, in "burping position", so Puppy sat straight up in front of her, with her ears up and a big smile on her open mouth.

And then ......

The door to the landing opened, and the grandfather appeared.  None of the women noticed him.  He approached the baby (who was facing over the MIL's shoulder) in a slight crouch, with one arm extended, making wriggly grabbing gestures, and strange "gitchy gitchy" noises.  

What happened next happened so fast I couldn't have stopped it.  I saw Puppy's mouth close, and her tail stop wagging (it hadn't stopped since the baby first appeared.)  She glanced rapidly back and forth between the FIL and the MIL, decided the MIL didn't see the danger, and then her ears went back, her body tensed, she tucked her head down, and she LEAPT!  From a seated position!  Straight over the MIL's shoulder and the baby's head!

She hit the FIL high on his chest with her front paws, and hit his chin with the top of her tucked head.  He staggered back into a counter, turned, ran for the landing door, slammed it behind him and ... I didn't know a 60+-year old man could climb stairs that fast.

Puppy had made no sound.  As soon as the FIL had turned away, Puppy resumed her happy face and waggy tail, and sat in her spot in front of the MIL and baby. 

Everyone else was shocked.  I laughed and hugged Puppy and told her she was a very good girl. 

The MIL was later very angry with me for not scolding Puppy.  I thought she had done exactly the right thing in exactly the right way.  If she had seen the same threat outside, she might have barked, but she knew she wasn't to bark indoors, and I suspect she didn't want to startle the baby, ...  so she did what she had to do in that instant to save the baby from the ogre.

Puppy died at age 20ish from kidney failure.  I still miss her.

#152 The Best Cheese Omelet Ever!

Some people are very "into" name brands and exclusivity.  If it isn't expensive, it simply can't be any good.  Stupid people...........

One time when I was with Jay in the neuro-ICU in Staten Island, I was wearing a very pretty printed gauze dress with beading on the bodice.  The very chatty (and name-dropping) wife of the guy in the next bed asked wherever did I find that beautiful dress.  When I said WalMart, she actually flinched, as if I'd slapped her.  She kept her back to me for the rest of her visit.  I guess I had offended her by tricking her into admiring something from WalMart?

I also don't understand the general disdain for Spam.  (The bits of white in it are not all fat, but mostly that nice sweet 100% protein gristly stuff.)  Broiled or fried it makes a great sandwich.  Same with cooked bologna.  Bologna or Spam also makes a terrific ham salad, with mayonnaise and sweet pickle relish.  (Daughter - I put much too much pickle in that bologna salad I took to your place that time - it was almost a pickle salad - yuck!  So don't go by that.  I always manage to mess up "having a party" food in some way.  Maybe it's subconscious-on-purpose try-too-hard overdoing.)

Anyhow, the omelet.

A few months ago I had the best cheese omelet I've ever tasted, in a tiny home-cooking cafe somewhere out in the middle of nowhere, discovered and subsequently lost on one of my let's see how lost I can get wanders.  I've had omelets with white truffles in Paris.  I've had $20 omelets made with cheeses with names I can't pronounce, in NYC and San Francisco.  But this cafe omelet was the absolute best ever, smooth and creamy, with a taste and texture like a dream cheese cloud. 

I badgered the lady behind the counter to tell me what was in it, but she said it was a secret.  I finally convinced her I was not a spy from the competition, and she relented.

"Velveeta and Philadelphia Cream Cheese, with a pinch of Hungarian paprika."

Yummy.  Take that, you cheese snobs!

#151 About Eating Bambi

I am an unapologetic omnivore.  I eat vegetables (preferably uncooked) and fruit as the major part of  my diet, but I need meats, too.  And milk products, and eggs.  Grains come in mainly as "carriers" for the other stuff (pizza is messy without the crust).   

I have friends and acquaintances who are various degrees of vegetarian, and that's fine, especially if they are doing it for health reasons, like avoiding antibiotics and hormones and so on.  Where I get impatient is with those who say they "won't eat anything with eyes", or "anything that had a mother".  They seem to think that it's ok to eat broccoli just because they can't hear it scream when they tear its living arms off.  It's alive!  All our food is alive (or comes from something alive, in the case of milk and unfertilized eggs).  In my belief system, it's all the same degree of alive. 

