Happy Halloween!

Dee Dee's Halloween pumpkin. Click for a larger view. Dee Dee helped me scrape it out the pumpkin guts. Dad did the cutting.

 

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Started: 2012-10-29

Dee Dee's 4th Birthday Party

We had Dee Dee's 4th birthday party Sunday. Mouse over the pictures to see captions. Click to see larger.

(I had an icing malfunction with the cake. It was an ice cream cake. Delicious. But after I'd written Happy Birthday on it, the #4 candle fell over. Lifting it back in position caused permanent icing damage. Maybe I'll do better with MiMi-Kayla-Marie-TeeBeeDee.)

The party's over...

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Go Shout at Someone Who Needs Convincing

1
Go Shout at Someone Who Needs Convincing

Angry good scholarship is just as offensive as angry bad scholarship. I no more wish to hear "America's founding father's weren't Christian!" than "Evolution leads to atheism!"

You may be very right, but if you're shouting at me, or even holding an obviously more intransigent position than your words convey, I'll stop listening.

If I think you're incorrigibly wrong, there's no sense in me listening further. If I think you're incorrigibly right, go shout at someone else who needs convincing.[1]

[2010-10-27]

 

2
Neither More nor Less

A careful writer neither includes nor excludes anything without reason. His goal is to present a product that in some way would be diminished if anything were added or removed.

That's why the subtitle of "The Thumb Lottery"  is "A Short Story in 4 Acts," but only has three.

Always assume something is there for a reason.

You may sometimes correctly assume something is missing for a reason, too, though the class of "what's not there" is infinite, so that is a risky business, but can be equally interesting.

[2012-10-27]

 

3
Where old socks go when they die...

"For as long as there have been washers and dryers, women have been plagued by the Bermuda Sock Triangle. For every pair of socks put in the laundry, only one is returned. .. I told my kids the other sock went to live with Jesus."

--Erma Bombeck, in Crockpot Sock, March 20, 1990

I read Erma Bombeck every day in the Erie Daily Times when I was a kid, along with Dear Abby, the editorial page, and the comics.

[2012-10-24]

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[1]
Operative word here is "incorrigible." When a person has lost all willingness to listen to opposing views and refine their own, we've moved from dialog to diatribe (which at one time was a classical rhetorical structure but now means one-sided attack).

A lot of progressive talk is getting this way. So is a lot of conservative posturing. I don't think Ann Coulter is right about much of anything, but she is a good example if intransigent conservatism, which I'm sure is perceived as a compliment:

Ann Coulter talks about Sununu's race remark and her tweet calling President Obama a "retard" on October 26 Piers Morgan

 

 

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Unfortunately, there will always be those who listen, and in great numbers, which is why the world gets their undies in a bunch when Ann Coulter's thumbs lose their connection with civil discourse.

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Suitability and Propriety

1
We work out our moral sensibility through sitcoms.

I remember seeing many TV episodes in the 70's that dealt with women who had posed for men's magazines and were struggling with the pictures coming out after they'd achieved some notoriety, or were marrying a man that was getting some notoriety, like a politician.

Invariably the story portrayed the woman as young, naive, needing money, and just making a poor judgment call; other characters would sympathize and tell the woman not to be ashamed, the human body is a beautiful thing.

Popular media is often a reflection of popular sentiment, and the 70's saw a lot of debate on pornography; episodes like this captured our anxiety and tolerance of the infant porn industry.

Those story lines were edgy for their time, but now seem naive, like Mrs Brady finding a pack of cigarettes in Greg's jacket, or Sheriff Taylor teaching Opie how to box so he can defend himself from a bully, or Barney Miller arresting a gay man and less enlightened characters thinking they can "catch" whatever he's got that makes him gay. [1]

[2010-10-26]

2
Say something else in that ear.

"God in his infinite wisdom has at every turn thwarted my attempts to gain an exaggerated sense of self-importance."

--Clarence 0ddbody

[2010-10-23]

 

3
Dress Codes

My office is business casual. Like most modern businesses, it has a very generous dress code that allows comfort and flexibility and conceals a cultural discomfort with certain parts of the human body.[2]

One of the rules is that you cannot wear jeans except on special days; these days are rare and often associated with large sporting events or business goals.

You can, if you wish, wear denim above the waist. Just not below.

I mentioned this fashion bipolarity many years ago to some colleagues that are no longer with the company. One responded with a good-natured laugh.

He saw the irony, but not the absurdity.[3]

[2012-10-23]

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[1]
I'm not gay, but had an abiding sympathy for characters like like Jack De Leon on Barney Miller, played by Marty Morrison. I didn't laugh at them, and they weren't scary; I wanted to get to know them; they somehow seemed gentle and safe. Perhaps there was a gay man in my youth that sensitized me to this; I don't know. There was no homophobia in my house, just as there was no racism or intolerance of other kinds; there was, however, a strong sense of right and wrong, and homosexuality was considered a sin. I do not share that view as an adult.

