Home » 2013 » April (Page 2)

Monthly Archives: April 2013

Penguin Feeding Time

Posted on by
Friday Afternoon Penguin Feeding

Friday Afternoon Penguin Feeding

I have always loved penguins. They are at one and the same time naive and well able to defend themselves with their razor-sharp beaks. The penguins on display at the Santa Barbara Zoo, which Martine and I visited last Friday, are Humboldt Penguins from around Peru, close to the Equator.

Never have I seen any emperor penguins, though I did see one disconsolate king penguin in Tierra Del Fuego in 2011 who got lost from his group and wound up with a colony of Magellanic and Gentoo Penguins on Isla Martillo in the Beagle Channel. (See picture below.)

Lost King Penguin in Argentina

Lost King Penguin in Argentina

That King Penguin was making a nuisance of himself by trying to mate with the smaller local penguins, who were having none of that particular type of miscegenation.

Why do Martine and I like the Santa Barbara Zoo instead of the much larger one at Griffith Park in Los Angeles? It seems that every time we go to the L.A. Zoo, they are undergoing major construction, forcing large crowds of people into narrow walkways past some upcoming future attraction. Until that future attraction arrives in the sweet by-and-by, we would be assailed by countless strollers wielded by desperate parents pushing their progeny through a surly mob. The future is nice, but I usually make my judgments based on the present.

There is some construction going on at the Santa Barbara Zoo, but it is small-scale compared to the pharaonic scale of L.A.

I’ve always loved zoos. We had a good time in November 2011 at the Buenos Aires Zoo, and I am toying with the idea of visiting the small Reykjavik Zoo in Iceland this June.

It was pretty hot the two days we were in Santa Barbara, but there are always a lot of shady benches for us to rest and re-hydrate ourselves.

A Change of Leeches

Ambrose Bierce

Ambrose Bierce

That I should give my hand, or bend my neck, or uncover my head to any man in mere homage to, or recognition of, his office, great or small, is to me simply inconceivable. These tricks of servility with the softened names are the vestiges of an involuntary allegiance to power extraneous to the performer. They represent in our American life obedience and propitiation in their most primitive and odious forms. The man who speaks of them as manifestations of a proper respect for “the President’s great office” is either a rogue, a dupe or a journalist. They come to us out of a fascinating but terrible past as survivals of servitude. They speak a various language of oppression and the superstition of man-worship; they carry forward the traditions of the sceptre and the lash. Through the plaudits of the people may be heard always the faint, far cry of the beaten slave.

Respect? Respect the good. Respect the wise. Let the President look to it that he belongs to one of these classes. His going about the country in gorgeous state and barbaric splendor as the guest of a thieving corporation, but at our expense—shining and dining and swining—unsouling himself of clotted nonsense in pickled platitudes calculated for the meridian of Coon Hollow, Indiana, but ingeniously adapted to each water tank on the line of his absurd “progress,” does not prove it, and the presumption of his “great office” is against him.

Can you not see, poor misguided “fellow citizens,” how you permit your political taskmasters to forge leg-chains of your follies and load you down with them? Will nothing teach you that all this fuss-and-feathers, all this ceremony, all this official gorgeousness and brass-banding, this “manifestation of a proper respect for the nation’s head” has no decent place in American life and American politics? Will no experience open your stupid eyes to the fact that these shows are but absurd imitations of royalty, to hold you silly while you are plundered by the managers of the performance?—that while you toss your greasy caps in air and sustain them by the ascending current of your senseless hurrahs the programmers are going through your blessed pockets and exploiting your holy dollars? No; you feel secure; power is of the People, and you can effect a change of robbers every four years. Inestimable privilege—to pull off the glutted leech and attach the lean one!—Ambrose Bierce, Antepenultimata (1912)

I Get Scammed

Posted on by | 7 Comments
Doesn’t Look Like a Crime Scene, Does It?

Doesn’t Look Like a Crime Scene, Does It?

If I haven’t posted the last couple of days, it’s because Martine and I took the weekend off and drove to Santa Barbara. We were staying at the idyllic-looking Marina Beach Motel on Bath Street right near the coast in Santa Barbara. It was an ideal location, midway between the marina and Stearns Wharf with their seafood eateries.

Unfortunately, Martine is still not feeling up to par with the traveling pains around her back and shoulder blades (fibromyalgia?). She got tired quickly, and she wasn’t able to sleep comfortably on the king-sized bed in the motel because the mattress was too mushy for her. Also, she was still too exhausted to do much walking at the tourist attractions we visited, about which you will be hearing over the next few days.

More seriously, last night as I was dozing off in the motel room, I received a phone call purportedly from the front desk. It was one “Stacy Anderson” to tell me that the registration records for eighteen rooms in the motel had been lost because of a computer glitch, and would I dictate the relevant info to her over the phone? Because I was groggy and my critical faculties were not operating at par, I complied—including giving “Stacy” my credit card info.

As Bugs Bunny, would say, “Whatta maroon!” Just after I gave this info, I was given an 8-digit “confirmation number” (94184437) and told that I would get 40% off my bill for helping them out. It was at that point that I said the big “Uh oh!” and threw my clothes on.