Back in the '70s there were experiments on plants, where they would have one person who would water and fertilize the plant (they used geraniums), and another person who would beat up on the plant, crushing leaves and tearing up roots.  Then they measured the electrical output/conductivity of the plant.  When the nice person approached, the needles stayed steady.  When the nasty person got within a few feet of the plant, the needles went wild.  Tell me that plant wasn't aware!  Tell me it wasn't afraid!  A "certain large computer manufacturer (think Blue)" actually played with using plants as security devices on mainframes.

Certain plants, when attacked by insects or browsing animals, will put out a chemical that alerts other nearby plants, who will then put alkaloids into their leaves to discourage the predators, even though they themselves haven't been munched yet.  Tell me plants aren't at some level conscious, tell me they don't communicate!  Just because we can't hear them doesn't mean they don't speak.  I'm pretty certain they don't ponder Algebra, but I also know of plenty of humans who don't.

And don't argue that it's "just a chemical thing".  The working of the human brain is "just a chemical thing". 

I don't mind hunting, as long as the hunters eat what they bag.  I strongly object to trophy hunting.  I grew up on a mountain where many families relied on hunting for the larder, and on trapping to fund the other necessities.  Nothing was wasted.  That's fine.  I've eaten possum and deer, squirrel and rabbit, pheasant and wild duck.  There were plenty of trophy heads on the walls, but there's not much to eat on the head, and mounting it was akin to honoring it.  "And that big fellow over there got us through the winter of '59."

All I ask is that whatever I eat didn't suffer unnecessarily on its way to me.  I don't eat veal because I once stumbled into a veal barn while visiting a dairy farm.  I support efforts to uncage chickens.  I understand kosher laws require a quick clean kill.  I wish there weren't so many people to feed.  I appreciate what I eat.

On the other side of the spectrum, I am annoyed by people who say that "God created the plants and animals for man, that man is placed in dominion over the rest", and who think that man is rightfully the "top of the food chain".  Well, that same God created viruses and bacteria, too, and it's not real clear to me exactly who He's rooting for! 

It's all a big circle, not a chain.  There is no top.  

The only thing that is expressly meant to be eaten is fruit**.  It's better for the plant that the fruit is eaten rather than just rot where it falls, because when it's eaten the seeds are deposited farther from the parent.  So if you aren't eating meat because you don't want to kill something, you shouldn't be eating plants, either.  You should eat only fruits, only those that grow in your area, throw pits out the window, and poop in a field.

**All living things are "meant to be eaten" by something, eventually, but you know what I mean....

#150 What Happened to the Recycle Symbols?

You know those numbers in the triangles on plastic containers? 

Our local recycle center takes only #1 and #2 plastics.  (I have long been of the opinion that local retailers, deli and takeout counters, especially, should make an effort to use only containers that can be recycled or reused one way or another.)

Lately I've noticed that the numbers are disappearing!  Did the rules change or something?  I stand there with a container in hand, and I don't know whether to put it in the recycle bag, or the trash bag, or the cabinet.  Another place I miss Jay.  He knew what all those numbers stood for, by the chemical name, and which could be put in the microwave and which not, and why some were more expensive to recycle than others, and he could tell what was what just by looking at it.  He didn't need those numbers - but I do!

I'm starting to get angry about it.  I'm about annoyed enough to put them ALL in a bag, drag them to the grocery store, and insist that the manager sort them for me.

#149 Something That Scares Me

I've always been a world news junky, and lately I've been avoiding it.  I finally figured out why. 

One zealous suicidal pilot during WWII could take out a ship and all its crew. 

One zealous suicidal bomber can take out a building and all its inhabitants.

What could one zealous suicidal government do?

It had always been unthinkable.  It's not any more.

#148 New Orleans in July!

I have made my hotel reservations for the Mensa Annual Gathering in New Orleans, July 6-11.  I got a "deluxe" river view room, high up (apparently they get "deluxer" as they go up the tower). 

