My Dang Notebook

Day Lily ... Dwarf Rootstocks

2012-01-29T00:09:00.000-05:00

Sonya… set off for St Petersburg with the intention of petitioning foran audience with the Tsar, so she could ask him personally forpermission to publish The Kreutzer Sonata. It was granted onthe proviso that the story was only published as part of themulti-volume collected works that were less readily available tovulnerable younger readers. …

Sonya’strip to St Petersburg was another nail in the coffin of the Tolstoys’marriage. Tolstoy regarded the very idea of petitioning the Tsar asdemeaning, and he wished for no profits to be made from his writing.… Unceasing arguments now led Tolstoy to make a decision torenounce all his property. … The arguments with Sonya continuedwhen Tolstoy insisted she send to the press a letter announcing hisrenunciation of the copyright on his writings. It finally appeared inall of Russia’s major newspapers on 19 September 1891.

Thewhole experience of dividing up his estate reminded Tolstoy of afamous antecedent, and he told his children to go away and read KingLear. It was probably the only time in his life that he actuallyrecommended Shakespeare, but he had clearly been ruminating on KingLear for a while.

[TOLSTOY:A RUSSIAN LIFE]

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JohannesEvangelista Purkinje [1787-1869] is remembered for many scientificfindings including the Purkinje fibers in the heart … but for theevening garden the most important discovery was the understanding ofthe Purkinje phenomenon, the shift in the relative apparentbrightness of red and green as compared to yellow and blue in dimlight.

Onlythe cones in our eyes can distinguish color; the rods located withinthe periphery of the retina are colorblind. The rest of the eye cansee blue and yellow while the fields for red and green are restrictedto the eye’s center section. Purkinje demonstrated that in dimlight the ability to see red and green disappears and we are leftwith blue and yellow plus black, white, and shades of gray. As thelight continues to dim, yellow fades – though it seems to glow justbefore it passes from our sight – but our eyes are still capable ofdiscerning brightness and can easily see white light. Finally onlywhite light remains in the evening garden, and though studded withstars, the deep blue of the night sky has quickly changed to black.

[PeterLoewer, THE EVENING GARDEN]

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How,exactly, dwarf rootstocks work, is ‘not really known’ … ‘recentinvestigations’ have led some unnamed pomologists to suspect thatthe rootstocks may harbor ‘some kind of virus’, which is‘probably latent’ …

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TheDAY LILY is one of the oldest plants known to man. Cultivatedthousands of years ago in China for its edible flowers, which arestill considered a delicacy, Hemerocallis fulva may well haveoriginated there as Linnaeus believed. It has been propagated bydivision for centuries, since it does not set seed. H. flava isequally ancient. It was familiar to the Egyptians and Romans and wasincluded as a medicinal herb in the influential Materia Medica by… Dioscorides in the first century. Both these lily-asphodills, asthey were then termed, reached England in the 1570s and were grown byGerard and ‘also in the gardens of Herbarists, and lovers of fineand rare plants’.

Inhis Garden Book of 1659 the gentleman gardener Sir ThomasHanmer noted that ‘we have only the Orenge, which is called the DayLilly, continuing in flower but a day, and the Yellow’. … Ahundred years later, these two day lilies were joined by a third, H.minor, from eastern Asia. As the epithet suggests, it is lesstall than the others, about 10 to 18 inches high … H. minor wasrecognized as a separate species by Philip Miller in 1768. It isdistinguished from H. flava by being smaller in every featureexcept the flower …

[VANISHINGGARDEN]

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Inthat dustiest room of a great library where "pub. docs."are stored,

Iunearthed a government report on forestry that gave, at last, a clear

ideaof the lay of the land. And here was news. We are wont to think of

theSouth as a low country with sultry climate; yet its mountain chains

stretchuninterruptedly southwestward from Virginia to Alabama, 650

milesin an air line. They spread over parts of eight contiguous States,

andcover an area somewhat larger than England and Scotland, or about

thesame as that of the Alps. In short, the greatest mountain system of

easternAmerica is massed in our Southland. In its upper zone one sleeps

underblankets the year round.

Inall the region north of Virginia and east of the Black Hills of

Dakotathere is but one summit (Mount Washington, in New Hampshire) that

reaches6,000 feet above sea level, and there are only a dozen others

thatexceed 5,000 feet. By contrast, south of the Potomac there are

forty-sixpeaks, and forty-one miles of dividing ridges, that rise above

6,000feet, besides 288 mountains and some 300 miles of divide that

standmore than 5,000 feet above the sea. In North Carolina alone the

mountainscover 6,000 square miles, with an AVERAGE elevation of 2,700

feet,and with twenty-one peaks that overtop Mount Washington.

Irepeated to myself: "Why, then, so little known?" The Alpsand the

Rockies,the Pyrennees and the Harz are more familiar to the American

people,in print and picture, if not by actual visit, than are the

Black,the Balsam, and the Great Smoky Mountains. It is true that summer

touristsflock to Asheville and Toxaway, Linville and Highlands, passing

theirtime at modern hotels and motoring along a few macadamed roads,

butwhat do they see of the billowy wilderness that conceals most of the

nativehomes? Glimpses from afar. What do they learn of the real

mountaineer?Hearsay. For, mark you, nine-tenths of the Appalachian

populationare a sequestered folk. The typical, the average mountain

manprefers his native hills and his primitive ancient ways.

Weread more and talk more about the Filipinos, see more of the Chinese

andthe Syrians, than of these three million next-door Americans who are

ofcolonial ancestry and mostly of British stock. New York, we say, is a

cosmopolitancity; more Irish than in Dublin, more Germans than in

Munich,more Italians than in Rome, more Jews than in nine Jerusalems;

buthow many New Yorkers ever saw a Southern mountaineer? I am sure that

aparty of hillsmen fresh from the back settlements of the Unakas, if

droppedon the streets of any large city in the Union, and left to their

ownguidance, would stir up more comment (and probably more trouble)

thanwould a similar body of whites from any other quarter of the earth;

andyet this same odd people is more purely bred from old American stock

thanany other element of our population that occupies, by itself, so

greata territory.

[HoraceKephart, OUR SOUTHERN HIGHLANDERS]

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'Tis pity learned virgins ever wed

Withpersons of no sort of education,

Orgentlemen, who, though well born and bred,

Growtired of scientific conversation:

Idon't choose to say much upon this head,

I'm a plain man, and in a single station,

But--Oh!ye lords of ladies intellectual,

Informus truly, have they not hen-peck'd you all?

[LordByron]

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Secondly,for directions for the Countrey, it is not to be feared, but that menof good estates may doe well there; alwayes provided, that they goewel accommodated with servants. In which I would not wish them totake over-many: tenne or twelve lusty servants being able to mannagean estate of two or three thousand pound. It is … the industry ofthe faithfull and diligent labourer, that enricheth the carefullMaster; so that he that hath many dronish servants, shall soone bepoore; and he that hath an industrious family, shall as soone berich.

[NEWENGLAND’S PROSPECT]

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MeatMagazine Compares the Humane Society to Hitler [Journalismism]

Onerock solid rule of editorial writing is, if you're against something,you always want to find a way to compare it to Hitler. This worksbecause people hate Hitler a lot—and, through the simple principleof transference, they will have an equal amount of hate for whicheverthing you compare to Hitler. This is just a basic "trick of thetrade" which cannot backfire.

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Rabbitat Rest

Thebizarre and misguided critical assault on John Updike’s reputation.

ByKatie Roiphe

Exactlythree years after his death, it’s sad to see that John Updike hassubtly fallen out of fashion, that he is left off best novels listslike the Modern Library’s, and that a faint sense of disapprovalclings to his reputation, even as his immense talent is recognized.

Infact, his immense talent is part of what people seemed to findsuspect about him in the years before his death. Critics and writershold the fact that he writes beautiful sentences against him, as ifhis writing is too well crafted, too flamboyantly, extravagantlygood. James Wood wrote a decade ago, “He is a prose writer of greatbeauty, but that prose confronts one with the question of whetherbeauty is enough, and whether beauty always conveys what a novelistmust convey.” Here one has to wonder about that special handbook of“What a Novelist Must Convey,” and the rules and regulationscontained therein.

Andyet many other writers over the years have harbored the same oddobjection. Take this critique in the New Republic (PDF): “He simplycan’t pass up any opportunity to tap dance in prose.” The idea isthat we should somehow distrust Updike because he is too good awriter. The word stylish in this way of thinking becomes a slur, asdoes the word beautiful.

