Happy Thanksgiving
How about Tofurkey instead?

Photos from Mexico

Church on the beach

I took thousands of photographs in Mexico and have been planning to post some but haven't gotten around to it yet but here's one of a village church near the beach.

Thanksgiving transmogrified

Bird and Piano Wire Compass
Thanksgiving is a hellish time for the turkeys so I'm dedicating this drawing I did recently to them. I don't know about you, but we're having a yummy Tofurky for our family feast.


We're just not into supporting slaughter house food. This turkey, for example, may still be alive. By law, they are supposed to be stunned so that they feel no pain before their throats are cut; but very often the stun only paralyzes their muscles, leaving them fully conscious and filled with great fear and pain. "You are what you eat." And it is not uncommon for these poor creatures to still be alive when they are dropped into the vat of boiling water, meant to remove their feathers.

If you're like most people, this is an unwelcome subject but ignorance is not bliss. If you've got the stomach and the heart to see what happens to that bird before it reaches the table, there's a pretty good photo journal at all-creatures.org. The sit's a bit too religious for me, but I certainly agree in spirit. For instance, they believe the breeder's practice of masturbating male turkeys is wrong because it's a sin. But that's an obtuse argument, especially if you don't believe in god. It's simpler than that. The practice is inhumane and therefore a violation of animal rights. Why drag god into the argument, especially as some people think their god wants them to torture and kill. Take Bush for example. But back to my Thanksgiving rant. The turkey report is accurate and timely for the upcoming Christian holidays. Some moral majority. Didn't Falwell's Jesus tell them, "What you do unto the least of them, you do unto me."

I'm all for liberating the turkeys and feeding them pumpkin pie.

Egg goes home

~asha

Attila the Attorney General Torture Memos

Attila the Hun
Since Texas, Alberto R. Gonzales (ARG) has been Bush's moral ghost writer. There, ARG penned minute memos for then Governor Bush knowing that Bush has a serious distaste for facts. To speed things up, ARG brushed aside bothersome trifles like "crucial issues in the cases at hand: ineffective counsel, conflict of interest, mitigating evidence, even actual evidence of innocence." As a result, innocent people died, murders stayed free to kill again and Bush, Praise Jesus!, had more time for golf. No wonder ARG remains part of Bush's born again, good old boy network.


Bush / Gonzales, good old boys on a roll.
Now, Mr. Mission Accomplished wants to appoint Gonzales our new Attorney General. Lovely. Gonzales, like Bush, is on the beginning rungs on the ladder of moral evolution. Perhaps he is a reincarnation of Attila the Hun. After all, he wrote the Torture Memos. ARG considers the compassion required by the Geneva Convention “quaint”. Too much to take in? Too bad. The rule of the day is either get informed or bend over and kiss your ass good-bye. Here in the Reality-Based Community, Gonzales rubberstamped torture. Why? Because the Bush Administration is a corrupt, arrogant maverick group who make it clear though their actions and mouth pieces like Gonzales, that they prefer to be law unto themselves. And, in case you’re confused by the administration's shell game, torture is NOT condoned by a moral society.

Which brings us back to another known fact, born again Bush and his born again cronies, are not moral men. They are racist, sexist bigots. They are priests in the fat cat corporate religion, GodCo. It’s not skin color that gets you into the club these days. It’s how low you go and how many people you’re willing to fuck on the way down. Roll over Hitler and tell Stalin the news.

Spin

Right wing Christians call it "Right to Life". Sounds good. What beast could possibly be against it? But look beyond the spin. What they actually mean by "Right to Life" is that they want to outlaw abortions even in cases of rape; even when carrying the child to term threatens the mother's life. Forget about the inevitable return of the coat hanger abortions, Right to Life means these zealots even want to force a woman to bear her rapist's child even if it means she will die during the birth.

Richard Thompson Ford, a Professor of Law at Stanford Law School wrote a good article on the power of the Republican spin machine. Check it out.
Nice guys finish last.

But as always, the extremist Right Wing Christian Army is on the move. Here's the latest from one of their leaders, Jerry Falwell:

"Falwell announces new coalition to build on evangelical momentum

By HANK KURZ Jr. / Associated Press 11/09/2004

Trying to seize on the momentum of a presidential election in which moral values proved important to voters, the Rev. Jerry Falwell announced Monday that he has formed The Faith and Values Coalition to guide an "evangelical revolution."

Falwell, a religious broacaster based in Lynchburg, Va., founded and led The Moral Majority from 1979-89, which was credited with boosting conservatism nationwide.

He said the new coalition will have a three-pronged mission that includes ensuring that pro-life conservatives are chosen to fill any vacancies that emerge on the U.S. Supreme Court, a Constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage and the election of another conservative president in 2008.

"The group's central premise is to utilize the momentum of the November 2 elections to maintain an evangelical revolution of voters who will continue to go to the polls to `vote Christian,'" the 71-year-old Falwell said in a statement released Monday night.

He called the organization a "21st Century resurrection of the Moral Majority," and said he is committing himself to a four-year stint as its national chairman."

Seeing as how the evangelicals are a political organization, I say they should have their tax-exempt status revoked. After all, why should taxpayers be forced to contribute to their Vote Christian campaign?

Circus Games

It's really a shame that the Gay Marriage Revolt was the deciding factor in the election. However, I wouldn't blame the surge of lovers who made national headlines sharing nuptials and rebellion. Dollars to day-old doughnuts, Karl Rove masterminded that one, with a little help from some gay Republican field ops. I hand it to them; they played the hell out of the gay scene. Their unwitting accomplices fell in line like lambs frolicking to the slaughterhouse...or Wedding Tent. Now they can amuse themselves watching the Bushwacker perform slight of hand tricks in the Domestic Issues Tent, making things like Lawrence vs. Texas (which overturned state sodomy laws) and Roe vs. Wade (granting abortion rights) disappear.