I tried to get a room starting July 3, a few days before the gathering, thinking that I would look up some old friends in Baton Rouge (Obie's sister Vera, and their parents) and watch fireworks over the river on the fourth, but there was absolutely nothing available the nights of the third or fourth, and the only thing available on the fifth was a suite (French Quarter view) for $1100 per night.  Gasp! 

It's possible I might still go a little early, and stay near Baton Rouge the first night or two.  But to do that, I'll need to contact Vera well ahead of time. 

I really want to drive, not fly, but nothing on the hotel website mentions parking, so I'll have to call and ask.  (Long pause here while I remember the time Obie and I picked up a reconditioned taxi cab in New York City that his uncle had bought at an auction, in late 1966.  Obie dropped me off in Gettysburg, where I was teaching, and then drove the danged thing all the way to Baton Rouge.  It took him more than a week, because it wouldn't go over 40 mph, and it kept breaking down.  He had no money, so he had to sleep in it, and you wouldn't believe how bad it smelled.  None of the dials or gauges or turn signals worked.  By the time he got home, he hated it, and that's when he found out that the uncle had bought it as a gift for him.  I really miss that boy.)

But anyway, I thought I'd let you know I'm locked in.  New Orleans in July (that could be painful!) and the Hawaiian cruise in August. 

Now all I have to do is lose 30 lbs by the end of June.

#147 Mensa Dictionary

The Washington Post's Mensa Invitational once again asked readers to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and supply a new definition.
Here are this year's winners:

1. Intaxication: Euphoria at getting a tax refund, which lasts until you realize it was your money to start with.

2. Reintarnation: Coming back to life as a hillbilly.

3. Bozone (n.): The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future.

4. Foreploy: Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid.

5. Cashtration (n.): The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period.

6. Giraffiti: Vandalism spray-painted very, veryhigh.

7. Sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.

8. Inoculatte: To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.

9. Hipatitis: Terminal coolness.

10. Osteopornosis: A degenerate disease. (This one got extra credit.)

11. Karmageddon: It's like, when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, right? And then, really, like, the Earth explodes and it's like, a serious bummer.

12. Decafalon (n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things thatare good for you.

13. Glibido: All talk and no action.

14. Dopeler effect: The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly.

15. Arachnoleptic fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you've accidentally walked through a spider web.  [Note - I understand this, but I don't see how it fits the rules.  Looks to me like more than one letter was altered/added.]

16. Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form of a mosquito, that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out.

17. Caterpallor (n.): The color you turn after finding half a worm in the fruit you're eating.

And the pick of the literature:

18. Ignoranus (n.): A person who's both stupid and an a55hole.

#146 Yup. Pagan.

I am including this article from the London Daily Mail via RedNova in its entirety because I find it fascinating.  I believe it to be true (not just the story, but the implications), and, based on my own personal experiences, only the tip of the iceberg.  (I was pointed to the article by an entry in the AOL journal "By the Way...", owned by "johnmscalzi".)   

                    ==================================

             Can This Black Box See Into the Future?

DEEP in the basement of a dusty university library in Edinburgh lies a small black box, roughly the size of two cigarette packets side by side, that churns out random numbers in an endless stream.

At first glance it is an unremarkable piece of equipment. Encased in metal, it contains at its heart a microchip no more complex than the ones found in modern pocket calculators.

But, according to a growing band of top scientists, this box has quite extraordinary powers. It is, they claim, the 'eye' of a machine that appears capable of peering into the future and predicting major world events.

The machine apparently sensed the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre four hours before they happened - but in the fevered mood of conspiracy theories of the time, the claims were swiftly knocked back by sceptics. But last December, it also appeared to forewarn of the Asian tsunami just before the deep sea earthquake that precipitated the epic tragedy.

Now, even the doubters are acknowledging that here is a small box with apparently inexplicable powers.

'It's Earth-shattering stuff,' says Dr Roger Nelson, emeritus researcher at Princeton University in the United States, who is heading the research project behind the 'black box' phenomenon.