Thefaux-democratic ideal of plain-spokenness, the sense that a novelistshould not write too beautifully or he sacrifices some vaguelyarticulated, semi-mystical claim to honesty, is not a million milesaway from the Sarah Palin-ish suspicion of east coast liberals, or aHarvard education, or people who know the dates of wars.

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CynthiaNixon vs. Sinead: Who'd You Rather?

AllenWest To Liberals: Get the Hell Out Of The U.S.

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TheWar On Vitamins

Dr.David Agus wages it in his new book The End of Illness. Brian Bethunesummarizes:

Vitaminsupplements would be bad enough if they were merely useless, he says.The money Americans spend yearly on vitamins—some $25 billion—issorely needed elsewhere in the medical system. They aren’t gettingmuch for their money now. Consider claims that vitamin Dsignificantly cuts cancer risks and that three-quarters of the U.S.population had insufficient levels of it. For Agus, these results arefound in not very high-grade studies; for one thing, he’s at a lossto understand how anyone can claim to have established the correctdose for appropriate D levels. The bone disease rickets is long goneand age-related fractures are not on the rise, meaning that by theonly indications we have, the population has quite enough vitamin D.

GregoryFerenstein details Agus' other prescriptions:

[W]ecombat weight loss by driving to the gym to walk on a treadmill--andthen return to hunch over laptops for hours on end. "Sitting atyour desk is akin to smoking a cigarette," he says. Prolongedsitting, independent of physical exercise, he writes, "has beenshown to have significant metabolic consequences," influencingeverything from cholesterol levels to blood sugar.

'At 10 PM the northern lights are flashing'

2012-01-28T02:53:00.000-05:00

[William]Frey was interesting, Tolstoy wrote teasingly to his sister-in-lawTanya, because of his absolute refusal to recognize ‘Anke Cake’,which was his ultimate symbol of bourgeois self-satisfaction andunearned privilege. Anke Cake was served on special occasions atYasnaya Polyana … In her recipe book, Sonya does not provideinstructions, merely a list of ingredients:

AnkeCake

1pound of flour

1/2pound of butter

1/4pound of caster sugar

3egg yolks

1glass of water

Thebutter should come straight from the cellar,

itneeds to be on the cold side.

Filling

Melta quarter of a pound of butter, then mix in two eggs, half a pound ofcaster sugar, the grated rind of two lemons and the juice of threelemons.

Heatuntil it is as thick as honey.

Therewas also a sour cream version, which involved mixing ten eggs withtwenty dessert spoons of sour cream, a cup of sugar, and two dessertspoons of flour, lining a tin with jam, pouring the mixture onto itand baking it in the oven. The puritanical Frey would have consideredit immoral to partake of something so rich and indulgent, and Tolstoywas now of the same opinion.

[TOYSTOY:A RUSSIAN LIFE]

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April19 [1852].

Turnedup the Juniperus repens onConantum yesterday with my foot, which above had a reddish and rustylook; beneath it was of an unexpectedly fine glaucous tinge with abright green inmixed. Like many things, it looks best in the rain. …

April22.

Iobserve the Parmelia saxatilis inmany places, now turned a pinkish. The yellow lily leaves appear nomore advanced than when I first observed them. A strange dogaccompanied us to-day, a hunting dog, gyrating about us at a greatdistance, beating every bush and barking at the birds, with a greatspeed …

At10 PMthe northern lightsare flashing, like some grain sown broadcast in the sky. I hear thehylas peep on the meadow as I stand at the door.

[Thoreau,JOURNAL]

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DWARFDECIDUOUS FRUIT TREES were brought to Theophrastus by Alexander theGreat’s troops; Roman orchardists grew them … in the earlydecades of the 20th century, the multitudinous types of dwarfrootstocks were organized and standardized by the folks at EastMalling, in Kent …

‘Whilethey do exert a decided dwarfing effect, rootstocks like the EMseries have one great drawback: their root spread is small and thusinadequate to hold the tree securely, necessitating staking or someother kind of support. So it is that fruit trees sometimes are‘double-worked’, or grafted in two places. In such instances, therootstock will be that of a normal, amply-rooted tree; to it will begrafted a short segment of a dwarfing stock – known as an interstem– and then on top of that will be added the scion, or fruitingupper story. … Thus the dwarf fruit tree that you buy at yournursery is probably two or even three or four trees joined together’.

[GARDENINGWITH THE NEW SMALL PLANTS]

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Gypsophilapaniculata is one of thoseindispensable plants whose role is to enhance others – a favouritein flower arrangements … In all there are some 125 species ofGypsophila, nativemainly to Europe, the eastern Mediterranean and the USSR. As the nameimplies, from the Greek gypsos, gypsum,and phylos, friendship,they are lime-loving plants and tend to inhabit arid mountains in thewild.

G.paniculata is popularly known aschalk plant and baby’s breath. It hails from Siberia and easternEurope and was introduced in 1759. It is a perennial which dies rightdown in winter and in late spring quickly burgeons into a bushy domeabout 3 to 4 feet high and as wide … From the end of June to Augustit is covered in a haze of tiny, grey-white flowers, with a slightbut warm scent. After this it becomes rather unsightly … ‘BristolFairy’ … is an improvement on … G. paniculata. Itis more robust and has a stronger constitution, and bears much largerpanicles of pure-white double flowers. The height of the plant isabout 4 feet … Another breakthrough came in 1938 with ‘Flamingo’…

Although‘Bristol Fairy’ and … ‘Flamingo’ were fairly standard itemsin catalogues until the 1960s, they are now offered by only a fewnurseries. Unless they continue to be made available and grown, theycould be in danger of disappearing from the garden scene for ever.

[THEVANISHING GARDEN]

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Ihave often admired the beautiful pink or white flowers of the muskmallow (Malva moschata)as I drove through New York and New England or even southeasternCanada. Although I know that all species of Malva aremore or less edible, and none poisonous, I had never experimentedwith this plant for food, as it doesn’t grow around my area ofPennsylvania. The plants reach one to two feet high, and the flowersresemble small hollyhocks or hibiscus blossoms, about two inchesacross. The leaves of those around Ithaca are dissected into fivelobes, which are further dissected inot more lobes bearing stillother lobes, giving the entire rounded leaf a lacy effect. Theflowers are followed by calyx-covered, wheel-like fruits resemblingundersized hollyhock buttons. These with the calyx peeled away areeaten by children and are called ‘Doll’s cheeses’.

Theselittle cheeses, only about a half-inch in diameter, are so mild inflavor that some of our nature walkers thought them tasteless. Butboiled for about thirty minutes until tender – green calyces andall – then seasoned with salt and butter, they were very good,still slightly crunchy, with a mucilaginous texture that made themslide down easily. Musk mallow is a quite passable food that Isuspect is quite nourishing, though its food value has never beenexplored.

[EuellGibbons]

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… Terpanderand

Pindarwere right in connecting poetry with bravery. The former speaks

thusof the Lacedaemonians:

"Wherethe youths are bold with the spear,

Andthe voice of the muse is clear,

Andjustice to all is dear."

AndPindar says of them--

"Wherethe old are wise in council,

Andthe young are brave in fight;

Wheresong and dance are honoured

Onmany a festal night."

Forthey represent them as being most warlike and at the same time most

poetical.

"Thesword with song full well combines,"

asthe Laconian poet says. Even in their battles the king first

sacrificedto the Muses, to remind them, it would appear, of their

educationand their former contests, that they may be bold in danger,

anddo deeds worthy of record in the fight.

Intime of war, too, they relaxed their strict rules and allowed

theiryoung men to dress their hair and ornament their shields and

costumes,taking a pride in them such as one does in high-mettled

horses.For this reason, although they all let their hair grow long

afterthe age of puberty, yet it was especially in time of danger that

theytook pains to have it smooth and evenly parted, remembering a

sayingof Lykurgus about the hair, that it made a well-looking man look

handsomer,and an ugly man look more ferocious.

Duringa campaign they made the young men perform less severe gymnastic

exercises,and allowed them to live a freer life in other respects, so

that,for them alone of all mankind, war was felt as a relief from

preparationfor war. When their array was formed and the enemy were in

sight,the king used to sacrifice a kid, and bid them all put on

garlands,and the pipers to play the hymn to Kastor; then he himself

beganto sing the paean for the charge, so that it was a magnificent and

terriblespectacle to see the men marching in time to the flutes, making

nogap in their lines, with no thought of fear, but quietly and steadily

movingto the sound of the music against the enemy. Such men were not

likelyto be either panic-stricken or over-confident, but had a cool and

cheerfulconfidence, believing that the gods were with them.

