Madness in Holley, New York

"The squirrel that you kill in jest, dies in earnest." 
- Henry David Thoreau

This is madness!

The fire department in Holley, New York is sponsoring the seventh annual "Squirrel Slam," an annual event organized for the mass killing of squirrels, with prizes given to the individuals who kill the largest and heaviest of the animals, often the pregnant females. This year, the squirrel killing contest even has a "youth" category for children 14 years and under interested in trying their hand at killing. I'm sure Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold would approve. Before opening fire at Columbine High School they bragged about cruelty to cats.

Therefore I say madness. And, because of this murderfest, how many wounded squirrels will crawl away to suffer and die slowly? And how many females will die and leave their young alone in the nest to starve to death?

If this isn't obscene enough, the Holley Fire Department will raffle off firearms including an AR/22 Semi, all part of their killfest frenzy. And I always thought firefighters were the "good guys".

Please add your voice to the protest:

Sign the petition

And/or better yet, give 'em a call:

NY Governor Andrew Cuomo: 518-474-8390
Mayor John Kenney, Jr.: 585-638-6367
Orleans County of Tourism: 1-800-724-0314

Members of the Board of Trustees:
Ross Gaylord: 585-638-6367
David Dill: 585-638-6367
Lewis Passarell: 585-638-6367
Donald Penna: 585-638-6367

INFORMATION / TALKING POINTS

DITL + Charles River Labs protest

We're back. It's been a month since we took off to Portland to lend support after our 20 year-old granddaughter attempted suicide. I'm hoping that's behind us now. She has now moved back to her mom's in Grants Pass where she will continue counseling, get a job and chill for awhile.

This morning it's party time in the Bird Park. Remember, I've been gone for a month but never fear. Good old Seven showed up at 7:22 with a friend. Not only did she find the usual peanuts and puppy kibble, but the delicious pumpkin pie I'd put the freezer when we left, thinking we'd be back in a week. I'm sure it's fine but M. Lee won't touch it. So far, Seven only gave it a peck but she'll check it out later, after she's done stashing the peanuts.

And, yay, a couple of quail just showed up. Excellent. Now the Bird Park is officially open.

 

So today I'm going to Reno to participate in the Reno Vegans protest against the Charles River Labs. In case you haven't heard, Charles River Labs is a notorious contract animal testing business and the world's largest supplier of animals for lab experiments in the world. Although animal testing has been replaced by humane, more accurate methods, Charles River Labs continues to conduct  painful, live experiments on any animal for a price. These poor innocent beings needlessly suffer torturous lives full of pain, fear, suffering and misery. And any who manage to survive an experiment at Charles River Labs are killed shortly afterwards. This needs to end.
 
So, have a good day.

"I know of no achievement through vivisection, no scientific discovery, that could not have been obtained without such barbarism and cruelty. The whole thing is evil."
—Charles Mayo, Founder of the Mayo Clinic, c. 1930.

Mitt Romney Debates Himself

Sam Bacile's gift to the world

TRIPOLI, Libya, Sept. 11, 2012 -- The U.S. ambassador to Libya and three other Americans were killed in an attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi by protesters angry over a film that ridiculed Islam's Prophet Muhammad.

Hate monger Sam Bacile, a 56-year-old California real estate developer who identifies himself as an Israeli Jew and who said he produced, directed and wrote the two-hour film, "Innocence of Muslims," said he had not anticipated such a furious reaction. This cowardly bastard is now "in hiding" while others pay for his little exposé with their lives.
 

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Update: Just for the record, as searches on the subject direct people to this post, "Sam Bacile" is one of the many aliases for Nakoula Basseley Nakoula a convicted felon from Cerritos, California. Nakoula and Joseph Nassralla Abdelmasih, the president of the Duarte-based charity Media for Christ, emerged Thursday as forces behind "Innocence of Muslims", the low-budget film which incited violence in recent days across the Arab world.