'We're very early on in the process of trying to figure out what's going on here. At the moment we're stabbing in the dark.' Dr Nelson's investigations, called the Global Consciousness Project, were originally hosted by Princeton University and are centred on one of the most extraordinary experiments of alltime. Its aim is to detect whether all of humanity shares a single subconscious mind that we can all tap into without realising.

And machines liketheEdinburgh black box have thrown up a tantalising possibility: that scientists may have unwittingly discovered a way of predicting the future.

Although many would consider the project's aims to be little more than fools' gold, it has still attracted a roster of 75 respected scientists from 41 different nations. Researchers from Princeton - where Einstein spent much of his career - work alongside scientists from universities in Britain, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Germany. The project is also the most rigorous and longest-running investigation ever into the potential powers of the paranormal.

'Very often paranormal phenomena evaporate if you study them for long enough,' says physicist Dick Bierman of the University of Amsterdam. 'But this is not happening with the Global Consciousness Project. The effect is real. The only dispute is about what it means.' The project has its roots in the extraordinary work of Professor Robert Jahn of Princeton University during the late 1970s. He was one of the first modern scientists to take paranormal phenomena seriously. Intrigued by such things as telepathy, telekinesis - the supposed psychic power to move objects without the use of physical force - and extrasensory perception, he was determined to study the phenomena using the most up-to-date technology available.

One of these new technologies was a humble-looking black box known was a Random Event Generator (REG). This used computer technology to generate two numbers - a one and a zero - in a totally random sequence, rather like an electronic coin-flipper.

The pattern of ones and noughts - 'heads' and 'tails' as it were - could then be printed out as a graph. The laws of chance dictate that the generators should churn out equal numbers of ones and zeros - which would be represented by a nearly flat line on the graph. Any deviation from this equal number shows up as a gently rising curve.

During the late 1970s, Prof Jahn decided to investigate whether the power of human thought alone could interfere in some way with the machine's usual readings. He hauled strangers off the street and asked them to concentrate their minds on his number generator. In effect, he was asking them to try to make it flip more heads than tails.

It was a preposterous idea at the time. The results, however, were stunning and have never been satisfactorily explained.

Again and again, entirely ordinary people proved that their minds couldinfluence the machine and produce significant fluctuations on the graph, 'forcing it' to produce unequal numbers of 'heads' or 'tails'.

According to all of the known laws of science, this should not have happened - but it did. And it kept on happening.

Dr Nelson, also working at Princeton University, then extended Prof Jahn's work by taking random number machines to group meditations, which were very popular in America at the time. Again, the results were eyepopping. The groups were collectively able to cause dramatic shifts in the patterns of numbers.

From then on, Dr Nelson was hooked.

Using the internet, he connected up 40 random event generators from all over the world to his laboratory computer in Princeton. These ran constantly, day in day out, generating millions of different pieces of data. Most of the time, the resulting graph on his computer looked more or less like a flat line.

But then on September 6, 1997, something quite extraordinary happened: the graph shot upwards, recording a sudden and massive shift in the number sequence as his machines around the world started reporting huge deviations from the norm. The day was of historic importance for another reason, too.

For it was the same day that an estimated one billion people around the world watched the funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales at Westminster Abbey.

Dr Nelson was convinced that the two events must be related in some way.

Could he have detected a totally new phenomena? Could the concentrated emotional outpouring of millions of people be able to influence the output of his REGs. If so, how?

Dr Nelson was at a loss to explain it.

So, in 1998, he gathered together scientists from all over the world to analyse his findings. They, too, were stumped and resolved to extend and deepen the work of Prof Jahn and Dr Nelson. The Global Consciousness Project was born.

Since then, the project has expanded massively. A total of 65 Eggs (as the generators have been named) in 41 countries have now been recruited to act as the 'eyes' of the project.

And the results have been startling and inexplicable in equal measure.

For during the course of the experiment, the Eggs have 'sensed' a whole series of major world events as they were happening, from the Nato bombing of Yugoslavia to the Kursk submarine tragedy to America's hung election of 2000.