[Plutarch]

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CLOUDBERRY| BAKED APPLE BERRY | MOUNTAIN RASPBERRY | Rubuschamaemorus

… RoseFamily … The fruit consists of a few small drupes borne on a flat,broad receptacle, from which they separate when ripe. The flavor ofthe ripened fruit is pleasant, being sweet and honeylike. … TheIndians in northern Quebec cook [cooked] the berries in a sugar madefrom birch juice, and the dwellers in the posts of the Hudson BayCompany make from them a jam of rare flavor.

[THEWILD GARDEN]

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»KEVINH. WHITE, a four-term mayor of Boston who came to national prominencefor shepherding the city through years of racial violence andeconomic stagnation — and for a decadelong federal investigationinto corruption in his administration — died Friday night at hishome in the Beacon Hill section of Boston. He was 82.

ADemocrat who ran as a reformer, Kevin H. White served as mayor ofBoston from 1968 to 1984.

Mr.White had been treated for Alzheimer’s disease since 2003.

In1982, The New York Times described Mr. White as “the last of aclass of vibrant, liberal, big-city mayors of the 1960s, personifiedby John V. Lindsay of New York, who talked of civil liberties, socialjustice and neighborhood needs.”

ADemocrat who ran as a reformer, Mr. White served from 1968 to 1984.For much of this period, Boston was torn by public outrage overcourt-ordered busing to desegregate its schools. Protests turned vio…

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CASTORor CASTER SUGAR is the name of a very fine sugar in Britain, so-namedbecause the grains are small enough to fit through a sugar "caster"or sprinkler. It is sold as "superfine" sugar in the UnitedStates. Because of its fineness, it dissolves more quickly thanregular white sugar, and, so, is especially useful in meringues andcold liquids. It is not as fine as confectioner's sugar, which hasbeen crushed mechanically (and mixed with a little starch to keep itfrom clumping). Castor sugar can be prepared at home by grindinggranulated sugar for a couple of minutes in a food processor.

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THEBEST MAN is a 1960 play by American playwright Gore Vidal. The playpremiered on Broadway at the Morosco Theatre on March 31, 1960, andran for 520 performances before closing on July 8, 1961.

Vidaladapted it into a film with the same title in 1964.

RonaldReagan auditioned without success for the lead in the play's originalrun. Vidal did not think he could play a credible president.

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ByMAUREEN DOWD

WHATis it with Barack Obama’s penchant for getting in tangles withblond politicians on airport tarmacs?

Usually,tarmacs are for joyous welcomes or teary goodbyes. But No Drama Obamasaves his rare tempests for the runway.

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Pardonedby Haley Barbour, a 'free man' is on the run

Convictedfor killing a convenience store clerk in 1994, Joseph Ozment walkedout of the Governor's Mansion after being pardoned by Gov. HaleyBarbour on Jan. 8 and hasn't been seen since.

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AlGreen sales jump after Obama sings "Let's Stay Together"

Weeklyonline sales of "Let's Stay Together" jumped 490% after thePresident sang a few lines of the 1972 hit at a fundraiser atHarlem's Apollo Theater last week, Billboard magazine reported.

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DepartmentOf Housing And Urban Development Issues Report Just To Keep Name OutThere

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NEWYORK, NY—NBC Nightly News correspondent Richard Engel wasn’t surewhy he thanked anchorman Brian Williams at the end of his news story.He was the one who traveled all the way to Syria for it.

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NoLeads Sought In Asshole's Murder

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Tea… may help lower blood pressure. Scientists at The University OfWestern Australia and Unilever, state in Archives of InternalMedicine, that drinking black tea three times a day may drasticallylower a person's systolic and diastolic blood pressure.

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BerlinGoes Nuts over Rare Palm Fruit

'In nothing else is shiftless, slovenly farming so apt to betray itself as in the culture of Grass and the management of grass lands'

2012-01-27T23:52:00.001-05:00

COMMONPERSIMMON | Diospyros virginiana L.

… indays of eld, persimmon wood was used for ‘weaver’s shuttles, golfclub heads, and other products requiring hard, smooth-wearing wood’… fruit is eaten by ‘man, animals, and birds. This species, avaluable honey plant, has been cultivated for its handsome foliageand fruit since 1629. Several varieties have been developed for fruitproduction’. … seeds are easy to prepare – macerate and allowthe pulp to float away … seeds then should be thoroughly dried …may be kept in a jar at 41° … seed dormancy can be broken bystratifying in sand or peat for 60-90 days at 37-50° … sow inspring … or stratify outside instead by sowing seeds in fall at 2inches deep …

[SEEDSOF WOODY PLANTS IN THE UNITED STATES]

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Awild carrot, or Queen Anne’s lace (Daucus carota), greweverywhere. I make some use of the stringy little carrots this plantproduces, mostly to give a familiar flavor to wild stews andvegetable dishes. But the roots must be gathered in late fall orearly spring to be much good. This was the last week in June; thefirst-year plants were so tiny their carrots were thin as fish line,while second-year plants had woody, fibrous roots and were growingthree feet tall, getting ready to bloom. My friend idly broke off oneof the tender, upper stems about three-eighths of an inch in diameterand peeled off the cortex, as we had done with the charlock stems. …We tasted the peeled green stem and found it tender and crisp –while the aromatic flavor wasn’t gone, it had been tamed down to aremarkably palatable level. Also present was a pronounced carrotflavor.

Myfriend, David Benner, who is a gung-ho health food freak andvegetarian, liked the taste of raw peeled stems better than I did.That aromatic flavor was fine as a nibble, but after eating severalraw stems I began to suspect that it wouldn’t wear well for thekind of hearty eating I like to do. We gathered a supply and boiledthem in salted water for ten minutes, then buttered them – this Idig. I was elated to discover that I could add a carrot flavor and adelicious aromatic herb to wild stews and vegetable dishes at a timeof the year I had formerly considered it impossible. I will beobserving those wild carrots with a great deal more love and respectthan I have accorded them up to now.

[EuellGibbons]

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Butit is from the more ancient coal-deposits that the most

extraordinaryevidence has been supplied in proof of the former

existenceof a very different climate--a climate which seems to have

beenmoist, warm, and extremely uniform, in those very latitudes which

arenow the colder, and in regard to temperature, the most variable

regionsof the globe. We learn from the researches of Adolphe

Brongniart,Goeppert, and other botanists, that in the flora of the

carboniferousera there was a great predominance of ferns, some of which

werearborescent; as, for example, Caulopteris, Protopteris, and

Psarronius;nor can this be accounted for, as some have supposed, by the

greaterpower which ferns possess of resisting maceration in water.

Thisprevalence of ferns indicates a moist, equable, and temperate

climate,and the absence of any severe cold; for such are the conditions

which,at the present day, are found to be most favorable to that tribe

ofplants. It is only in the islands of the tropical oceans, and of the

southerntemperate zone, such as Norfolk Island, Otaheite, the Sandwich

Islands,Tristan d'Acunha, and New Zealand, that we find any near

approachto that remarkable preponderance of ferns which is

characteristicof the Carboniferous flora. It has been observed that

treeferns and other forms of vegetation which flourished most

luxuriantlywithin the tropics, extend to a much greater distance from

theequator in the southern hemisphere than in the northern, being found

evenas far as 46° S. latitude in New Zealand. There is little doubt

thatthis is owing to the more uniform and moist climate occasioned by

thegreater proportional area of sea. Next to ferns and pines, the most

abundantvegetable forms in the coal formation are the Calamites,

Lepidodendra,Sigillariæ, and Stigmariæ. These were formerly considered

tobe so closely allied to tropical genera, and to be so much greater in

sizethan the corresponding tribes now inhabiting equatorial latitudes,

thatthey were thought to imply an extremely hot, as well as humid and

equableclimate. But recent discoveries respecting the structure and

relationsof these fossil plants, have shown that they deviated so

widelyfrom all existing types in the vegetable world, that we have more

reasonto infer from this evidence a widely different climate in the

Carboniferousera, as compared to that now prevailing, than a

temperatureextremely elevated. Palms, if not entirely wanting

whenthe strata of the carboniferous group were deposited, appear to

havebeen exceedingly rare. The Coniferæ, on the other hand, so

abundantlymet with in the coal, resemble Araucariæ in structure, a

familyof the fir tribe, characteristic at present of the milder regions

ofthe southern hemisphere, such as Chili, Brazil, New Holland, and

NorfolkIsland.