Winter Solstice 2011

Okay. It's nearly midnight but I don't like to see a Winter Solstice pass without wishing you a good day and new year. Of course this Solstice marks the beginning of the final countdown to the end of the Mayan Long Count Calendar (5125 ears long) and some say the end of time and life on earth. It's always something.

And tonight I learned that Al Linde, an old friend, died about a week ago. Seems he was on blood thinners following knee surgery in preparation for the new baseball season, suffered a freak accident blow to the head and just bled out. WTF, Al?!

Jersey Shore 1904

Atlantic City, circa 1900. Swimsuits were either flannel, serge or Alpaca, went from head to toe, included vest and collar plus skirts for the women topped off with modest caps.

And in case you are wondering.... yes.
The women are wearing swimming corsets under their suits.

Source: Shorpy

Even though we saw topless women on Miami Beach the other day, and even though no one seemed to mind or, for that matter even notice, the crowd still reminded me of the subdued, modest bathers from more puritanical times. I think it was the general disconnect people seemed to have regarding the environment itself as though being in a crowd offered protection from the power and uncertainties of Nature. Like I said before, creepy.

Diorama of a Midsummer's Day

We went to Fort Lauderdale last week to visit M. Lee's cousins and explore the area a bit. His cousins are nice fellows and basically hermits. They live in a big pleasant house in a skeevy part of town with their mother, kids, a sweet, pony-size pit bull who is not neutered and six hens they treat like children who have their own place out back. We saw everybody for dinner both nights and during the first day biked around Ft. Lauderdale and the second decided move on and check out Miami Beach.

It wasn't a particularly pleasant drive. Imagine "dragging yourself shirtless across a desert of blazing hot broken glass, your back full of arrows, predator birds tearing at your flesh". That's how Lee described driving to Miami Beach. 

America is already a tax haven for the world's wealthiest people and Southern Florida is one of their favorite spots. Everyday millionaire retirees roost all over Florida but South Florida is known for it's high-stepping billionaire, and very shady, richer-than-god crowd. Even from the street Miami is a gaudy showcase questionable wealth.

But, for us, there really wasn't any there there, just more urban sameness.

When we finally got to the beach, the world famous Miami Beach, I ran like someone escaping a fire, well, with a few stops along the way.

 

I'm a surrealist and, surprisingly the beach was surreal, so I should have loved it but, instead, I was horrified. I already knew that every inch of ground, mangrove and shoreline in Miami is developed, and has been for a long time so, of course, its "world famous" beach would be no exception but it was so dismal. Whether I looked north or south, it was hotel after hotel after hotel—no trees, no shade, no wildlife—and on the sand— thousands of people laying under umbrellas or standing in the water. I assume for them it was a lovely summer day at the beach.

To me the scene had a musty and unreal quality as though, rather than at the ocean, people were in a diorama built by a Jersey taxidermist and titled Day at the Beach. And mostly it was just sad. We're back along Alligator Creek today. The development here is bad enough but I'm still caught in yesterday's mood but grateful to be back in the small world here on the gulf.

Ghost of birthdays present

Today is my birthday so we are going to Pelican Alley for lunch. I've been wanting to eat there ever since I learned that the place has a reputation for being haunted. According to legend the ghost of Pelican Alley's previous owner likes to give cute waitresses weggies as well as do all the usual ghost type stuff like float the sound of mysterious foot steps, radiate an odd presence, open and close doors and move shit around.

A group of female ghost hunters recently tried evoking the ghost so they could catch him on their lame video. They offered to let him "touch the fun bags" and pull their undies. They treated him like a demented circus clown with demands to "make it move" and "give me a photo for my wallet"..., "wuss boy"... "you must not be a man". WTF, ladies? No self-respecting ghost is going to give it up for that.

I'll let you know how it goes today. It is only lunchtime but if anything funny happens I'll have my camera.

Murdoch and Media as Empire and Circus

Just watching the Murdoch media inquiry live on CNN and writing the blog post included below when someone shoved a shaving cream pie on Murdoch's face. LOL

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Rupert Murdoch is the P. T. Barnum of the News Internatio­nal/News Corp media circus plus Mafioso boss. In case you don't know who Barnum is, he's the Barnum of the Ringling Bros/Barnum Bailey Circus and the guy who said, "There's a sucker born every minute". 