The Eggs also regularly detect huge global celebrations, such as New Year's Eve.

But the project threw up its greatest enigma on September 11, 2001.

As the world stood still and watched the horror of the terrorist attacks unfold across New York, something strange was happening to the Eggs.

Not only had they registered the attacks as they actually happened, but the characteristic shift in the pattern of numbers had begun four hours before the two planes even hit the Twin Towers.

They had, it appeared, detected that an event of historic importance was about to take place before the terrorists had even boarded their fateful flights. The implications, not least for the West's security services who constantly monitor electronic 'chatter', are clearly enormous.

'I knew then that we had a great deal of work ahead of us,' says Dr Nelson.

What could be happening? Was it a freak occurrence, perhaps?

Apparently not. For in the closing weeks of December last year, the machines went wild once more.

Twenty-four hours later, an earthquake deep beneath the Indian Ocean triggered the tsunami which devastated South-East Asia, and claimed the lives of an estimated quarter of a million people.

So could the Global Consciousness Project really be forecasting the future?

Cynics will quite rightly point out that there is always some global event that could be used to 'explain' the times when the Egg machines behaved erratically. After all, our world is full of wars, disasters and terrorist outrages, as well as the occasional global celebration. Are the scientists simply trying too hard to detect patterns in their raw data?

The team behind the project insist not. They claim that by using rigorous scientific techniques and powerful mathematics it is possible to exclude any such random connections.

'We're perfectly willing to discover that we've made mistakes,' says Dr Nelson. 'But we haven't been able to find any, and neither has anyone else.

Our data shows clearly that the chances of getting these results by fluke are one million to one against.

That's hugely significant.' But many remain sceptical.

Professor Chris French, a psychologist and noted sceptic at Goldsmiths College in London, says: 'The Global Consciousness Project has generated some very intriguing results that cannot be readily dismissed. I'm involved in similar work to see if we get the same results. We haven't managed to do so yet but it'sonly an early experiment. The jury's still out.' Strange as it may seem, though, there's nothing in the laws of physics that precludes the possibility of foreseeing the future.

It is possible - in theory - that time may not just move forwards but backwards, too. And if time ebbs and flows like the tides in the sea, it might just be possible to foretell major world events. We would, in effect, be 'remembering' things that had taken place in our future.

'There's plenty of evidence that time may run backwards,' says Prof Bierman at the University of Amsterdam.

'And if it's possible for it to happen in physics, then it can happen in our minds, too.' In other words, Prof Bierman believes that we are all capable of looking into the future, if only we could tap into the hidden power of our minds. And there is a tantalising body of evidence to support this theory.

Dr John Hartwell, working at the University of Utrecht in the Netherlands, was the first to uncover evidence that people could sense the future. In the mid-1970s he hooked people up to hospital scanning machines so that he could study their brainwave patterns.

He began by showing them a sequence of provocative cartoon drawings.

When the pictures were shown, the machines registered the subject's brainwaves as they reacted strongly to the images before them. This was to be expected.

Far less easy to explain was the fact that in many cases, these dramatic patterns began to register a few seconds before each of the pictures were even flashed up.

It was as though Dr Hartwell's case studies were somehow seeing into the future, and detecting when the next shocking image would be shown next.

It was extraordinary - and seemingly inexplicable.

But it was to be another 15 years before anyone else took Dr Hartwell's work further when Dean Radin, a researcher working in America, connected people up to a machine that measured their skin's resistance to electricity. This is known to fluctuate in tandem with our moods - indeed, it's this principle that underlies many lie detectors.

Radin repeated Dr Hartwell's 'image response' experiments while measuring skin resistance. Again, people began reacting a few seconds before they were shown the provocative pictures. This was clearly impossible, or so he thought, so he kept on repeating the experiments. And he kept getting the same results.

'I didn't believe it either,' says Prof Bierman. 'So I also repeated the experiment myself and got the same results. I was shocked. After this I started to think more deeply about the nature of time.' To make matters even more intriguing, Prof Bierman says that other mainstream labs have now produced similar results but are yet to go public.