[CharlesLyell, PRINCIPLES OF GEOLOGY]

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TheSouthern highlands themselves are a mysterious realm. When I

prepared,eight years ago, for my first sojourn in the Great Smoky

Mountains,which form the master chain of the Appalachian system, I

couldfind in no library a guide to that region. The most diligent

researchfailed to discover so much as a magazine article, written

withinthis generation, that described the land and its people. Nay,

therewas not even a novel or a story that showed intimate local

knowledge.Had I been going to Teneriffe or Timbuctu, the libraries

wouldhave furnished information a-plenty; but about this housetop of

easternAmerica they were strangely silent; it was terra incognita.

Onthe map I could see that the Southern Appalachians cover an area much

largerthan New England, and that they are nearer the center of our

populationthan any other mountains that deserve the name. Why, then, so

littleknown? Quaintly there came to mind those lines familiar to my

boyhood:"Get you up this way southward, and go up into the mountain;

andsee the land, what it is; and the people that dwelleth therein,

whetherthey be strong or weak, few or many; and what the land is that

theydwell in, whether it be good or bad; and what cities they be that

theydwell in, whether in tents, or in strongholds; and what the land

is,whether it be fat or lean, whether there be wood therein or not."

[HoraceKephart, OUR SOUTHERN HIGHLANDERS]

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Innothing else is shiftless, slovenly farming so apt to betray itselfas in the culture of Grass and the management of grass lands.Pastures overgrown with bushes and chequered by quaking, miry bogs;meadows foul with every weed, from white daisy up to the rankestbrakes, with hill-sides that once may have been productive, but fromwhich crop after crop has been taken and nothing returned to them,until their yield has shrunk to half or three-fourths of a tun ofpoor Hay, these are the average indications of a farm nearly run outby the poorest sort of farming. Such farms were common in the NewEngland of my boyhood; I trust they are less so to-day; yet I seldomtravel ten miles in any region north or east of the Delaware, withoutseeing one or more of them.

[HoraceGreeley, WHAT I KNOW OF FARMING]

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TheWOLF is very numerous, and go in companies, sometimes ten, twenty,more or fewer, and so cunning, that seldome any are kill'd with Gunsor Traps; but of late they have invented a way to destroy them, bybinding four MAYCRIL HOOKS … and then wrapping some Wool aboutthem, they dip them in melted Tallow till it be as round and as bigas an Egg; these (when any Beast hath been kill'd by the WOLVES) theyscatter by the dead Carkase, after they have beaten off the WOLVES;about Midnight the WOLVES are sure to return again to the place wherethey left the slaughtered Beast, and the first thing they ventureupon will be these balls of fat.

[NEWENGLAND’S RARITIES]

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»RonPaul: Liar

RonPaul knew about the content of his racist newsletters.

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'BarefootBandit' sentenced to more than six years in prison

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Drinkingeight teas a day 'cuts blood pressure and heart disease'

Havinga cup of tea has long been the preferred way for the English torelax.

Butnow scientists have found tea really does lower the blood pressureand could prevent heart disease.

Drinkingeight cups of black leaf tea, such as Earl Grey or English Breakfast,a day “significantly” cuts blood pressure, researchers at theUniversity of Western Australia found.

Volunteerswith normal to high blood pressure were given three drinks a daycontaining 429 milligrams of the plant chemicals polyphenols – theequivalent of eight and a half teas a day. A second group were givena tea-flavoured placebo.

Aftersix months, the blood pressure of the tea-drinking group had fallenby between two and three mmHg, the measurement of pressure used inmedicine.

Ablood pressure fluctuating with the heartbeat between 112 and 63 mmHgis considered healthy, while a reading fluctuating between 140 and 90is deemed high.

Ifthe experiment was emulated by the general population, the number ofpeople with high blood pressure would be cut by ten per cent and therisk of heart disease would fall by between seven and ten per cent.

“Ourstudy has demonstrated for the first time to our knowledge thatlong-term regular consumption of black tea can result insignificantly lower blood pressures in individuals with normal tohigh-normal range blood pressures,” the team, led by Dr JonathanHodgson, wrote in the journal Archives of Internal Medicine.

Previousstudies suggest adding milk to tea does not affect the body's abilityto absorb polyphenols.

Greentea is widely considered to have numerous health benefits because itis high in antioxidants. It is said to aid weight loss, preventglaucoma, reduce the risk of cancer and even treat acne.

-----

DemiMoore was barely conscious after 'smoking something'

-----

ConservativesDumb, Says Science

PennsylvaniaHouse Votes To Declare Bible Awesomest Book of 2012

-----

HowOut There Is Grover Norquist?

Soout there that if Obama and the Dems win this fall, and the temporaryBush tax cuts expire, this is his scenario:

Obamacan sit there and let all the tax [cuts] lapse, and then theRepublicans will have enough votes in the Senate in 2014 to impeach.

Today's"conservatives" would use the impeachment provision tooppose an elected president's fiscal policies. If you want to tograsp just how much contempt they really have for the Constitutionand the institutions of government - something actual conservativescare about - absorb that fact.

'What variety in the trunks of oaks! How expressive of strength are some! '

2012-01-26T00:30:00.000-05:00

‘Notstrictly a dwarf, as it is naturally a very low grower and has nolarger form, but demanding inclusion in any survey of woodyornamentals favored for small gardens, is BEARBERRY, Arctostaphylosuva-ursi. Known as KINNIKINNICK … it is a prostrate, creepingevergreen shrub that makes a delightful ground cover. Its springtimeflowers, white or tinged pink and bell-shaped, are followed by brightred berries (inedible), and its small leaves turn bronze in theautumn. Preferring sandy soil and full sunlight, it is much used atthe seashore or in rocky areas’. … as most cultivars were bredfor milder climes, they won’t grow in your area; however, a varietynamed ‘Big Bear’ seems to be ‘commendably tough’ and will behardy to at least Zone 6 … very little upkeep is needed once it isestablished …

[GARDENINGWITH THE NEW SMALL PLANTS]

==========

MOUSE-EAREDCHICKWEED | Cerastium viscosum L. (syn. Cerastium fontanum)

… winterannual … margin of bracts below flowers GREEN … pedical equalingor shorter than fruit … flowers in dense clusters … sepals withlong forward-pointing glandless hairs protruding well beyond the tip… Cerastium mutans is an annual; stick-hairy also, but hairsdo not surpass sepal tips … found in wooded slopes and calcareousareas, alluvial soils … the fruit (a capsule) is more than twice aslong as the calyx; the capsule of viscosum is less than twiceas long as the calyx …

==========

April15 [1852].

Itis, according to Emerson, the dwarf cassandra (C.calyculata of D. Don) that is socommon on the river meadows and in swamps and bogs; formerly calledan andromeda, of the Ericaceae, orHeath Family, with the uva-ursi (Arctostaphylos).Now well flower-budded. …

April16.

Whatvariety in the trunks of oaks! How expressive of strength are some! …

Howmany there are who advise you to print! How few who advise you tolead a more interior life! In the one case there is all the world toadvise you, in the other there is none to advise you but yourself.

[Thoreau,JOURNAL]

==========

SONGSPARROW! Well named! This is the modest, lowly avian minstrel of thebrier-patch – the most persistent singer of them all. …

Whenonce this sparrow has chosen a home, nothing but death will keep itfrom the beloved spot. It dodges the dogs and cats, and can hardly bedriven away. Once an inexperienced pair built a nest on the ground atthe foot of a high tree in my garden. As is so common in such casesa cat got the young. Then the birds built again in a bush; again thestealthy cat! Twice bereaved, the mated pair grieved for a while andthen fashioned a third domicile about twenty feet up in an elm treeamong dense ‘suckers’, where they escaped the notice of theirfeline enemy and reared their young in triumph.