[2]
Social anthropologists 1,000 years hence will have a very clear picture of what those parts are by analyzing these rules. They have enormous cultural and linguistic value; they reveal how weather affects our dress, for example (which is practically unnecessary in a climate-controlled building), and how we use euphemistic language to refer to things we're uncomfortable addressing directly.

[3]
I suspect, but cannot be sure, that the prohibition against jeans stems from the large number of business leaders who rose from modest means and associate denim with manual labor. I believe my Grandpa Grandy, LaVerne E Grandy, probably fell into that category; as you may recall, he went from farm boy to SVP of GTE in the 1970s.

If you asked Grandpa why jeans shouldn't be worn to work, he might say something to the effect of, "Well, I don't know, probably for the same reason I don't wear my dress slacks when I'm gardening." It would be a matter of suitability, not propriety, at least not most of the time.

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The Thumb Lottery

The Thumb Lottery: You Can't Live If You Don't Play
(A Short Story in 4 Acts)

A society is so overpopulated and resources so scarce, everyone has been praying for a disaster to control the population, but year after year, decade after decade, they live in peace with no plagues or earthquakes or famine to even take the edge off the exponential population boom.

But even though food and water are plentiful, space and jobs are not, and those with more and enough to spare don't share with those that have none.

Realizing they cannot solve this problem by increasing their resources or teaching folks how to share, the entire country agrees to hold a 50/50 lottery. Each person above the age of 18, or upon turning 18, will go to a central location in each city and will press a button with their right thumb. The machine will respond by either A) indelibly tattooing the thumb with a red X, or B) doing nothing at all.

Half get a red X, half don't.

This becomes known as the Thumb Lottery.

Those that do not receive a red X may, at any time after turning 18, be eliminated by those that do have a red X.

Any person with a red X may at any time have an unmarked person killed, even for no other reason than because they cut them off in traffic, or gave their child a bad grade in school, or looked cross-eyed at them.

There arises a great black market in red X thumbs, because they can be removed and sewn on someone else.

Initially, anyone without a right thumb is considered safe, for it is assumed that they once had a thumb with a red X that was cut off by black marketeers. But eventually, to avoid being eliminated, people start removing their own right thumbs and say that their red X was stolen.

100 years later....

The population begins to adjust. Not everyone with a red X decides to kill another person; society is accustomed to many people with and without red X's living side by side. Occasionally, quietly, those without a red X will disappear, but this is done discretely and tolerated.

One day, a nonpartisan group decides the Thumb Lottery has met its goal and proposes they no longer force anyone to go through the lottery.

But there is wide protest, especially among those with red X's. "I went to the Thumb Lottery like everyone else," they say, "I pressed that button and I received my red X and I want to keep the rights that go along with it." Many without a red X agree because it sounds so reasonable and it's been the law for so long.

Then there is a great famine, and nearly all the people die.

1,000,000 years later...

They sky and oceans and rivers are clear. Vast tracts of wheat and corn separate large cities.Streets are airy and festive. Through a window we see a man having dinner with his family. It's a nice house, well lit, spacious, spartan, futuristic and otherworldly. As he raises a fork to his mouth, you notice he has no right thumb. He looks like any ordinary 21st Century man but for the missing thumb. He talks to his wife and children. They are all eating too. And as they raise their forks and drink from their cups and wipe their mouths and laugh as all families do, even a million years hence, you see that none of them have right thumbs, either.

Started: 2012-10-26

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Live the Dash

1
Into the Abyss

Last night [2012-10-22] I watched Werner Herzog's riveting Into the Abyss, a documentary account of a triple murder in Conroe, Texas and the subsequent execution of one of the accused killers.

The former Death House Captain, Fred Allen, who was in charge of the team that strapped down the condemned, talked at some length about the execution of Karla Faye Tucker and his role in it. (He participated in 125 executions and resigned after that, forfeiting his pension, because the toll had simply become too great to bear any more.)

The "dash," BTW, is everything that appears between the date of birth and date of death on your tombstone. It's a metaphor for life.

I remember the Karla Faye execution in 1998 well ( read more > ). It was the first execution I opposed along the development of my sensibilities regarding life and death (which are still developing). I didn't oppose it because Karla Faye found Jesus and deserved to be spared (everyone on Death Row finds Jesus[1]), but because by all accounts of those that knew her, the person being executed was not the same one who committed the crime.

If ever there was a defense of mercy for those that repent and reform, Karla Faye was it.

And we killed her.