'They don't want to be ridiculed so they won't release their findings,' he says. 'So I'm trying to persuade all of them to release their results at the same time. That would at least spread the ridicule a little more thinly!' If Prof Bierman is right, though, then the experiments are no laughing matter.

They might help provide a solid scientific grounding for such strange phenomena as 'deja vu', intuition and a host of other curiosities that we have all experienced from time to time.

They may also open up a far more interesting possibility - that one day we might be able to enhance psychic powers using machines that can 'tune in' to our subconscious mind, machines like the little black box in Edinburgh.

Just as we have built mechanical engines to replace muscle power, could we one day build a device to enhance and interpret our hidden psychic abilities?

Dr Nelson is optimistic - but not for the short term. 'We may be able to predict that a major world event is going to happen. But we won't know exactly what will happen or where it's going to happen,' he says.

'Put it this way - we haven't yet got a machine we could sell to the CIA.'

But for Dr Nelson, talk of such psychic machines - with the potential to detect global catastrophes or terrorist outrages - is of far less importance than the implications of his work in terms of the human race.

For what his experiments appear to demonstrate is that while we may all operate as individuals, we also appear to share something far, far greater - a global consciousness. Some might call it the mind of God.

'We're taught to be individualistic monsters,' he says. 'We're driven by society to separate ourselves from each other. That's not right.

We may be connected together far more intimately than we realise.'

-----

On the Net:

Global Consciousness Project

Princeton University

Source: Daily Mail; London (UK)

#145 Confession

I give up.  I'm not going to pay any attention to the TV weathermen any more.  They are nuts!  We were supposed to get rain this afternoon and evening.  It started snowing this afternoon, and there's a few inches out there now.   So I watched the news tonight to find out how much we were going to get and when it will stop.  The weathermen on all four network channels are still insisting that it's raining and/or sleeting here.  No snow.  Huh?

I went to the post office about 4 pm, and was surprised at how slippery it was.  There are fender-benders all over the place, and sitting here now I hear almost constant sirens down on the highway.

=======================================

Another of my Chinese auction sellers has gone NARU.  That makes four in the past ten days.  This time, the auction hadn't ended yet, and now the item listing is gone.  Totally disappeared from the system. 

Another seller, in Texas, has refunded my money because the hat rack I bought from him is out of stock.  It is a violation of the auction site's policy to sell items you don't have on hand, and according to this guy's feedback he does it all the time, but he's still registered....

I don't understand.

======================================

A confession:  For the past two years, I have been addicted to online auctions. 

It all started when I decided I wanted to make a silk, velvet, and satin crazy quilt duvet cover.  I went to the local fabric shops, and found that my choices in silk, satin, velvet, and lace were limited.  I could find maybe three colors in each, and they didn't go together.  And, plain medium weight silk was at least $12-15 per yard!  Ouch!

Someone suggested that I try eBay.  That was the start of the trouble. 

I found that I could buy silk yardage, new or vintage, for $7 a yard or less, including shipping.  Then I discovered saris.  I could buy a 6 yard long, 45-48" wide, real silk sari with gold or silver edges, for $35 or less (usually less), including shipping from India.  I found I loved wearing saris (although the opportunities are limited).  I found that some were amazingly beautiful.  I bought a LOT of saris, most just because they were so beautiful.

This caused an expansion into salwar kameez sets, and Indian jewelry, thence to other jewelry (Thai silver is gorgeous! and cheap!), alongside the fabric expansions into Tibetan and Thai silks and on to Chinese and Japanese silks, which led to the discovery of Japanese haori jackets and kimonos, with their beautiful hand-dyed and embroidered patterns, into Eastern carved ivory and bone, culminating in my purchase of a 200+ year old Chinese Marriage bed (which is still in boxes in the garage because I have to clear out the bedroom first).    

Parallel in time, I discovered American Tribal belly dance.  I love the costumes  (check out Bal-Anat here (or here), or Domba here, or Fat Chance here).  I looked at them and thought - I can make that!  I would enjoy making that!  (The birth of an eBay seller....)  So I also started stocking Kutchi jewelry and medallions, trims, beads, yarns, feathers, chains, patterns, etc.  I noticed that the prices were going up on all this stuff, so I figured it wouldn't hurt to buy as much as I could now, before it all topped out.