TheSong Sparrow was one of my earliest bird acquaintances, and the veryfirst on which, at the age of thirteen, I began my self-education inthe gentle art of taxidermy. Daily after school for several days Ilabored on that mishandled bunch of feathers in an attempt to impartto it a lifelike appearance. That first ‘stuffed bird’ stood formany a year in my collection, a cherished specimen. … It had muchthe appearance of many old museum birds of that period which, asCharles Waterton puts it, were ‘stretched, stuffed, stiffened andwired by the hand of some common clown’. Since that day I havealways had a peculiar affection for the Song Sparrow, and must admitthat as its historian I am prejudiced in its favor.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

==========

CARNATION| PINK | Dianthus

Fewof our garden plants have lasted so well as the carnation, florists’flower par excellence from the seventeenth to nineteenthcenturies and again today in the modern sense of the term. Its wildprogenitor Dianthus caryophyllus, a native of central andsouthern Europe, was known to the ancients and was mentioned in thefourth century BC by … Theophrastus. He was also indirectlyresponsible for the generic name, which he gave as diosanthos,from dios, divine, and anthos, flower, and whichLinnaeus shortened to Dianthus. In Britain the history of thecarnation stretches back to the Norman Conquest, when it is supposedto have been brought over by the monks, either deliberately or, likethe wallflower, accidentally in the Caen stone imported for buildingabbeys. It was used to flavour ale and wine, whence the namesops-in-wine, and was of course endowed with vague but alwayscomforting medicinal properties. …

Inhis Paradisus of 1629 Parkinson devotes a whole chapter tothem, an honour accorded to few other plants, and lists fifty-twokinds.

[THEVANISHING GARDEN]

==========

PASSAGESFROM HAWTHORNE'S

AMERICANNOTE-BOOKS.

__________

SALEM,June 15, 1835. – A walk down to the Juniper. The shore ofthe coves strewn with bunches of sea-weed, driven in by recent winds.Eel-grass, rolled and bundled up, and entangled with it, – largemarine vegetables, of an olive-color, with round, slender, snake-likestalks, four or five feet long, and nearly two feet broad: these arethe herbage of the deep sea.

__________

Returningby the almshouse, I stopped a good while to look at the pigs, – agreat herd, – who seemed to be just finishing their suppers. Theycertainly are types of unmitigated sensuality …

==========

Mostepic poets plunge 'in medias res'

(Horacemakes this the heroic turnpike road),

Andthen your hero tells, whene'er you please,

Whatwent before--by way of episode,

Whileseated after dinner at his ease,

Besidehis mistress in some soft abode,

Palace,or garden, paradise, or cavern,

Whichserves the happy couple for a tavern.

Thatis the usual method, but not mine--

Myway is to begin with the beginning;

Theregularity of my design

Forbidsall wandering as the worst of sinning,

Andtherefore I shall open with a line

(Althoughit cost me half an hour in spinning)

Narratingsomewhat of Don Juan's father,

Andalso of his mother, if you 'd rather.

[LordByron, DON JUAN]

__________

»BarneyFrank and His Partner Are Getting Married

RetiringMassachusetts Rep. Barney Frank will marry his longtime partner JimReady, a handyman from Maine.

-----

PatSajak Admits He and Vanna White Were Often Plastered on Wheel ofFortune

ICan’t Stop Looking at This Weird Chinese Goat

Datwuz funny…do it again.

DemiMoore’s Overdose Gets the Taiwanese Animation Treatment

-----

HEIDIKLUM DATING BAT BOY

LOSANGELES - Heidi Klum split from Seal and within a day she has a newbeau: Bat Boy!

HeidiKlum interviewed a number lawyers and is ready to file for divorcefrom Seal. And now she can be with her true love… Bat Boy.

Theworld may have been stunned wh announced their divorce this pastweekend, but according to new reports, the couple had been plottingtheir separation for weeks!

Heidimet Bat Boy at a convention in New York last year and reports arethat they fell in love immediately. “Ironically, Heidi felt thatBat Boy was more of a man than Seal,” said a source close to Klum.

Oneof the reasons Heidi is divorcing Seal is because of his nastytemper, but Bat Boy has been known to fly of the handle as well. “Bat Boy is no shrinking violet either,” said Dr. Barry Leed whohas studied Bat Boy for the last ten years. “Bat Boy is a lot tohandle, but I think Klum is up to the task.”

Klumand Bat Boy plan to split their time between Hollywood and WestVirginia.

-----

WelcomeBack Kotter star Robert Hegyes dies of heart attack aged just 60

-----

Thesite of the EMPIRE STATE BUILDING was first developed as the JohnThompson Farm in the late 18th century. At the time, a stream ranacross the site, emptying into Sunfish Pond, located a block away.Beginning in the late 19th century the block was occupied by theWaldorf-Astoria Hotel, frequented by The Four Hundred, the socialelite of New York.

…

OnMay 1, 1947, 23-year-old Evelyn McHale leapt to her death from the86th floor observation deck and landed on a United Nations limousineparked at the curb. Photography student Robert Wiles took a photo ofMcHale's oddly intact corpse a few minutes after her death. Thepolice found a suicide note among possessions she left on theobservation deck: "He is much better off without me ... Iwouldn’t make a good wife for anybody". The photo ran in theMay 12, 1947 edition of LIFE Magazine and is often referred to as"The Most Beautiful Suicide". It was later used by visualartist Andy Warhol in one of his paintings entitled Suicide (FallenBody).

OnDecember 2, 1979, Elvita Adams jumped from the 86th floor, only to beblown back onto the 85th floor and left with a broken hip.

Onlyone person has jumped from the upper observatory. On November 3,1932, Frederick Eckert of Astoria, Queens, ran past a guard in theenclosed 102nd floor gallery and jumped a gate leading to an outdoorcatwalk intended for dirigible passengers. Eckert's body landed onthe roof of the 86th floor observation promenade.

-----

Inthe latest tell-people-what-they-want-to-hear speech on the endlesselection circuit, Republican presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich madea remarkable promise: he wants a moon base. My response was, hell,don't we all?

Aheadof next week's primary, Newt "grandiose is my middle name"Gingrich told an audience on Florida's space coast that, by the endof his second term in the Oval Office America would have a permanentbase on the moon, used for science, tourism and manufacturing. Theseare welcome words for a community that saw the last flight of thespace shuttle from the Kennedy Space Center in July 2011. With thatlast flight went thousands of local Nasa jobs and their accompanyingsupport and community services.

Therewas no indication of how anyone might pay for such an enterprise but,according to Spaceflight Now, Gingrich suggested setting aside 10% ofNasa's budget for prizes aimed at the commercial space sector.Gingrich also proposed further space travel, using a "continuouspropulsion system" that could take astronoauts to Mars.

-----

… Romneywon this debate, and probably Florida, and so the nomination. Newtcollapsed, as bullies and blowhards often do when somebody fightsback. Santorum auditioned for Romney’s VP, and greatly enhanced hischances. Ron Paul shines on, that crazy diamond.

-----

GermanCrow-Killing Group Faces Growing Backlash

Agroup of fanatic bird killers in Germany known as "theCrowbusters" has been waging a war on the birds withmilitary-grade weapons and crusader-like zeal. But their statedreasons for massacring these "feathered vermin" areunfounded, and their bloodthirstiness has irked even some huntinggroups.

-----

UNIVERSITYPARK, Pa. -- In a packed sports arena not nearly big enough to holdthe emotions of those inside, thousands of Nittany Lions fans todayare bidding one last public farewell to Joe Paterno.

Thememorial service in the 16,000-seat Bryce Jordan Center here comes aday after the former football coach, 85, was buried following aprivate family funeral.

'I am made somewhat sad this afternoon by the coarseness and vulgarity of my companion'

2012-01-25T23:49:00.001-05:00

April.12 [1852].

Itwas very pleasant to come out on the railroad in this gentle rain.The track, laid in gray sand, looks best at such a time, with therails all wet. The factory bridge, seen through the mist, isagreeably indistinct, seen against a dark-grayish pine wood. I shouldnot know there was a bridge there, if I had not been there. The darkline made by its shaded under side is most that I see here spanningthe road; the rails are quite indistinct. We love to see things thuswith a certain indistinctness.

Iam made somewhat sad this afternoon by the coarseness and vulgarityof my companion, because he is one with whom I have made myselfintimate. He inclines latterly to speak with coarse jesting of factswhich should always be treated with delicacy and reverence. I lose myrespect for the man who can make the mystery of sex the subject of acoarse jest, yet, when you speak earnestly and seriously on thesubject, is silent. I feel that this is to be truly irreligious.Whatever may befall me, I trust that I may never lose my respect forpurity in others.

[Thoreau,JOURNAL]

==========

KEFIRis closely related to yogurt, but with even stronger healthfulproperties. The term KEFIR is … Turkish … Although you can buy acommercial product labeled as ‘kefir’ in some health food stores,this is basically a cultured milk drink that does not use actualkefir starter. True kefir can be made only with a culture of kefirgrains, which are small colonies of friendly bacteria and yeasts. Allkefir grains come from an original mother culture with very ancientorigins. The grains were first used many centuries ago in theCaucasus region of Central Asia, where residents still consider kefiran important food staple, and where they enjoy some of the longestlife expectancies in the world. … its constituent organisms are anextremely symbiotic community of yeasts and bacteria that exhibitstrong probiotic qualities and are capable of beneficially colonizingthe human gastro-intestinal tract.