Republican hand puppets

There is a fine economy to this blood-letting, again compliments of Karl, who keeps Bush on a need-to-know basis. Karl is a bright guy. He understands his road blocks to civil rights will be challenged sometime in the future. It's the old hop-scotch game of democracy, but for now it pays off the tunnel vision voters who kept Bush in office and keeps all the kiddies focused elsewhere as the Iraq civil war and the terrorist jihad reach boiling point; something the rest of the world is already acutely aware of. Certainly they are gnashing their teeth over how stupid and dangerous we Americans are but, here at home, there's a bright side to it all. The newlyweds could be spared the cost of a divorce.

Nameless Writers

Cowee and I are going to Reno this morning to attend the monthly Unnamed Writer's Group speaker event. They have a pretty good tshirt. Otherwise, I'm not so sure. Cowee and Ellen Hopkins recently became officers there and have plans to bump it up a bit; offer monthly publishing information, that kind of thing. They will definitely make things more interesting. I attended one of the UW meetings a couple of years ago and wasn't much impressed. They definitely could use a kick in the ass. The guest speaker didn't even know her magazine had an online edition and that all the back issues were available there.

Day Two

Okay, the stun guy effect of Bush's re-election is yesterday's news. It's another sunny day, somewhere, even if only here in Nevada or the future. For now, Bush will lurch onward, waving his so-called mandate and half the people will press on with him, waving their little flags.

The way I see now, just about every other person on the street is someone who thinks and feels like me; that Bush is very, very wrong and by following him, American is falling behind. And there is some dark humor about it all. Bush spent his first term loading the fan with shit. Now let him face it.

Dawn of an old day

Okay. Kerry has to make a show of wanting every vote counted. That's his job after Gore stiffed us in the last election. The upside is that we know we're not alone in our view. But no surprise really that George won this time. He is the straw Americans grabbed in the moral aftermath of 9-11, their panic over the gay marriage revolt, the continuing rise for people of color, developments in technology and science, and as always, more and more women empowering themselves. But his fusing of politics and evangelicalism is a mere place holder, a stand-in for the eclectic moral compass we seek. It is a shallow pond in a time of deep thirst.

High on hubris

"We're an empire now" - senior adviser to President Bush

The New York Times Magazine recently posted an article by Ron Suskind titled "Without a Doubt". In it he presents a rare and candid look at George W. Bush, religious fanatic and right wing extremist. I highly recommend reading it, especially if you think Bush's confidence and decisions are based on facts or even an informed intuition. I've included a couple of paragraphs from the article below but you can read it in its entirety here, here or here. As Kerry said during the debates, "You can be certain and still be wrong". Bush is so wrong it's nothing short of chilling. In fact, even Pat Robertson has trouble with Bush's megalomania.

Excerpt from "Without a Doubt".

"REALITY-BASED COMMUNITY"
"In the summer of 2002, after I had written an article in Esquire that the White House didn't like about Bush's former communications director, Karen Hughes, I had a meeting with a senior adviser to Bush. He expressed the White House's displeasure, and then he told me something that at the time I didn't fully comprehend -- but which I now believe gets to the very heart of the Bush presidency.

The aide said that guys like me were 'in what we call the reality-based community,' which he defined as people who 'believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.' I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. 'That's not the way the world really works anymore,' he continued. 'We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.'"

This madness is rooted the neoconcervative program of Perception Management. George Orwell with his Newspeak has nothing on these guys.

--Ron Suskind was the senior national-affairs reporter for The Wall Street Journal from 1993 to 2000. He is the author most recently of "The Price of Loyalty: George W. Bush, the White House and the Education of Paul O'Neill."

Magic Johnson

Magic Johnson called yesterday. He wanted to remind me to vote. General Westley Clark called today. He also reminded me to vote. Busy guys. I suppose you've also heard from them too and probably many others. I was already planning to vote. In fact, I voted today. There was a pretty good line, but it went quickly. I have to say it. I hope you vote too, and early if possible. Nov. 2nd is sure to be a very busy day. Have a question about where to go? Go here, enter you zip code and you'll be directed to local information. If you're voting early, be sure and double check on the location. It may be different than it is on Nov. 2nd. So vote, damn it!

Bill Cowee, impresario with a heart

An American director who had, along with his troupe (his two wives), nearly starved to death in Mexico told me once that you can claim to have an audience when there is one more person in the house than in the cast. I don't know if that's true. Good thing poets aren't bound by rules otherwise, even counting bartenders and baristas, we'd generally come up wanting. My fall back when doing a reading has always been to include an open mic. However, the Ash Canyon Poets don't do open mics. Cowee wants people to have attended at least one Ash Canyon meeting before reading with us in public.

Bill Cowee, poet
Ash Canyon Poet's beloved Impresario

That said, after the conclusion of our reading last night at Border's Books, Bill invited audience members to read if they wanted to. They were practically falling out of their chairs in eagerness. Cowee has an eternal soft spot for anyone with the slightest interest in writing poetry. Under his enormous wing, I have seen people improve who I would rather have dropped off a cliff. And after that, he invited them to join us at Casino Fandango. It is a garish, friendly place which, as soon as it opened, Bill immediately declared our new Friday night meeting after the meeting institution.

Susan Priest, Ash Canyon poet

Roy Chavez, Ash Canyon poet

The casino's quirky Vegas style jungle theme and pampering staff instantly earned the highest regard a group of poets, or dogs, can confer... Loyalty. Every Friday, we sit under the canopy of its neon jungle talking deep into the night over wine and coffee, lakes of chowder and mountains of fries. It provides perfect hideaway for strange birds and even includes a squawking mechanical parrot that scoots along a ceiling track randomly dropping money on people below. When I was a kid the adults warned me that if I grew up to be a poet I would die drunk and poor in the gutter. I don't know whether or not they'll turn out to be right, but that damn bird never drops a penny on any of us.