And then-governor George W Bush, who denied her clemency, would later smirk and joke about it (source > ).[2]

Learn more about Into the Abyss here >

[2012-10-23]

2
They say you can tell a lot about a person by his bookshelf.

This is mine:

Well, it's not a shelf so much, but a collection with bookends. I used to have a lot of book shelves, built into the wall of my study in my previous home. I dreamed of one day handing over thousands of volumes I'd read and studied to someone who wanted to care for them. But since I was a student of more classical periods that have long since fallen into the public domain, the digital age made paper books unnecessary, and so I have saved only those that have sentimental or financial value. There are more elsewhere in the house, but Capote was such an enormous influence on me, his books (and those related to him) have a special place on my desk.

The bookends are onyx and came from Millcreek Mall in Erie, PA back in the 1970's. There was a fellow selling Mexican onyx at a kiosk; he also sold chess sets, tikis, jewelry, and such. These bookends were actually a gif to Tom from Mom and Dad for Christmas, but somehow they wound up with me. I got a pair too, they were green. I don't know what happened to them. I bought  a green onyx chess set at the time from the same kiosk, very pretty but very impractical. It chipped and broke easily.

[2012-10-24]

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[1]
Is that surprising? No. Is that bad? No. Dire circumstances have a way of refining our perspective.

[2]
Mr Bush went on to renew the war in Iraq that resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and not a few Americans.

Over nonexistent weapons of mass destruction.

If Americans had paid attention to the levity with which the governor had dismissed Tucker's execution, this world might be shy one war right now.

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Nuns on the Pill

1
Nuns on the Pill

Wow, now here's a conundrum ... "Doctors call for nuns to be given the Pill"

Not knowing the official reaction, I would guess that because the pill is not being used for contraception and is just a chemical like any other medicine, the Church would find nothing wrong with it.

But it is ironic. And to be sure, a health advantage for the celibate is coming by way of a practice condemned by orthodoxy.

[2012-10-24]

 

2
Say something else in that ear.

"You can no more capture Santa in a picture or a movie or a book than you can the taste of a candy cane."

--Clarence 0ddbody

[2012-10-15]

 

3
You know you're getting old when....

... after getting out of the shower, you spend a minute looking around the room for the clean socks you put out and then realize you already put them on.

[2012-10-11]

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Schizochronistic

1
"Too much Alice cooper, too little Alice Faye."

That's a a line from the 1976 Paul Lynde Halloween Special with guest stars Kiss, Witchiepoo (Billie Hayes) and The Wicked Witch of the West (Margaret Hamilton), among others.

Kiss was not allowed in my house when I was a boy. My brother Tom and I did try to watch this when it aired in 1976; when Kiss came on to perform their first number, Mom said "Turn it off. I won't have that in this house."[1]

I just watched this same Paul Lynde special with my almost-4-year-old daughter Dee Dee, who liked seeing Margaret Hamilton dressed up again as her favorite witch. She said Kiss looked like scary monsters.

If you don't have a fondness for the era, it may fall a little flat, but you can watch the entire show here:

The Paul Lynde Halloween Special (1976)

If you can't watch the whole thing, at least watch this:

KISS 1976 - King Of The Night Time World

I played Kiss's "Destroyer" so much I wore the printing off the cassette tape. (Head phones let me rock 'n roll all night.) Believe it or not, at one time, Kiss was as big as Justin Beiber, Lady Gaga, Taylor Swift, and Ke$ha all rolled into one. Bigger.

Oh, and the two Alices didn't appear in this special. I like them both, in different ways and for different reasons. Phil Harris and Alice Faye are at the top of my list of Old Time Radio favorites. You can listen to a little of them here on a radio episode of their show, "Talented Children's Screen Test".

I'll coin a word for my condition: schizochronistic.

[2012-09-29]

 

2
Say something else in that ear.

"The spiritual connection one generation has with its own music is rarely shared by the next.

Just as every person who falls in love thinks no one else has ever felt that way, so each generation thinks no music has ever sounded or will ever sound as sweet.

--Clarence 0ddbody

[2012-10-09]

 

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Overheard

Q: Why did you convert?
A: It was late and I heard my mother calling.

[2012-10-20]

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[1]
My Grandma Grandy (Mom's mom) told me once of having the same reaction to Elvis swinging his hips on Ed Sullivan. But during the same period my mom was falling asleep listening to Love Me Tender on the radio; she thought Elvis was dreamy. Grandma Grandy also felt George Burns was behaving shamefully by having Vegas chorus girls hanging off each arm in the 1970's. She thought it was disrespectful to the memory of Gracie, George's wife and partner in vaudeville, radio, and TV for many years. That was one of the few times I saw sincere disappointment in Grandma Grandy.

He was devastated by the loss of Gracie. There is a clip of him being assisted by Jack Benny and others at the end of the committal at the cemetery. I can't find it, but it often appears in retrospectives.

Burns spanned a century, 1896–1996. He died at the age of 100, of pneumonia as I recall. He had been booked to perform for the Queen of England on his 100th birthday but was too ill.

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