[FRESHFOOD FROM SMALL SPACES]

==========

In1881 Tolstoy had started work on a new novella which would in timereceive the title ‘The Death of Ivan Ilych’. He had put it asidein 1883, but would return to work on it the following year …

==========

DECUMARIAis a genus of only two known species, one native to the southeasternUSA, the other to central China. The name comes from the Latindecimus, tenth, andalludes to the fact that the petals, stamens and other parts of theflower are grouped in tens or multiples of ten. They are climbingshrubs which cling by aerial roots in the same way as ivy and areclosely related to Hydrangea, exceptthat the flowers are fertile, not partially sterile ... neither iscommon in cultivation.

[THEVANISHING GARDEN]

==========

ALUSHER or more bountiful foraging area would be hard to find than theFinger Lakes Region of New York. Anyone who goes hungry around thereneeds either more knowledge or the energy to use it! …

Oneof the most conspicuous wild plants of the area was the coarse,rough, jointed charlock or wild radish (Raphanusraphanistrum), growing up tothree feet high, with stems thicker than your finger. I’ve knownthis plant a long time but was always unable to find much use for it.Although a close relative of our garden radish, it doesn’t producean edible root. Sometimes I’ve added a few leaves to a mixed wildpot of cooked green vegetables, but they’re rather rough and hairy,quite bitter, and generally unattractive.

Myfriend and I took a closer look at this plant. The yellowish budsthat would soon be golden, four-petaled flowers were just showing. Wedecided to try these bud-clusters cooked with broccoli, but firsttasted them raw and discovered that they had a delightful pungencylike the hot mustard usually served with Chinese food. These wouldperk up otherwise dull salads and sandwiches. Finely chopped andmixed with butter, they made a complete sandwich spread, better thanmost herb butters I have tasted. Cooked, the buds were edible butnothing to brag about.

Breakingthose thick stems near the top of the plant where they were newlygrown, we found them tender, solid, and succulent inside, with arather rough cortex that peeled off easily. The peeled stems were atranslucent green, tender, juicy, and mildly pungent. They would makea good addition to a tossed salad. Boiled only five minutes in saltedwater, then seasoned with butter, they made a palatable cookedvegetable.

[EuellGibbons]

==========

TheSWAMP SPARROW is not a public character. He will never be popular ornotorious. He is too retiring to be much in the public eye, and toofond of the impassable bog and morass to have much human company; andso he comes and goes unheralded and to most people unknown. He is thedark little bird that fusses about in the muck when spring floodshave overflowed the wood roads, or slips through the grasses onmarsh-lined shores of slow-flowing, muddy rivers. Any watery, muddy,bushy, grassy place where rank marsh grasses, sedges and reeds grow –any such bog or slough where a man will need long rubber boots to getabout – is good enough for Swamp Sparrows. In such places theybuild their nests. But in migration they may appear almost anywhere,though seldom distinctly seen and recognized by ordinary observers,because of their retiring habits. When they are looked for, theysneak about, mostly under cover, and hardly show themselvessufficiently for identification, but if the observer apparently takesno interest in their whereabouts and sits quietly down, curiosity mayovercome their suspicions and bring them into view.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

==========

Ifit be true that the carcass of the mammoth was imbedded in pure ice,

thereare two ways in which it may have been frozen in. We may suppose

theanimal to have been overwhelmed by drift snow. I have been informed

byDr. Richardson, that, in the northern parts of America, comprising

regionsnow inhabited by many herbivorous quadrupeds, the drift snow is

oftenconverted into permanent glaciers. It is commonly blown over the

edgesof steep cliffs, so as to form an inclined talus hundreds of feet

high;and when a thaw commences, torrents rush from the land, and throw

downfrom the top of the cliff alluvial soil and gravel. This new soil

soonbecomes covered with vegetation, and protects the foundation of

snowfrom the rays of the sun. Water occasionally penetrates into the

crevicesand pores of the snow; but, as it soon freezes again, it serves

themore rapidly to consolidate the mass into a compact iceberg. It may

sometimeshappen that cattle grazing in a valley at the base of such

cliffs,on the borders of a sea or river, may be overwhelmed, and at

lengthinclosed in solid ice, and then transported towards the polar

regions.Or a herd of mammoths returning from their summer pastures in

thenorth, may have been surprised, while crossing a stream, by the

suddencongelation of the waters. The missionary Huc relates, in his

travelsin Thibet in 1846, that, after many of his party had been frozen

todeath, they pitched their tents on the banks of the Mouroui-Ousson

(whichlower down becomes the famous Blue River), and saw from their

encampment"some black shapeless objects ranged in file across the

stream.As they advanced nearer no change either in form or distinctness

wasapparent; nor was it till they were quite close, that they

recognizedin them a troop of the wild oxen, called Yak by the

Thibetans.There were more than fifty of them incrusted in the ice.

Nodoubt they had tried to swim across at the moment of congelation, and

hadbeen unable to disengage themselves. Their beautiful heads,

surmountedby huge horns, were still above the surface, but their bodies

wereheld fast in the ice, which was so transparent that the position of

theimprudent beasts was easily distinguishable; they looked as if still

swimming,but the eagles and ravens had pecked out their eyes."

[CharlesLyell, PRINCIPLES OF GEOLOGY]

==========

Catsdo not copulate with

arearward presentment on the part of the female, but the male stands

erectand the female puts herself underneath him; and, by the way,

thefemale cat is peculiarly lecherous, and wheedles the male on to

sexualcommerce, and caterwauls during the operation. Camels copulate

withthe female in a sitting posture, and the male straddles over

andcovers her, not with the hinder presentment on the female's part

butlike the other quadrupeds mentioned above, and they pass the whole

daylong in the operation; when thus engaged they retire to lonely

spots,and none but their keeper dare approach them. And, be it observed,

thepenis of the camel is so sinewy that bow-strings are manufactured

outof it. Elephants, also, copulate in lonely places, and especially

byriver-sides in their usual haunts; the female squats down, and

straddleswith her legs, and the male mounts and covers her. The seal

coverslike all opisthuretic animals, and in this species the copulation

extendsover a lengthened time, as is the case with the dog and bitch;

andthe penis in the male seal is exceptionally large.

[Aristotle,HISTORIA ANIMALIUM]

==========

"InjunJoe," "Jimmy Finn," and "General Gaines"were prominent and very

intemperatene'er-do-weels in Hannibal two generations ago. Plenty of

grayheadsthere remember them to this day, and can tell you about them.

Isn'tit curious that two "town drunkards" and one half-breedloafer

shouldleave behind them, in a remote Missourian village, a fame a

hundredtimes greater and several hundred times more particularized in

thematter of definite facts than Shakespeare left behind him in the

villagewhere he had lived the half of his lifetime?

Endof the Project Gutenberg EBook of WHAT IS MAN? AND OTHER STORIES, by

MarkTwain

__________

»'Onemore thing ...': George Lewis on 42 years at NBC News

GeorgeLewis, NBC News correspondent writes …

“Onemore thing.” It’s something the late Steve Jobs used to say ashe was introducing Apple’s latest gadgets, always saving the bigsurprise for the end of his presentation.

AsI end 42 years at NBC News, they’ve asked me to write “one morething” about my incredible journey — a career that’s taken meto all 50 states, 30-some countries and all of Earth’s continentswith the exception of Antarctica. (Going there is on my bucket listof places to see.)

-----

SadTaylor Swift Takes A Sad Stroll In The Rain

Whatdo you suppose she’s listening to? Surely it’s got to be Adele’s“Someone Like You” or something equally as tragic, right? … "Ohlook, a sad swan."

-----

PhotosThat Show Joe Biden Is The Drunk Uncle Of The United States

Andthese are just from last night's State Of The Union. He points! Heclose-talks! He's handsy!

-----

Ourold pal to the South, retired Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, has beenwatching these Republican debates, including the most recent one inwhich the candidates talked about Fidel Castro going to Hell. He hasnot been impressed, writing in an editorial that "the selectionof a Republican candidate for the presidency of this globalized andexpansive empire is - and I mean this seriously - the greatestcompetition of idiocy and ignorance that has ever been."

-----

Guesswhat is one of Kate Bush's favorite art forms? Right: shadowpuppetry.