There were side excursions into other finds, like fox coats - who could resist a $1500 full pelt silver fox jacket for $125?  Or two, or three of them, especially when each one is nicer than the previous?  Or a fox hat, or two, or three, to match?  At bargain prices? 

And more.  You wouldn't believe the stuff.  All of it made me happy - I love almost everything - I love getting all these packages in the mail.  A lot of it will end up getting resold, those instances where I bought one, then a better one, then a best ever one.  I'll go through and pick out what I like best and then resell the others.  A lot of this stuff is almost an investment.

But, right now, the house is full of stuff.  I have to sort and pack and put away, but first I have to clear places to put it all.  I literally have to turn sideways to walk through certain areas (well, almost everywhere).  There's no place left to sit.  It's impossible to vacuum. 

A few nights ago I was sitting there staring at the screen, trying to think of something to search for and bid on.  Sigh.  It was pretty bad.  There's nothing left I haven't bought.  I got desperate. 

I am now the proud owner of 10 large bright pink lawn flamingos.

That's when I realized this is an addiction.

I went to soak in the bathtub and consider the situation, to think about how full the house is, and that's when I realized that even though the house is full, it's empty.  In all this buying,

what I have been trying to do

is

fill the empty spaces.

 

#144 What Do You Believe - Really?

This quiz is making the rounds of journals now. Since it's found in several, I think it's ok if I don't note the two or three places I found it.  It seems to be remarkably accurate, except that Paganism seems to be a jumble of "everything else". I guess that's because there's no central defining authority.

On the one hand, I'm a little bit surprised.  I thought I was closer to Buddhism, or a native American system, and when I read the definition of New Age (click on the "for info"), that seems closer, too.  But it's not just the beliefs that determine the label, it's also the importance you put on certain aspects.  So when I think about it further, I guess I'm not surprised.  (Just for the record, I don't "do" crystals.  But I do believe in "fairies" (by my definition, not necessarily yours).  Really.  I really really do.)

Please try it.  I am very interested in what you get.  Please email me the first four or five (at least) on your list, with percentages.  (Or don't, as you choose.)

According to the SelectSmart.com Belief System Selector, my #1 belief match is Neo-Pagan.  What do you believe? Visit SelectSmart.com/RELIGION  

Your Results:

1.  Neo-Pagan (100%) Browse Neo-Pagan related books.  Click here for info

2.  New Age (96%) Browse New Age related books.  Click here for info

3.  Mahayana Buddhism (92%) Browse Mahayana Buddhism related books.  Click here for info

4.  Unitarian Universalism (89%) Browse Unitarian Universalism related books.  Click here for info

5.  New Thought (88%) Browse New Thought related books.  Click here for info

6.  Liberal Quakers (86%) Browse Liberal Quakers related books.  Click here for info

7.  Theravada Buddhism (82%) Browse Theravada Buddhism related books.  Click here for info

8.  Taoism (79%) Browse Taoism related books.  Click here for info

9.  Scientology (78%) Browse Scientology related books.  Click here for info

10.  Hinduism (76%) Browse Hinduism related books.  Click here for info

11.  Jainism (70%) Browse Jainism related books.  Click here for info

12.  Secular Humanism (69%) Browse Secular Humanism related books.  Click here for info

13.  Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (69%) Browse Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) related books.  Click here for info

14.  Orthodox Quaker (66%) Browse Orthodox Quaker related books.  Click here for info

15.  Mainline - Liberal Christian Protestants (65%) Browse Mainline - Liberal Christian Protestants related books.  Click here for info

16.  Reform Judaism (52%) Browse Reform Judaism related books.  Click here for info 

17.  Sikhism (51%) Browse Sikhism related books.  Click here for info

18.  Bahá'í Faith (47%) Browse Bahá'í Faith related books.  Click here for info

19.  Non-theist (42%) Browse Non-theist related books.  Click here for info

20.  Orthodox Judaism (40%) Browse Orthodox Judaism related books.  Click here for info

21.  Seventh Day Adventist (33%) Browse Seventh Day Adventist related books.  Click here for info

22.  Islam (27%) Browse Islam related books.  Click here for info

23.  Mainline - Conservative Christian Protestant (26%) Browse Mainline - Conservative Christian Protestant related books.  Click here for info