Borders Reading

After Hours

We're reading at Borders tonight (Ash Canyon Poets) and I'm at it again, doing a fourth version of my poetry zine, After Hours. Will it ever end? I changed a word, redid my SkyRiverPress logo, tweaked the cover and am printing out a few new copies. For all this, I'll probably just give the damn things away. Madness. Yes. This is madness. If, by some remote chance, you want to actually buy a copy, email me. They're 3 bucks, postage paid. ashaATashabot.com


Old logo


My revised logo. Much better.

Pat Robertson, Bush on the eve of the invasion of Iraq

Strange times. Who would have ever guessed that a playboy cowboy backed by such an unlikely combination as former Communists, Jewish extremists, fat cat CEOs, highly discrete billionaires, Ivy League Professors, otherwise known as Neoconservatives, and swarms of automaton evangelicals guided by Pat Robertson and the Christian Coalition would ever be able to railroad the United States of America into this bullshit, first-strike war, needlessly sacrifice so many lives and line their pockets all in one swoop?

But recently Pat Robertson and the White House butted heads after Robertson reported to CNN that on the eve of invading Iraq, Bush told him "Oh, no, we're not going to have any casualties". Today on CNN the White House denied that Bush ever said such a stu-pid thing. What's up with that? Is the Brotherhood getting confused by its own spin? Robinson described Bush that night as "the most self-assured man I've ever met in my life. You remember Mark Twain said, 'He looked like a contented Christian with four aces.' I mean he was just sitting there like, 'I'm on top of the world'."

There's a creepy, quasi-sexual image...Bush at night, intoxicated by power, totally out of touch with reality, aroused and eager for war. Is it that he just doesn't get it or that he just doesn't care?

Monday Blue Plate Poetry Special #2

Rilke by Balladine Aquarelle

The other day, Mr. Lee reminded me that it's almost Nanowrimo time again. I immediately purged myself of the idea and wouldn't have thought of it until next year (when he will tell me again). But then someone else had to mention it. ARG! But don't get me wrong. I think Nanowrimo is a great idea. Get over yourself! Have fun! Kick out the stops! Be bold! Blast your ass out of the mud! Just write, damn it! Leap before you look! Of course, I'm not going to enter Nanowrimo. I'd have to write 1666.6666666666666666666666666667 words a day for thirty days. I'm sticking to poetry. There I can get by with writing 2 words a day. Less. I don't remember who it was but I completely relate to the poet who said of their day's work, "This morning I changed a comma to a semi-colon and in the afternoon, I changed it back again."

Which brings me to my point, Rilke's "For The Sake Of A Single Poem" which I include here for no particular reason other than it's the Monday Blue Plate Poetry Special.

from The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge
...Ah, poems amount to so little when you write them too early in your life. You ought to wait and gather sense and sweetness for a whole lifetime and a long one if possible, and then, at the very end, you might perhaps be able to write ten good lines. For poems are not, as people think, simply emotions (one has emotions early enough) – they are experiences. For the sake of a single poem, you must see many cities, many people and Things, you must understand animals, must feel how birds fly, and know the gesture which small flowers make when they open in the morning. You must be able to think back to streets in unknown neighborhoods, to unexpected encounters, and to partings you had long seen coming; to days of childhood whose mystery is still unexplained, to parents whom you had to hurt when they brought in a joy and you didn’t pick it up (it was a joy meant for somebody else – ); to childhood illnesses that began so strangely with so many profound and difficult transformations, to days in quiet, restrained rooms and to mornings by the sea, to the sea itself, to seas, to nights of travel that rushed along high overhead and went flying with all the stars, - and it is still not enough to be able to think of all that. You must have memories of many nights of love, each one different from all the others, memories of women screaming in labor, and of light, pale, sleeping girls who have just given birth and are closing again. But you must also have been beside the dying, must have sat beside the dead in the room with the open window and the scattered noises. And it is not yet enough to have memories. You must be able to forget them when they are many, and you must have the immense patience to wait until they return. For the memories themselves are not important. Only when they have changed into our very blood, into glance and gesture, and are nameless, no longer to be distinguished from ourselves – only then can it happen that in some very rare hour the first word of a poem arises in their midst and goes forth from them.”
– Rainer Maria Rilke

Adventures in Birdland

Birdie Num Num
Magpies love peanuts so I
put some out this morning along
with a little cheese then waited for
one to arrive. It took about 3 minutes.


The Early Bird
However, the magpie wasn't
the only one who showed up.


Kitty Num Num


Hasty Retreat
But the cat beat a hasty retreat
as the magpie hopped along
the fense squawking at him.



Table for One
Be sure to check out the
classy black pants.



Two for One

Wizards of Oz

Georgetown, USA

Power loves a vacuum; that's why the Neoconservatives filled the one in US politics (quietly), while the rest of us were busy doing other things. Until recently the neocons were one of American's best kept secrets, but the war in Iraq changed a lot. Among other things, we got politicized, polarized and some of us began poking our noses under the tent. After all, Bush mired us in a sink hole, lose-lose war with the Muslim world. Why not ask why?

In the beginning I thought it was the Republicans who got us into this mess. But after doing some reading I found out that, at least on the national level, the Republican Party is a sockpuppet for the Neoconservatives. In case you haven't been following along, the neocons embrace a fascist ideology and are deeply embedded in Georgetown society and beltway politics. One of their main strengths is blending into the background, appearing to be mainstream but, as Michael Lind of the New Statesman put it, "they are an extremist group of former liberals; "products of the largely Jewish-American Trotskyist movement of the 1930s and 1940s, which morphed into anti-communist liberalism between the 1950s and 1970s and finally into a kind of militaristic and imperial right."

For a quick look at who and what the neocons are, scroll through this page. I think you'll find it interesting.