-----

Hey,everybody, have you heard the good news? If Newt Gingrich is electedpresident, we can all go live on the moon! Cool…wait, what? Yep,here's what the man said earlier today:

‘Bythe end of my second term, we will have the first permanent base onthe moon and it will be American.’

-----

"Dynasty"star JAMES FARENTINO who made headlines for his 1994 conviction forstalking FRANK SINATRA’s daughter has died suddenly at 73.

APreported Farentino, who appeared in tons of movies and televisionshows, has died of heart failure after a long illness at Cedars-SinaiHospital on Tuesday.

Amonghis many films Farentino costarred alongside Kirk Douglas and MartinSheen in sci-fi film "The Final Countdown" where anaircraft carrier traveled back through time in an attempt to stop thebombing of Pearl Harbor.

Farentinonetted a Golden Globe as "Most Promising Newcomer" 1967 forhis perf in "The Pad and How to Use It."

-----

'Hewas a really cool guy:' Actor who voiced Lost in Space robot, DickTufeld, dies aged 85

'Hedgehogs copulate erect, belly to belly'

2012-01-24T23:13:00.002-05:00

Theboys steal with such earnestness that there is a story of one

whohad taken a fox's cub and hidden it under his cloak, and, though his

entrailswere being torn out by the claws and teeth of the beast,

perseveredin concealing it until he died. This may be believed from

whatthe young men in Lacedaemon do now, for at the present day I have

seenmany of them perish under the scourge at the altar of Diana

Orthias.

Afterdinner the Eiren would recline, and bid one of the boys sing, and

askanother some questions which demand a thoughtful answer, such as

"Whois the best among men?" or "How is such a thing done?"By this

teachingthey began even in infancy to be able to judge what is right,

andto be interested in politics; for not to be able to answer the

questions,"Who is a good citizen?" or "Who is a man of badrepute?" was

thoughtto be the sign of a stupid and unaspiring mind. The boy's answer

wasrequired to be well reasoned, and put into a small compass; he who

answeredwrongly was punished by having his thumb bitten by the Eiren.

[Plutarch]

==========

… the

majorityof quadrupeds copulate as best they can, the male mounting

thefemale; and this is the only method of copulating adopted by birds,

thoughthere are certain diversities of method observed even in birds.

Forin some cases the female squats on the ground and the male mounts

ontop of her, as is the case with the cock and hen bustard, and the

barn-doorcock and hen; in other cases, the male mounts without the

femalesquatting, as with the male and female crane; for, with these

birds,the male mounts on to the back of the female and covers her,

andlike the cock-sparrow consumes but very little time in the operation.

Ofquadrupeds, bears perform the operation lying prone on one another,

inthe same way as other quadrupeds do while standing up; that is

tosay, with the belly of the male pressed to the back of the female.

Hedgehogscopulate erect, belly to belly.

[Aristotle,HISTORIA ANIMALIUM]

==========

Afew DWARF CONIFERS have acquired their reduced stature in response toenvironmental stresses, the most notable being the dwarf balsam fir(Abies balsamea ‘Nana’) … in the White Mountains of NewEngland, and the dwarf mountain pine or Pinus mugo of Europe. …

Piceaabies ‘Little Gem’ was bredfrom a witch’s broom that appeared on another dwarf spruce, Piceaaabies ‘Nidiformis’, ITSELFthe produce to a broom. …

Afew dwarfs that have become well known were discovered in the wildbut under circumstances that indicated they were descendants of amutated plant long ago. The most famous is the Sargent weepinghemlock, Tsuga canadensis ‘Pendula’…

Onecommon manifestation of genetic mutation in conifers is the …WITCH’S BROOM, a thickly congested growth mass that may appear atany growing point on a tree and that sometimes does have a broomlikelook. The cause is believed to be the abnormal triggering ofADVENTITIOUS buds – the kind that enable a tree to leaf out anewafter losing its foliage in a hurricane … now and then a geneticmishap causes them to burst out in one spot to make broom. Theprogeny of such growths – propagated vegetatively by cuttings –almost invariably yield dwarfs. …

Somedwarf conifers produced from witch’s brooms are stable: they remaindwarfed, and cuttings made from them will produce plants identical tothe parent. Some species, however, are characterized byunpredictable behavior … the Norway spruce has given rise to morethan 80 dwarf forms …

[GARDENINGWITH THE NEW SMALL PLANTS]

==========

Aneighbor once asked my wife if she worried about me going off in thefields and woods with attractive women reporters, but she answered,‘Not at all. They will soon learn, as I had to, that no woman cancompete for Euell’s attention against a wild plant!’ …

Ontop of the hill we found first-year EVENING PRIMROSE plants growingso thickly that they actually overlapped one another, making a solidcarpet of green rosettes. These are also biennials, storing vastamounts of food in their reddish, carrotlike roots the first year,and then sending up their seed stalks that bear beautiful yellowflowers the second year. These flowers stay closed during the day,then open rather suddenly, and even faintly audibly, just beforedark.

Whenthe evening primrose grows as thickly as it does here, it can furnishtwo excellent foods. The starchy root is a hearty root food, with ahint of pungency that most people like. But even this pungency can beremoved by boiling in two waters, then practically drowning it meltedbutter. … The central crown of the first-year rosette, with all theold outside leaves removed and nothing left but the tender, blanchedheart, makes a grand green vegetable. Some people even like them insalads, but to me they are a bit too pungent to be palatable raw. Ilike these cooked in two waters, even if I am sacrificing some of thevitamins I am sure are there. After all, these wild plants haveproved, whenever analyzed, to be so extremely rich in nutrients thatone can afford to pour part of them down the drain and still have a more vitamin-rich food than you can get from vegetables sitting fordays on a produce counter. We dug another basket of the fat roots andgathered a bagful of the tender green crowns.

[EuellGibbons]

==========

CYCLAMEN:sows and wild boars love to eat the roots – ‘Mrs Beeton, thefamous Victorian cookery writer, claimed that the pigs’ diet ofcyclamen bulbs imparted special flavour to the pork products of thePérigord’. … a pieces of the root, inserted into a man’snostrils, will prevent baldness … an excellent treatment for your‘suppurating boils’ … cyclamen is a genus of 17 species … thewild stock in Turkey has been raided and sold to corporations; thecorporations evidently do not know that ‘the species are bestraised from seed which, with few exceptions, is freely produced andwill germinate readily if sown fresh, as will old seed soaked inwater for a day or so. The young seedlings should be encouraged tocontinue growing as long as possible and not dried off’. …

[THEVANISHING GARDEN]

==========

LIZARD’STAIL | Saururus cernuus L.

… rhizomatous… colony-forming … ‘Reestablishment of the beaver after nearextinction in the sUS has increased the Lizard’s-tail habitat.Common. Swamps, margins of streams and lakes, and low woodlands’ …

WILDBUCKWHEAT | DOG-TONGUE | Erigonum tomentosum Michx.

… 225species, mostly in the West … ‘Seeds and other parts of manyspecies are important as food for various kinds of wildlife’. …

==========

TheEASTERN FOX SPARROW is a bird of the lingering snow. … This is oneof the few of our sparrows that scratches with both feet at once. Itleaps into the air, and while off the ground scratches with both feetat once. It leaps into the air, and while off the ground scratches orkicks quickly with both its powerful feet … Thus it is able toexcavate rapidly, throwing leaves and dirt sometimes a yard or more.… He excavates! Jumping and scratching he makes the snow fly, andis soon is at the bottom of a hole and at his usual occupation ofturning over the dead leaves and searching for seeds and insects. …Along the coast they begin to sing about the first of April in dampeasterly weather, which may remind them of the fog in their homesalong the Labrador coast. The song, though short, is a fine cleareffort, a typical song of the northern wilds.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

==========

Ican now confidently say that QUANTITY of diet may be safely left tothe natural appetite; and that is is the QUALITY only, which isessential to abate and cure corpulence.

[LETTERON CORPULANCE]

__________

»BrownFat, Triggered by Cold or Exercise, May Yield a Key to Weight Control

Fatpeople have less than thin people. Older people have less thanyounger people. Men have less than younger women.

Itis brown fat, actually brown in color, and its great appeal is thatit burns calories like a furnace. A new study finds that one form ofit, which is turned on when people get cold, sucks fat out of therest of the body to fuel itself. Another new study finds that asecond form of brown fat can be created from ordinary white fat byEXERCISE.