24.  Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (25%) Browse Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) related books.  Click here for info

25.  Eastern Orthodox (17%) Browse Eastern Orthodox related books.  Click here for info

26.  Roman Catholic (17%) Browse Roman Catholic related books.  Click here for info

27.  Jehovah's Witness (14%) Browse Jehovah's Witness related books.  Click here for info

 
Neo-Pagan A community of faiths bringing ancient pagan and magickal traditions to the modern age -- including mostly Wicca but also Druidism, Asatru, Shamanism, neo-Native American, etc. Neo-Pagan is an umbrella term for various and diverse beliefs with many elements in common. (See Pagan Path Selector below) Some Neo-Pagans find no incongruence practicing Neo-Paganism along with adherence to another faith, such as Christianity or Judaism.

Belief in Deity: Some believe in a Supreme Being. Many believe in God and Goddess - a duality. Many believe there are countless spirit beings, gods and goddesses, in the cosmos and within all of nature - God is all and within all; all are one God. The Great Mother Earth, or Mother Nature, is highly worshipped. Divinity is immanent and may become manifest within anyone at any time through various methods.

Incarnations: No human incarnations are worshipped in particular, as all of nature and the universe are considered embodiments of God and Goddess, or of gods and goddesses, worthy of respect, reverence or worship.

Origin of universe/life: Generally there is no conflict between observations revealed through science and Neo-Pagan beliefs on origins of the physical universe and of man. Many believe in a supreme intelligence that created a duality of God/Goddess who then created a spirit world of gods and goddesses as well as all of the universe and nature.

After death: Many believe in reincarnation, after some rest and recovery in the “Otherworld.” There is generally no concept of hell as a place of punishment, but some believe wrongdoing can trap the soul in state of suffering after death. Some (Wicca) believe the soul joins their dead ancestors who watch over and protect their family. Some believe that life energy continues in some, if unknown, form. Some believe in various spiritual resting places. Many say we don’t or can’t know what happens after death.

Why evil? “Evil” is imbalance. Most believe there is no evil but rather that people sometimes make mistakes. Wrongdoing results when we forget we are one with the universal spirit.

Salvation: The concept of “salvation” is essentially irrelevant; rather the belief that people can attain spiritual balance and harmony with each other and Nature. The path includes group ceremonies, dances, songs/chants, prayers, meditation, trance, altered states of consciousness, the metaphysical, magic, invoking or evoking deities or spirits, Tantric practices. Intercessors are commonly used: psychics, seers, shamans, tarot, Oui-Ja Board. Ethical choices are influenced by belief in rebirth and karma - that one is rewarded or punished within this or after this lifetime for one’s choices, and an ethical code to do no harm.

Undeserved suffering: Most do not believe in Satan or any spirit Being as the cause of suffering. Some believe in karma, that choosing to live a life of wrongdoing and pain will naturally result in suffering in this or later lifetimes. Many view suffering as a result of spiritual imbalance in one’s life or on the planet or in the universe. The focus is generally on healing suffering rather than answering definitively why it exists.

Issues: Abortion choice is supported by many, but beliefs about abortion range from “pro-life” to “pro-choice.” Views on divorce, homosexuality, and gender equality are generally very supportive of human differences, equality, and personal choice. Many believe that involvement in community action, especially regarding environmental concerns, is integral to the belief in human interdependence and worship of the Earth Mother. Many promote strict nonviolence to humans and animals.

Books on Religion & Spirituality from Amazon.com

Recommended Website: Pagan Path Selector

Recommended Website: Wiccan Tradition Selector

Recommended Website: Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance

Recommended Website: neopagan.net -- Isaac Bonewits' Homepage

Recommended Website: LunaSea's Neo-Pagan Pages

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