Naturally, the night crew, who were sitting around sharing a pizza, had no idea of who “Stacy Anderson” was, nor had they called, nor was there anything wrong with their computer. I ran back to my room, picked up my cell phone, and called U.S. Bank to report a credit card fraud. Sure enough, they had already run up a $320 charge with Access Secure Deposits, which I denied having initiated. My credit card was promptly canceled, and I scissored it and distributed the pieces across a wide swath of Southern California.

If you are staying at a hotel or motel, you would do well to distrust any communications over the land line telephone in your room. If it is from the “front desk,” tello them you’ll be right there—and hang up! Don’t be a fool like me.

God Hates Westboro Baptist Church

Posted on by | 2 Comments
Gonzo Picketer for So-Called “Westboro Baptist Church”

Gonzo Picketer for So-Called “Westboro Baptist Church”

The “Westboro Baptist Church” is no more a church than I am the Pope of Islam. They are a right-wing group that delights in fomenting outrage by picketing events where the vast majority of people attending are against their believes. That doesn’t bother the folks at WBC, who say on their website: “0 – nanoseconds of sleep that WBC members lose over your opinions and feeeeellllliiiiiings.” Also on the same page is a counter of the number of souls God has cast into hell since the web page was loaded. (Yeah, like they know!)

At a time when so much that is called political discourse is actually nothing but grandstanding in front of the media, WBC holds down a particularly odious niche. After all, their website is called GodHatesFags.Com. Whenever some disaster occurs, you can count on these hucksters to tell us all that we had it coming because of our tolerance of gays or something else these misguided white people hate or feel threatened by.

I do not think that WBC will be around for much longer: How much further can they go without bringing peoples’ wrath down on their heads or violating the law in some gross way?

So enjoy them while you can.

Dribbling Dritskers and Elf-Frighteners

Posted on by | 1 Comment
The Hill of Helgafell Just South of Stykkisholmur

The Hill of Helgafell Just South of Stykkishólmur

The old Vikings had a word for it. I learned about it last night as I was reading the thirteenth century Saga of the People of Eyri (also known as the Eyrbyggja Saga).In it, we learn about Thorolf Moster-Beard who dedicated a temple to his namesake god, Thor, atop Helgafell, a smallish hill near his farm at Thorsnes (now called Stykkishólmur) along the south shore of Breidafjórd. Let’s use the words of the skald who wrote the saga:

He named this mountain Helgafell and believed that he and all his family on the headland would go there when they died. At the place where Thor had come ashore, on the point of the headland, Thorolf held all court sessions and he established a district assembly there. He considered the ground there so sacred that he would not allow it to be defiled in any way, either by blood spilt in rage, or by anybody doing their elf-frighteners there—there was a skerry [small rocky islet] named Dritsker (Shit-Skerry) for that purpose.

Now this is a longish lead-in to the point I am trying to make, which is that television and the other news media are so full of people saying such ridiculous things leading variously to outrage (on the part of all right-thinking people) or pride (on the part of American Conservative wing-nuts). I am referring to people such as Wayne LaPierre; the “Reverend” Pat Robertson; Ted Nugent; Senators Lindsay Graham of South Carolina, Jim Imhofe of Oklahoma, and Rand Paul of Kentucky; Michele Bachmann; Sarah Palin; and Rush Limbaugh. Whenever they move their lips, all that comes out are various shapes and scents of dritskers and elf-frighteners.

Perhaps there should be a skerry someplace to which they can all be transported and where they can practice their creativity without scaring the dogs and children.

If you want to see more pictures of the area around Helgafell, where I will be visiting this June, check out The Magic of Iceland, from where I hijacked the above pic, which is actually one of the least interesting of the bunch.

“Grassed Down and Forgotten”

tess

Cover of Tess of the D’Urbervilles

The past was past; whatever it had been it was no more at hand. Whatever its consequences, time would close over them; they would all in a few years be as if they had never been, and she herself grassed down and forgotten. Meanwhile the trees were just as green as before; the birds sang and the sun shone as clearly now as ever. The familiar surroundings had not darkened because of her grief, nor sickened because of her pain.

She might have seen that what had bowed her head so profoundly—the thought of the world’s concern at her situation—was founded on an illusion. She was not an existence, an experience, a passion, a structure of sensations, to anybody but herself. To all humankind besides Tess was only a passing thought. Even to friends she was no more than a frequently passing thought. If she made herself miserable the livelong night and day it was only this much to them—’Ah, she makes herself unhappy.’ If she tried to be cheerful, to dismiss all care, to take pleasure in the daylight, the flowers, the baby, she could only be this idea to them—’Ah, she bears it very well.’ Moreover, alone in a desert island would she have been wretched at what had happened to her? Not greatly. If she could have been but just created, to discover herself as a spouseless mother, with no experience of life except as the parent of a nameless child, would the position have caused her to despair? No, she would have taken it calmly, and found pleasure therein. Most of the misery had been generated by her conventional aspect, and not by her innate sensations.—Thomas Hardy, Tess of the D’Urbervilles

Another Tax Season Over and Done With

Posted on by
You Won’t Find Me on the Side of Late Filers

You Won’t Find Me on the Side of Late Filers

I hope that this will be the last tax season I have to live through. It was by far the worst, mostly because of the same clients who—every year—wait until the last minute to get their information to us. I would probably lose a lot of these people by attaching late charges of 100% for all information submitted after, say, March 25. But my boss doesn’t want to get rid of these deadbeats, so the last few days are always a horror.