Perception Management

The New War
Ever wonder how Bush has so successful passed off such obvious lies? Perception Management combined with a vast dissemination network. It's all just part of the Neo-Conservative's grand plan. After the embarrassment of Watergate and Vietnam, the big brains at the neocon think tanks decided that the real war was the "war of ideas". That's when they began sculpting what they call their "war machine". Perception Management, which includes doublespeak and newspeak, is one of their most powerful and dangerous weapons. George Orwell coined the term newspeak but the neocons brought it to life. Perception Management establishes the machinery by which opposition can be bent towards their goal; a free-wheeling, uncensored collusion between an authoritarian government and (select) private corporations. Bush's effectiveness depends on newspeak and doublespeak.

FreeDictionary.com explains that the basic idea behind newspeak is ... to remove all shades of meaning from language, leaving simple dichotomies such as pleasure / pain, happiness / sadness, good / evil. In addition, words with opposite meanings are removed, so "bad" becomes "ungood", "lies" become "misinformation". The ultimate aim of newspeak is to reduce even the dichotomies to a single word that is a "yes" of some sort: an obedient word with which everyone will answer affirmatively to whatever is asked of them. Bush does not lead. He does not have a vision. Bush jabbers newspeak while standing before hand picked audiences at select locations prized for their patriotic ambiance. http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/newspeak


Newspeak

And doublespeak. FreeDictionary defines doublespeak as "language deliberately constructed to disguise or distort its actual meaning." Doublespeak is a communication bypass. In doublespeak a corporation says "downsizing" or "non-duty, non-pay status" instead of "you're fired", and the news reports "collateral damage" rather than "innocent civilian death". A doctor may say "patient failed to fulfill his wellness potential" instead of "patient died", and a junk dealer advertises a "semi-antique rug" instead of a "used rug". As you might guess, doublespeak is also a huge hit with the government, military,and corporate institutions. Call me old-fashioned, but for me the test of a person is still what they do, not what they say they do. http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Double+speak

The name "Patriot Act" is a brilliant example of Perception Management. It equates loss of freedom with freedom. It turns the US into a ready-to-go, 21st Century style police state but the sleepers are grateful. This act was drafted before 9-11 then the neocons waited for an appropriate crisis to slip it in. Their patience paid off. After 9-11, people were desperate. Most didn't protest the Patriot Act at all. They didn't know what it entailed, but they loved the newspeak title. They snuggled right up to it. It has a nice, comforting ring, like "Homeland Security". The fact is, the Patriot Act was forced on us , a true triumph for the perception managers. It was voted into law without anybody reading it. They couldn't. No one received a copy of the some thousand page document until the night before the vote.

Over the years the neocons also built another indispensable arm of their war machine, a well-funded network of think tanks, media outlets and attack groups like Fox News, the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Times. Furthermore, they installed an army of over-the-top conservative commentators on TV, radio, in newspaper columns and on well-funded websites. Perhaps you've noticed.

I understand why otherwise intelligent people fall for all this. Perception management is complete. Meaning appears to be on the surface. Suggestions and ideas instantly become foregone conclusions and are reported in the media like news. When that fails, the conservatives use bribes. My hope is that Americans on both sides of the political spectrum will join together and change the frightening direction the radical right is dragging us. We shall see.

Want to read more about Perception Management? Check out the Dictionary of Modern Newspeak. There's a link to it from the Newspeak Dictionary website. It is a true formula for a very dangerous form of madness when you add in George Bush's religious fanaticism and hubris.

Monday Blue Plate Poetry Special, #1

I attend a local poetry critique group called Ash Canyon Poets that also happens to be the best one I've ever attended. In general, that's not saying much. Most writer's groups suck big time, but this is one is an exception. There are some fine poets in attendance and the group as a whole has a genuine love and awareness of what is real poetry. Even the occasional precious artiste who drifts in gets useful pointers with a minimum of mollycoddling. I tried a writer's group in Reno a couple of years ago, but it didn't go well. As is more often the case, egos got in the way. I took a break when I went on the Interferon treatment for Hep C and by the time I was ready to pick up my life again, the group faded out. Ash Canyon, on the other hand, has been meeting on Friday nights at the Brewery Arts Center for the last 18 years. That is amazing.

Cats in Birdland

Birdland Hanky Panky
A couple of neighborhood cats have discovered my little bird park. The bastards! I suppose it was inevitable, especially with the big piles of dry weeds laying around. They use them like hunting blinds. I haven't found any feather piles yet but not for lack of scheming on the cats' part. The birds have been a little scarse lately. I don't think they're any too happy with cats crawling though the underbrush. Definitely puts a crimp in the party. And I'm sure it's no comfort that there's a little courting action going on. But try herding cats.

Still Afternoon

It is amusing the way words twist, no more than vapors, while in the neighborhood a buzz saw gets down to business. It is an afternoon with no where to go but home, away from the street, closed doors and sadness. An afternoon to sit and watch images of things that never were, happen in places that don't exist...happen in my mind with such detail, so quickly they are instant memories among memories of things that did happen, once, perhaps. Then a different fly starts and stops on the warm window sill. And the little, black dog, asleep on a penny, twitches and sighs with a dream, wakes to bark then, convinced, curls again to sleep. And still it is afternoon.

The big dog hears a couple of small explosions in the muted distance, rushes to the screen door, presses her nose to it, goes back under the table where she licks a crumb then, satisfied, disappears down the hall. I hear her flop and sigh in the dark innards of the house. The afternoon is finally quiet. I list in the silence like an unsinkable, wrecked ship. I will never cry. When everything else is gone, there will be one small hurling drop of water grooved in its orbit in black space.

-----------------------------------
* This may seem like a confessional poem, but it's not.

Science Update

I got this email from my brother today. It's a correction for the Mt. Saint Helen Math equation he did for me yesterday.

______________________________________________________


Mad Scientist Convention

"Oops! I added a few extra zeros. There its 5E+9 = 5,000,000,000 not 5,000,000,000,000, that number is 5 trillion. Better make changes on your blog or some scientist will roast us. You see why we use short hand notation."   J.

______________________________________________________

So, now that we've got that straightened out, we can all go back to enjoying our infinitesimal fraction *(in geologic time) of this human day.