Murdoch's formula of tabloid spectacle, fake news and propaganda backed by bribes, intimidation and criminal activity proves that that is still true, and here in America Roger Ailes, the head of News Corp, Murdoch's operation in the US, proves it with Murdoch's FOX NEWS. For too long these crooks have had the power to run politician­s, law enforcemen­t and play King Maker.

It is time to the flush this scum out of the system. They replaced truth and integrity with lurid spectacle and propaganda. Sadly, yesterday whistleblower Sean Hoare, the man who set the ball rolling on Murdoch Co., was found dead (murdered?) at his home. How many more victims have to fall before the public demands an end to this empire of thugs and clown henchmen?

Barkie's Bad Night

Barkie in better days.

Poor Barkie. A bunch of humans got into a huge fight at his house last night. He probably hid under the bed the whole time they duked it out, threatening each other, screaming, yelling, crying. They were so loud I wouldn't be surprised if they also disturbed all the birds in the area as well as the raccoons and opossums. Opossums are especially timid. And surely Frida Kahlo the squirrel did not appreciate the ruckus though it didn't bother us. We were out on the deck staring over at his house through the dark like naked ghouls but Barkie, the poor bastard, was trapped in the house with those maniacs.

Finally the fight poured out into the street where we could see, whenever the fluky streetlight flicked on, several teenage girls circling each other as some guy yelled in a very loud voice.... "One punch. You get one punch. ONE!". Unfortunately at that point the streetlight flicker off again so we couldn't see who punched who but then one of the girls cried out, "Where are we going to sleep tonight?" and he yelled back, "At my house. Everybody into the car. Come on! Get in. Now! NOW!" The streetlight flicked on just in time for us to see them drive off. We haven't seen or heard Barkie this morning. I hope he's okay.

Rapture do over

Everybody knows that God keeps time with a sundial, not the UTC or even the GMT. I just had a horrible thought. What if He misses The Big Moment which is scheduled for 18:00 hours UTC? Does that mean we'd be stuck with all the damn Believers?

Earthquakes and daytime TV

Sandhill Cranes in a Florida shopping mall last Sunday morning. This is what I love about Florida. I wish we were there now but we decided to spend a few weeks in lovely Costa Rica before settling down in Florida for the summer.

So we're in San José at the moment. The capital. There's plenty of wildlife here too. For example, feeding the pigeons in Parque Central is wildly popular but, as much as I love birds, it seems kind of gruesome to me. It's an all day, every day feeding frenzy that feels like it might, any minute, spin out of control and you know who'd get blamed. The birds.

Holy crap! We just had an earthquake! 6.0 according to the news. The strongest this year to date. It was also felt throughout Nicaragua and Panama...this following an afternoon of repeating stories on TV about Bin Laden interspersed with images of the Mississippi flooding and Ron Paul scolding America again.

U-Turn in 465 Miles

Well, we made it to Florida. Tonight we are staying in a little town in the panhandle called Marianna. It took us five days, at about 500 miles a day, to get this far. If all goes well, we will be in Venice by tomorrow afternoon where we'll stay briefly before going to Ft. Lauderdale then Costa Rica for about three weeks. After that we'll return to Venice where we plan to stay for the rest of the summer.

The drive went pretty well. We only had a couple of fights, regretted only one too-close-to-the-freeway-to-get-a-good-night's-sleep motel and ate at only one really bad restaurant. We did have to battle our cheap ass GPS from time to time but it still works. That's something. And we realized something about the South that never occurred to either of us before. Louisiana and Florida have hogged a helluva lot of coastline from Mississippi and Alabama.

Notes from the plane

Just after I got to the Southwest boarding gate yesterday I realized that I'd left my phone at home and muttered "god damn it!" under my breath in an emphatic and more or less fairly loud voice causing an old couple seated nearby to recoil and stiffen like irritated cats. I immediately plopped down, pulled out my laptop, skyped M. Lee and left a very contrite message that went something like "please please mail my phone as soon as possible, like today". Overhearing that, a really nice guy sitting one row over jumped up and offered his phone so I could call mine. That threw the cats off a bit though they managed to continue radiating disapprove. But no phone.