Perhaps it’s getting time for me to retire. Part of the problem is that the firm’s president thinks I’m an accountant. I’m not: I’m just a very good specialist on accounting software—not on tax law per se. I don’t get to go to the continuing education classes, and I am totally ignorant on how to prepare returns for trusts, corporations, foundations, partnerships, and estates. And yet I am consulted as if I knew about tax law for all those entities.

 

“It Will be Summer—Eventually”

Posted on by
A Poem from Emily Dickinson Looking Forward to Summer

A Poem from Emily Dickinson Looking Forward to Summer

As this year’s horrible tax season grinds to a close, I look forward to having weekends to myself once again, and time to enjoy them with Martine. Now, as often, I turn to the poems of Emily Dickinson to express my feelings:

It Will Be Summer—Eventually
by Emily Dickinson

 It will be Summer — eventually.
Ladies — with parasols —
Sauntering Gentlemen — with Canes
And little Girls — with Dolls —

Will tint the pallid landscape —
As ’twere a bright Bouquet —
Tho’ drifted deep, in Parian —          [porcelain, snow?
The Village lies — today —

The Lilacs — bending many a year —
Will sway with purple load —
The Bees — will not despise the tune —
Their Forefathers — have hummed —

The Wild Rose — redden in the Bog —
The Aster — on the Hill
Her everlasting fashion — set —
And Covenant Gentians — frill —          [blue flowers

Till Summer folds her miracle —
As Women — do — their Gown —
Or Priests — adjust the Symbols —
When Sacrament — is done —

“It will be Summer—eventually” (#342) by Emily Dickinson, from The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson. © Back Bay Books, 1960. Reprinted without permission.

I am curious about that concluding dash in the poem. I cannot help but think that it is deliberate and contains its own message, such as: And the whole process will be repeated again one more time.

News On Demand

Posted on by
A Horrific Video of Bashar’s Jets Bombing a Village Filled with Refugees

A Horrific Video of Bashar’s Jets Bombing a Village Filled with Refugees

You don’t have to watch Faux News any more to find out what’s going on in the world. Salon.Com has published a link to Ifiles, which contains links to investigative reporting you may not get when you watch rancid sausage being squeezed through Sean Hannity’s lips. I was entranced by two videos currently available:

The first is almost half an hour long and shows footage of a bombing raid by Bashar al-Assad’s air force on the village of al-Bara in the north of Syria. Some dozen or two people were buried under rubble when two heavy bombs hit within 400 meters of each other. Typically, the jets make one pass, and loop around and return about 15-20 minutes later, when a crowd has gathered to dig out the victims of the first blast. We owe this frightening footage to FRONTLINE reporter Olly Lambert, who does a great job showing us the panic and the community spirit of people trying frantically to help one another when they don’t have the wherewithal to do so effectively.

The second was an amusing commentary on the failures of international reporters to get to the bottom of one continuing story: Somali piracy on the high seas. Naturally, it’s too dangerous to go to Somalia; so reporters are going to Kenya and interviewing enterprising Africans (some of whom are in fact Somalis) pretending to be pirates. This way the news media get their story, and the “pirates” get some money to support themselves in their nefarious venture. These pretend pirates have probably never even been in a boat.

 

 

Kimilsungia

Posted on by | 2 Comments
A North Korean Flower Show with—What Else?—A Model of a Missile

A North Korean Flower Show with—What Else?—Models of Armed Missiles

The world is wondering where North Korea’s bellicose rhetoric will lead them. On one hand, some political analysts say that there will be a missile launch, but without a nuclear warhead, aimed in the general direction of South Korea and/or Japan. (John Kerry will be in the area on Sunday, and Monday is the birthday of Kim Il Sung, grandfather of present DPRK leader Kim Jong Un.) In this interpretation, the whole thing is merely a form of theater to exact concessions from South Korea and the United States.

My own feeling is that North Korea may attack some isolated island or other outlying piece of the peninsula not presently under their control, but claimed by them. In this case, there would be South Korean casualties aplenty; and the South will be attempted to launch a massive counterattack. In this event, the U.S. would probably get involved because of ongoing treaty obligations, though there would be a tug-of-war between Hawks and Doves as to the best response.

If Kim Jong Un is doing all this because he is comfortable wearing the vampire mantle of authority traditionally exercised by the Terrible Kims, he may be in some danger from forces inside his country, especially in the military. The North Korean army has not done any appreciable fighting in the last sixty years, and they have been a privileged and cosseted force within their country. Famines do not touch the DPRK armed forces: They get whatever they want. It kind of reminds me of the Praetorian Guard in the days of the Roman emperors.

Incidentally, the blossoms in the flower show illustrated above have been named Kimilsungia, after the eldest of the Kims.