Logic vs. Superstition Debate


* added 2017.02.17

Mt. Saint Helen Math

Mt. Saint Helen Web Cam
Someone at Bluesky was wondering about how Mt. Saint Helen's latest eruption fits into the passage of geologic time. So I asked my brother. I always ask my brother when I need an equation. Several years ago I asked him what my total life earnings as a poet figured out to be as an hourly wage. The answer was 8 cents an hour. Yes. Anyway, on to Mt. Saint Helen.


Mt. Saint Helen and Mt. Rainier

___________________________________________________________

"Here are my calculations:

We actually don’t need to bring humans into the process, unless one thinks that our evil ways with the body politic have upset the mountain again.


Mt. Saint Helen's new dome peeking up over crater edge

Contrary to the early century Christian scholars who thought the earth was 144,000 years old, the scientist think its more like 5 billion years old. Putting in the zeros the number looks like this 5,000,000,000,000. Of course we scientist don’t like to waste things much even if they are zeros, either do Norwegians, so we use a short notation and write 5E+9, which means a five followed by nine zeros after it. The E stands for exponent, what ever that is. So if there is a 70% change of Mt. Saint Helens getting pissed off this year and we assume that she only get pissed on very occasionally, for you see she is a cool mountain, lots of snow, and so the chance of it getting pissed off over the age of the earth is this…

Let’s just first figure out what percent one year is compared to the age of the earth. That is easy..

1 year/ age of earth = 1/5,000,000,000,000

Now we are wasting zeros again, so we write this the stingy Norwegian math way 1/5E+9 was is approximately 0.5E-9. We use the minus sign after the E to denote how many zeros in front of the nine. So one year equals 50E-9 % of the earth life. Notice we moved the zeros around converting from fraction of 0.5 to percent 50%.

So then multiple that by 70%, which reduces it to a chance of say about 35E-9% which is a very small number by our normal measures


Satellite image of Mt. Saint Helen crater and new dome

But this calculation has a flaw because the mountain has not been around since the beginning of the earth. Mt. Saint Helens is more like a zit on the nose of the earth. When it gets squeezed, out comes earth blood and puss, which for the earth is red lave and white ash.

So what do humans have to do with all this? Humans have been waking around the zit for about 5E+3 years which is about 30 seconds of the history of the entire earth.

On a related subject I thought I might write a book for kids. Here is the title:

"Mathematical Ecology For 9 Year Olds or How I Learned To Get Even With My Big Sister"

___________________________________________________________

Little brothers! They never really do grow up. I can count change.

Bushman Flub n Fumble

President Pinch Face

Watching George Bush, the President of the United States, flub and fumble like he did during the debate was not only sad, it was chilling. He clearly hasn't got what it takes in an unscripted situation. He manages okay speaking from notes, to hand picked followers. But this is not why we elect a President. The President must be able to speak for all of us in difficult situations. For this Bush is exceptionally UN-qualified. He even flubbed and fumbled at the United Nations. People wanted to work with him but when they wouldn't immediately co-sign his plans for a pre-emptive strike, he sighed. He squirmed. He fussed. He pouted. He picked up his toys and went home. And he started his war on his own. Now he tells us, "it's hard work"; that he, "sees it on TV". He pleads he's doing the best job he can, "but it's hard work folks. Everybody knows it HAARD WORK". Christ! The guy's not only a dummy. He's a menace!

His campaign promise to us is that he will, "stay the course". That's not comforting. That means George Bush is incapable of keeping up with reality, on the ground, as more is revealed. One plan fits all. Overkill. Some policy! Whether or not he gets re-elected, his oil grab has already shamed and left us with a painful legacy of distrust, ridicule, resentment, hatred and unnecessary suffering.

And at home Georgie took the healthy budget he inherited from Clinton and turned it into an unprecedented national debt of $142 billion. And that debt is increasing by $177 million per day. That's $7.4 million per hour or $122,820 per minute. $122,820 a minute! Every sixty seconds the United States is another $122,820 in the hole! I don't know about you, but I sure could use a minute's worth of money from Bush's war chest. So much for Republicans being for small government. His solution? Privatize. Let Corporate Amerika run the show...like Cheney's Enron. Lovely.

Over 1,000 Americans have already been killed in Iraq and over 12,000 Americans have been treated for illness, non-combat injury and combat injury (7,000) since March of 2002. That toll rises daily. And at least 10,000 Iraqi citizens have been killed so far and hundreds of thousands more wounded. There never were any WMDs but Bush was too antsy to wait and find that out the peaceful way. He didn't want to wait.

An action is judged by its results. Findings show that Saddam Hussein never was a member of al-Qaida. But he was a lynch pin in the stability of the Middle East. He kept his own warring factions at home, under one roof. Now he's gone, a sovereign nation is in shambles, and Osama bin Laden, the leader of al-Qaida, the man who did mastermind the 9-11 attack, is still free and planning more attacks. And Iraq now is a hot house for terrorists and the price of oil has never been higher. Just today al-Qaida released a new tape urging Muslim youth to "take the initiative like the United States and wage a preventive war". Bush should be flattered. Imitation is the highest compliment. But talk about sad? Here's what's really sad. Dead Iraqi children are now the poster children inspiring militants everywhere. What does Georgie do? He sticks in his thumb, pulls out a turd and says, "It's HAAAARD WORK."

Listen to the man himself. He says it best. It's vintage George. http://www.pleasurecaptains.com/favor/howsmall.html

I'm voting for Kerry. He's not just the other choice. He's the better choice.

Bush in a NUTshell

Here's a fun little compilation from last night's debate which isolates that folksy charm Dubya's supporters are so fond of. How Bush Did.

Presidential Debate #1

Kerry did a great job in the debate tonight. He knows the facts, understands the realities we are facing, and delivered real answers. He was dignified. His presence and intelligence commanded respect.