This is getting old. Last weekend I left my phone charger in Tonopah. A replacement is on the way. Now the phone. The worst part is that I tired, I really tried to pack right. I'm experimenting with a smaller bag and everything counts. I checked and rechecked. Two of this, one of that and not much of anything. Then I leave the damn phone.

~Contest with the Gods~

Right after the plane took off and we got the business of oxygen masks and flotations devices out of the way, one of the flight attendants rushed me a cup of coffee before anyone else got served. Perhaps you are thinking, "God! Was she that distraught"? I tell you. No. I trust M. Lee. The phone and charger will come. So why did I get two cups of coffee? Simple. The gods are toying with me. And why? Because I brought the white jacket. 

This jacket has hung in my closet since I got it, two years ago. I've never worn it. I've been afraid. On me, white attracts disaster at every turn. I think about wearing white and tomato sauce foments in the can. My own pen turns on me like an inksaber possessed. Coffee refuses to stay in the cup.

As it did on the plane.

That first cup of coffee, compliments of the gods? It tipped over and spilled toward the pristine white jacket cradled safely, I thought, on my lap. It missed by half a centimeter. And when my daughter picked me up at the airport carrying her barista special? Unlikely globs of coffee sloshed at me through the lid. The score? So far? So good. It's on, bitches.

Another cure for writer's block

Deadlines. So says Laura Miller in her recent article posted at Salon. We knew it all along, right? If  you have to, you will. So, I have given myself 10 minutes to write this post. Damn. I just wasted about three of those minutes fiddling around finding albums to copy to my player and several more re-reading Miller's article. I am down to one minute. ONE MINUTE. Deadlines and decoy projects.

That's what every blocked writer really needs: something more significant they should be doing instead, an earth-shaking, life-changing project you're stealing time from to work on this little novel. Or the great novel you ought to be drafting while you knock off your memoir just for fun. Granted, inventing such a decoy project and convincing yourself that you may actually get around to it someday requires a bold and sustained act of imagination. But that's what writers do, isn't it -- make stuff up?

My "decoy project": is blogging. How fucked is that?

Earth ship

I wonder what effect pulling all this oil out of earth has on things. Seems to me oil must act as a ballast for the planet and that planetary stability depends on it. We must have already siphoned out gazillions of pounds of ballast from the innards of the planet. Aren't we leaving empty chasms where the oil once was thus changing the way planet is balanced? And won't those chasms collapse and the balance inevitably shift?  What are the chances earth will be spun out of orbit altogether? At least, it seems to me, that these gigantic earthquakes will become more common.

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Update: I posted the above at Huffpo this morning and was pretty much drubbed, as expected. What I appreciate is the couple of people who responded in a straight forward scientific manner.  As usual, the boobs used it as an opportunity for ridicule. One commenter even accused  me (WOO!) of believing "everything in Al Gore's movie". WTF! I'm tired of clowns.

WTF???

Sarah Palin's America

Last year Sarah Palin called for conservatives to target Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. She marked Giffords district on a map with cross hairs and people have threatened Giffords in various ways ever since. It will be interesting to watch now how the blamestream media backs away from the criminal implications of their ongoing hate speech while continuing to goad people to, as Palin puts it, "take a stand".

Click to enlarge

Prostitute Mickey 3

It has come to my attention that a friend at the other end of the rainfuckingbow is having a bad day. Cheer up. It just got worse. Shuffle on over to the morgue and see why...


(Note: If you haven't met Prostitute Mickey, it's better to watch parts 1 & 2 first.)

Prostitute Mickey 3

Prostitute Mickey

Prostitute Mickey 1

OMFG...a part of me just died but I can't stop laughing. WTF?
And, as though I'm not already curled up in a ball weeping, I immediately watched

Prostitute Mickey 2