Bush was rigid, jittery, dull-witted and out of touch with reality. He relied on rhetoric, sentiment and one-liners. His only promise, more of the same. Bush doesn't know the difference between a rope and a snake. I have to hand it to him though. This evening he did seem to realize that he was in the presence of the better man. I bet Bush's speech writers and coaches were writhing in their seats watching Slow Boy sweat and squirm in front of the cameras.

Obviously Bush is coached to stick to one idea, that he is a Great Leader because he does "not change his approach under any circumstances". So I ask you this. The car you are in is headed over the cliff yet the driver insists on "staying the course". Do you let him stay at the wheel or do you peel him off and get back the car back on the road? I peel him off.

Second Hand Wedding

The Obscure Store just posted a link to about a wedding between a Omaha Goodwill employee and a customer. He met her while she was working at the store, they dated, fell in love and decided to get married, at the Goodwill. They also decided to purchase as many wedding items from the store as possible. They did a good job of it finding, among other things, her wedding dress, the cake topper, guest book, champagne glasses, and the invitation kit. Many of the items were still in their original wrapping.

I'd forgotten until I read the story that I went to second hand store wedding one time. However, the bride and groom were not as organized as the Brozacs from Omaha. There was no guestbook. In fact, there wasn't really any guests. Besides a couple of Goodwill employees, I was the only person who attended. I loved it. I think everything must have been second hand including the cake which looked like one of those day old delights that finds its way to charitable organizations. It was near closing time so the ceremony, held unceremoniously in one of the isles, was brief. There was no special decorations. The Justice read the parts, they nodded, we smiled benignly and it was over. They cut the cake, the moment dissolved and we all went our separate ways. I never did find out their names but they didn't seem to mind at all.

TV Time

I would like to tell you about the ancient, stone knife blade I came across during my last camping trip in central Nevada. I would like to tell you about the chilling crossroads we re-visited near Area 51. At the moment, I can’t. I just spent the last few days in Oregon and my mind is completely polluted by the Brain Drain (television). My god! I’m so glad we don’t have a TV. The feverish spin of the election “news” is so polluting. I found I was watching more television to counter act the effect of watching some television. At home, I get my news online. I control the sources and the pace. The dis/ease spewing from the propaganda machines of Fox and CNN etc. is really unsettling. After a couple of days of being force fed poison pap, I felt ill. I can see why TV is the preferred brain-washing tool of Corporate Amerika and its agents in Washington DC. It works.

The first time I voted, I voted for Ronald Reagan. Don’t get me wrong. It wasn’t because I thought Reagan would make a good president. Even though I was living on a religious commune and barely knew what year it was, I knew Reagan was an asshole. I just didn’t care who was president. However, it was the opinion of our spiritual leaders was that voting for Reagan was good because “preaching would be so much better after the war” (he would start). So I voted for Reagan.

The other night, instead of sleeping, I lay awaking thinking that maybe Bush should win this election. After all, he deserves shit on his face, for all the shit he’s hurled at the fan. Maybe after four more years of his ever increasing shit storm, people would wake up…. blahblahblah. But, the fact is, we don’t learn “later”. We either learn or we don’t. Plus, it already is later and the behind the scene guys running the Bush administration are the same guys that ran the Reagan administration…the good old boys over at the Project for the New American Century, moldy wine in new bottles. They are everyone’s enemy and Bush is merely their latest poster boy.

But the brain dead dummy christian religious fanatics have fallen for an illusion of security, sweetened with the promise that gays will go away and creationism will be re-enthroned as the state philosophy. These dopes are simply the well-fed counterparts of the muslim (etc.) fanatics. In fact, the evangelicals, whatever name they give their “god”, are closer to each other than to anybody else on the planet. And the christian and muslim extremists are out of the same pod. And what particularily erks me is that they are both lopsided, oppressive patriarchies claiming exclusive access to The One and Only True and Jealous God who just happens to want men to control women, for their own good of course.

But for however smart they claim to be, people who can but don’t vote are no better. Silence is compliance. After I left the commune, I was dejected for a long time. For all the soul sucking, it’s hard transitioning out of the safely cloistered world of a religious community. I was pretty numb but it life returned. Eventually there was evan a local measure on the ballot I actually felt strongly about. A first. About fifteen minutes before the polls closed I found myself directly across the street from the library where the voting was taking place. But instead of going over and casting my ballot I gave in to the old thought, “Oh well. Why bother? One vote won’t make a difference one way or another.” The measure I would have voted for lost by one vote. So vote, damn it.

Oh, and if you want to watch the so-called debate online and comment afterwards go to Talk Left.

Requiem for a Cockroach

La Mort de Ha'penny
We got home from camping yesterday to find out that Ha'penny had died. There was an unseasonal cold snap the day before and the drunken neighbor who was watching over things didn't think to turn the heat on. She was the baby of the bunch and just got too cold. Bummer. This Christmas we would have had her three years. I can't really blame the neighbor. Cockroaches are cold-blooded so I always meant to get a heat pad for them but didn't get around to it until yesterday. Delicata and Nugget are pretty happy about it but sadly it's too late for Ha'penny.


La Delicata and Ha'penny with Nugget on tube.
It's funny the things we can get attached to. Mr. Lee and I were really shocked when Ladybug gave us three giant, hissing Madagascan cockroaches as our Big Present, Christmas 2001. I have to admit, cockroaches were not on the Wish List. We named them La Delicata the big fat pig, Nugget because, after all, we are in Nevada and Ha'penny because she was the watermelon seed sized baby who hitchhiked a ride in the shavings. There were only supposed to be two. But life is life, big or small, and she became part of mine. So I will miss her now and then. I put a chunk of crystal in the terrarium as a place holder marking the mystery of things.

Delicata, Nugget and the Ha'penny Stone

Tonopah Public Library

Tonopah is half ghost town located along highway 395 in Nevada, but as long as it has a gas station it will never die. I happen to really like Tonopah and am here for the weekend at a conference. Lucky me. It's got a fantastic museum, a wonderful old graveyard and creepy, decrepit buildings such as the abandoned Mizpah Hotel which is perpetually for sale; plus plenty of boarded-up miner shacks, not much bigger than the cots they once sheltered, to make even the dirt alleys ripe or rotten (according to your perspective) with history. Tonopah has had several boom and bust cycles but is just too mean to die. The surrounding playa is dotted with sun-bleached pyramid shaped piles of tailings left by crazed miners ransacking the desert for gold. It sprawls between several wind carved peaks but even they have been shaved down to nubs and there's a defunct mine pit right in the center of town. But I digress.

I just checked my website and found that none of the photos are loading! Fuck! It may be that the library's computers are too slow or their settings are super restricted, something along those lines, but other sites load just fine. If you have a second, I'd really appreciate it if you'd check a couple of links for me and let me know if you see the images. If you go to the Nevada Journal (and can see anything) check out the photo of Bill Bailey, Sheik of the Desert. I took that in the Tonopah Museum. From the looks of things, Bill Bailey was high up in the social hierarchy here perhaps only a tier or two down from Madame Taxscine, Tonopah's favorite Madame fondly referred to as the Little Desert Mother. She's in the Nevada Journal too. Here's those links: Ashabot - Nevada Journal
It's undoubtedly my fault but I don't know what I'm doing wrong. I check my site from other computers whenever I get the chance and usually things are okay. But this is bad. I don't know crap about building a website. I just bang around in FrontPage and hope I get things right. If anyone has any tips, I'd really appreciate hearing from you. You can leave a comment here or email me directly at ... ashaATashabotDOTcom ... I'll pick it up when I can. I'd prefer hearing from you in email so I have a better chance of picking your brain, but then maybe you don't want your brain picked.

In happier news from the road, John called this morning just minutes before we left. He got home about 10 last night!!! I was ecstatic. I wish they'd all come home. NOW.

Outback and Apple Pie

It's late and we're leaving early in the morning for the back country. Sorry. I hate calling it that. Sounds so affected. But it's better than saying "outback", even thought it's perhaps a more accurate image. But "outback" sounds completely phony to me. What the hell? I'm not in Australia. But Nevada is a true and great wilderness. We will be completely off the grid. Sorry for using another cliche but it's a good image. That's exactly where we'll be. A cell phone wouldn't work, if we had one. The jeep is packed and both Mr. Lee and I are drooped over our keyboards, too wired to sleep. But we're leaving in 5 hours so I'm going to go now.

But one thing. I'm kind of superstitious about mentioning good things until I know for sure, but I'm going to take a risk and tell you anyway. Otherwise, I won't be able to say anything for a week or two. My son John is coming home! He's not going to Iraq after all, at least right now. If you don't know, he was recently deployed along with the rest of his Montana National Guard Unit and has been training in Texas for the last couple of months. But Congress sets tine limits on overseas duty and because he has already served abroad he would exceed them before the rest of his Unit. He wasn't told before he left. Once they're deployed, some guys "volunteer" to extend. He didn't, thank god. He was supposed to arrive home today but I haven't heard anything yet. Anita told me that he called the university when he found out he was returning and got permission to start classes late. I'm delighted! What a twist!! Oh my god!!! Last I heard, she stayed up late last night and baked him an apple pie.

Liar's Test

How can you tell when President Bush is lying?
His lips are moving.

You Don't Have to be Smart to be Mean

Finch and Feeders.

Case in point. I bought a cheap ass bird feeder the other day for the finches. Now finches are in need of a little TLC. They are those tiny song birds about 2 inches tall and, due to all the development and in particular the neighborhood cats, they are disappearing at an alarming rate. So a while ago I bought them a bird sock. They love it. The problem is the bigger birds love it too, gobble the seeds and in the process, drill out the holes. So I bought this cheap ass tube. It's clear plastic with four feeder posts. You can easily see the seed through the tube but the only way to get at it is via the slits made exclusively for finches. I envision a day when only the tiny song birds will dine at the tube. Of course they all hate it and have, for the most part, been ignoring the damn thing. The bag is much more bird-friendly. It's made of soft, perforated material they can easily cling to and nibble to their hearts content. And sometimes I think they riding the bag in the windjust for the fun of it. Anyway, I am slowly weaning them off of it. I only fill it a little bit and letting it hang empty for a while everything it gets empty. The result is that gradually the finches are using the new feeder and the larger birds are going elsewhere.

But not the dummy. This afternoon, two finches were eating from the new tube and one big guy. One big, dumb guy. He was pecking at the clear plastic and couldn't figure out for the life of him why he wasn't getting what what he so clearly saw right in front of him. He's like George Bush. Bush's words and actions don't match either, they don't even make any sense. Anyway, sorry for the slip into politics. Where was I? Oh yes. Birds. The other day the dummy noticed that the finches were getting seed, so he reached over, pecked them away then went back to the pecking at the outside of the tube. Dumb and mean. Like Bush.

GOBs

SICK and TIRED of government "by the GOBs, for the GOBs? Me too. Here's a good rant on subject. GOBs, of course being the "Good Old Boys". If they make it through this upcoming election, we have only ourselves to blame.

Polling Place Locater

Don't know where you're supposed to go to vote? Use this handy polling place locater. Click here or the JUST VOTE icon below. This site has everything, maps, sample ballots. You can even check on the status of your voter's registeration card. During the last election, I wasn't allowed to vote. They claimed I wasn't registered, which was bullshit because I was.


POLLING PLACE LOCATER

Crow's Breath

This morning it was cold enough to see a crow's breath. I've never noticed a crow's breath before. I've never noticed any bird's breath before. It was a cool way to start the day.

The crows are here a lot. They're intelligent. They can make and use tools. They're social. They can learn words. Perhaps I can strike up an acquaintance with one; share some small talk now and then. I'm not a full on birdwatcher but the crows are here anyway so what the heck? It's not a formal project but perhaps the birds and I will have a little fun. It's a chance that it's always the same crow on roof broadcasting the morning news so I'll start with her.

Also, speaking of birds.... Plonk and his girlfriend were here this morning for breakfast, so she's okay after all.

"It was the saying of Bion, that though boys throw stones at frogs in sport, yet the frogs do not die in sport but in earnest." --Plutarch

Birds in the Bush

It's the down side of being a small world. Things get around and even though deserts aren't mosquitoes friendly places, the West Nile virus has finally gotten around to Nevada.

No mosquitoes, please.

The advance of the virus is tracked by the trail of dead birds left in its wake but, as usual, anything other than human is suffering gets little press. The Reno Gazette-Journel did publish a good article on the subject though. It's definitely worth a read. I sure hope Plonk will be okay. At least he's been around lately. I haven't seen his girlfriend though so I'm worried about her. I'm worried about them all... the roudy, morning bunch of crows, the tiny finches, sparrows, and big, lovely magpies. They are all at risk, and perhaps the crows in particular. And I've been complaining about them. How quickly things can change. Sad. Very sad.

Plonk (L) and his girlfriend.

Sometimes good things happen to bad people.

It rained last night. The smell of damp sage is coming in through my window, along with the sound of dripping water. The desert light is soft and bright. And my new keyboard arrived. A belated birthday present from Mr. Lee. It's a Yamaha s90. Holy crap!

Zero G Hotel

Midnight Wishes and Zero G Bars

I hope you enjoyed this summer's Perseid Meteor Showers. Mr. Lee and I went out about 10 and made a few wishes. Wouldn't miss it for the world.... even though the light pollution was a drag. It's times like these that imagination comes in very handy. There I had a perfect view from a big, comfortable chair bobbing in outer space. I could see Earth, among limitless stars, bathing in the comet's space river. Absolutely lovely. I'm sure when space tourism becomes afforadable, dinner for two in a zero G bar or hotel restrauant will be the place to be during the Perseids. On the other hand, meteors only light up after they enter Earth's atmosphere so maybe they won't be visible from the the bar. Hmmm. Well, I'm sure they will provide us with some kind of entertainment.

I hear that Anita and John sat together (via phone) at midnight watching the Perseids, making wishes. I hope they all come true.

Through the window

Plonk and the small birds.

Bird Park Update

This morning the birds are contentedly nibbling away in the Bird Park outside my window. The weeds are taller then ever, but the taller they get, the more they like it. You could almost say the backyard has gone to the birds but it never was landscaped in the first place. We tried doing a lawn on the cheap but it failed. The effort did result in a more interesting variety of weeds however. Anyway, lawns are stupid. Especially in a desert. Think about it. In the first place, weeds are free. They don't require any watering or maintenance. You don't have to go out and weed em. Plus they hold the dirt down. And the more the merrier, as far as the birds are concerned. They love wandering around under the towering stalks eating the tasty seeds I sprinkle for them. You may think I’m exaggerating about how virle the weeds are. I only snap off the tops when they poke over the 8 foot fence. Out of respect for the neighbors. It is, truly, the least I can do.

Plonk's back since I stopped putting out so many crow goodies. As you might remember from an earlier exciting Bird Park update, he started hanging out next door while we were in Mexico and, o_pain_o_me_heart, he didn't dash home the minute we returned. But I don't blame him. He's a shy fellow and doesn't care much for raucous types. Crows land with a thump and stomp through the crowd snapping up everything in sight. They're a pain in the ass but they're grand. I wouldn't want Plonk to know this but I'd love riding around on a crow's back. Or better yet, a magpie's. But Plonk is number one around here; Plonk and the little birds. I haven't seen Plonk's girlfriend lately but then I'm staring at the monitor most of the day and forget to look out the window. Anyway, here's a photo of Plonk from this morning.

Señor Muerte and Lagarto - 08.09.04

Tarjeta del Días, número nueve

Shakespeare and the Clown

HAMLET
They are sheep and calves which seek out assurance in that. I will speak to this fellow. Whose grave's this, sirrah?

First Clown
Mine, sir.


Hamlet
Act 5 - Scene 1
-------------------------
Number nine. La Calavera is the last card of this silly Tarjeta del Días extravaganza single-digit-day-in-August birthday party I sucked myself into. Like yesterday, the bug backed out so Will volunteered to be presenter again. Poets always get the dirty work. Part of the job. So... if today's your birthday, don't say you didn't get anything. If it's not, lucky you, I guess. But then, as always, it's all in how you see things.

Whew. Some party! I'm glad it's over. I think I won't do this next year.

Shakespeare and the Spider

LEONTES

How blest am I
In my just censure, in my true opinion!
Alack, for lesser knowledge! how accursed
In being so blest! There may be in the cup
A spider steep'd, and one may drink, depart,
And yet partake no venom, for his knowledge
Is not infected: but if one present
The abhorr'd ingredient to his eye, make known
How he hath drunk, he cracks his gorge, his sides,
With violent hefts. I have drunk,
and seen the spider.


A Winter's Tale - Act 2, Scene 1
-------------------------------------------------------
Understandably, the bug did not want to attend today's Tarjeta del Días so the task naturally fell to Bill as interim copy editor at the Ashabot. Yes, it's a dirty job but poets always get the dirty jobs. At least, that's my experience.

If you're thinking that I am exploiting Wills, that he's over-qualified and the arrangement is an offense to him personally and the scholastic tradition in general...hell, doesn't bother me. Times are hard for poets so it's good for both of us. He's glad for the work and I'm glad for the help and the company. With this morning's drawing, we're debating what knowledge acceptance will not temper.

Tarjeta del Días, número ocho

El Cotorro

El Cotorro looks a little bit freaked out, but I sure feel better. Okay. You've got your friggin card for the day. Now go do something productive. Jay-sus. I've got work to do. Providing you with these 10 seconds of entertainment has already laid my morning waste.

Tarjeta del Días, número siete WHEW!