-----

TheDECEMBRIST REVOLT or the DECEMBRIST UPRISING took place in ImperialRussia on 26 December [O.S. 14 December] 1825. Russian army officersled about 3,000 soldiers in a protest against Nicholas I's assumptionof the throne after his elder brother Constantine removed himselffrom the line of succession.

-----

GeorgeClooney Defends Making Coffee Commercials

-----

DemiMoore Rushed Hospital for Drugs, Headed to Rehab

JenniferAniston adopts shelter dog

-----

OklahomaLawmaker Wants To Outlaw Use Of Human Fetuses In Production Of Food

OklahomaGOP State Senator Ralph Shortey is on a mission to finally put an endto his state’s allegedly rampant cannibalism problem. Alarmed afterhis own research, which consisted of reading a nameless reportstating that companies have used stem cells in the production offood, Shortey introduced a bill that would prohibit the manufacturingand sale of food “which contains aborted human fetuses.”

Shorteywas unable to provide any specific examples of the problem he’strying to curb, and admits that it’s possible there aren’t anyhuman fetuses in Oklahoma’s food. “I don’t know if it ishappening in Oklahoma, it may be, it may not be,” he said.

-----

Eatingfried food may not bad for the heart, as long as you use olive orsunflower oil to make it, experts say.

Theyfound no heightened risk of heart disease or premature death linkedto food that had been cooked in this way.

-----

Secretrecordings made by President John F Kennedy reveal in the days beforehis assassination that he predicted the following Monday would be a"tough day". It would prove to be the date of his funeral.

-----

SteveJobs hated the stylus. It’s obvious why: controlling your mobiledevice with a penlike thing meant having to carry something extra,and Jobs always disdained extra things. “God gave us 10styluses—let’s not invent another,” he used to say, accordingto Walter Isaacson’s biography.

Thestylus was one of the reasons Jobs killed the Newton, Apple’s1990s-era mobile personal assistant. It was also one of the reasonshe decided to build the iPhone and the iPad. A decade ago, whenMicrosoft was pushing its vision for tablet machines, Jobs consideredBill Gates’ love of the stylus a key vulnerability. “As soon asyou have a stylus, you’re dead,” he said. In 2002, after hearinga description of Microsoft’s tablet, Jobs marched into his officeand issued an order: “I want to make a tablet, and it can’t havea keyboard or stylus,” he said. “So could you guys come up with amulti-touch, touch-sensitive display for me?”

Andthat was it—the moment the stylus died for good. Over the next fewyears, Apple worked in secret to perfect touch computing, and withthe introduction of the iPhone in 2007, Jobs sought to make thetouchscreen the signature digital interface of our era. “Who wantsa stylus?” he sneered at his Macworld keynote unveiling the phone.“You have to get ‘em, put ‘em away, you lose ‘em. Yech!Nobody wants a stylus. So let’s not use a stylus.”

-----

Mourningthe loss of 'The Senator,' a 3,500-year-old tree

Fanslament the loss of a giant bald cypress in Florida, one of theworld's oldest trees.

A3,500-year-old bald cypress tree known as "The Senator"burned to the ground in Big Tree Park in Longwood, Fla., earlier thisweek, bringing forth mournful comments from the people who lived nearit and from around the globe.

The118-foot tree, which was designated a national historic landmark byPresident Calvin Coolidge in 1929, had likely been smoldering deepinside its trunk for two weeks after a lightning strike, according toinvestigators.

-----

GoDaddyGoes After Lucrative Idiot Demographic With New Naked Lady Ad

-----

WildlifeExperts Alarmed

StalloneAction Movie Wakes Up Hibernating Bats

Thousandsof bats hibernating in a Bulgarian cave have been woken up by thefilming of Hollywood action movie "The Expendables 2,"wildlife experts say. They complain that authorities shouldn't havepermitted filming in one of Europe's top winter bat refuges, and warnthat many of the creatures are so confused that they may starve.More...

-----

'SarkozyHas Learned to Like Angela Merkel'

1949- John Belushi

Wandering Jew ... Scotch Broom ... White-throated Sparrow

2012-01-23T23:12:00.002-05:00

… Itook this attitude--to wit,

Ionly BELIEVED Bacon wrote Shakespeare, whereas I KNEW Shakespeare

didn't.

[MarkTwain]

==========

Theirmeals are purposely made

scanty,in order that they may exercise their ingenuity and daring in

obtainingadditions to them. This is the main object of their short

commons,but an incidental advantage is the growth of their bodies, for

theyshoot up in height when not weighed down and made wide and broad by

excessof nutriment. This also is thought to produce beauty of figure;

forlean and slender frames develop vigour in the limbs, whereas those

whichare bloated and over-fed cannot attain this, from their weight.

Thiswe see in the case of women who take purgatives during pregnancy,

whosechildren are thin, but well-shaped and slender, because from their

slightbuild they receive more distinctly the impress of their mother's

form.However, it may be that the cause of this phenomenon is yet to be

discovered.

[Plutarch]

==========

Mr.Darwin conceives that the amount of vegetation supported

atany one time by Great Britain may exceed, in a ten-fold ratio, the

quantityexisting on an equal area in the interior parts of Southern

Africa.[147]It is remarked, moreover, in illustration of the small

connectiondiscoverable between abundance of food and the magnitude of

indigenousmammalia, that while in the desert part of Southern Africa

thereare so many huge animals; in Brazil, where the splendor and

exuberanceof the vegetation are unrivalled, there is not a single wild

quadrupedof large size.

[CharlesLyell, PRINCIPLES OF GEOLOGY]

==========

SCOTCHBROOM | Cytisus scoparius (L.) Lk.

… evergreen,bushy … 3-7 feet tall; occasionally to 12 feet … escaped fromcultivation, obviously … ‘It favors dry, sandy soils in fullsunlight, and has been used successfully in strip-mine reclamation inOhio, where it was considered one of the most successful and valuableplants for wildlife’. … can grow on acid or alkaline soils …poisonous to livestock … first cultivated on these shores in 18 and30 … the flowers are into the whole bisexual thing … to propagateby seed, soak in hot water, then scarify the cotyledon end after its3-hour soak … ‘For germination, diurnally alternatingtemperatures of 68° (night) and 86° (day) for 28 days have beenrecommended’. … can also be propagated by cuttings …

[SEEDSOF WOODY PLANTS IN THE UNITED STATES]

==========

WANDERINGJEW | Tradescantia

‘Thisgenus has provided a number of great candidates for container culture… for outdoor use, though, one stands out from the crowd’ – T.pallida ‘Purpurea’ … find a plant … do not even thinkabout setting them outside until nighttime temps remain above 50°…pinch regularly … high winds make them scream in agony … snip offstems after they bloom as they become ‘unattractive’ to unnamedpersons … T. fluminensis (syn. T. albiflora) is thestandard-issue wandering Jew; its tendency is to be prostrate – ina container it will ‘pour over the pot edge, making no pretense ofwanting to grow in any direction but down’ … should have someafternoon relief from Sol … also: T. zebrina – purplishfoliage with silver bands …

[ANNUALSFOR EVERY PURPOSE]

==========

TheWHITE-THROATED SPARROW is one of the sweetest singers among thesparrow tribes. The brief song that it gives occasionally during themigration is not its best music, which for its full effect should beheard on its northern breeding-grounds at evening, when, as Mr. C. J.Maynard says, ‘the ledges of the mountain tops are gleaming in thebrilliant moonlight and the silvery beams are finding their waythrough the openings in the shadowy forest, illuminating the littleglades which form the home of the Sparrows … Then, when all else issilent save the occasional melancholy notes of the Whip-poor-will orthe distant hoot of some Owl, the effect produced by thisincomparable song is surpassingly beautiful’. …

Normallythis sparrow breeds in the glades of coniferous forests, preferringnorthern firs and spruces, but on the hills from which most of thespruce has been cut it often remains to breed in waste left by thelumbermen.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

==========

Andnow a last word on Insects.

Mytownship (Newcastle) is said to have formerly grown more Apples perannum than any other township in the United States; its apple-treesare still as numerous as ever, but their product has fallen offdeplorably. I estimate the average yield of the last three years atless than a bushel per annum for each full-grown tree …

Ilay down the general proposition that no man who harbors caterpillarshas any moral right to Apples – that each grower should be requiredto make his choice between them. Slovenly farmers say, 'O there areso many of them that I cannot kill half so fast as they multiply'.Then I say, cut down and burn up the trees you can best spare, untilyou have no more left than you can keep clear of worms.

Ifit were the law of the land that whoever allowed caterpillars to nestand breed in his fruit-trees should pay a heavy fine for each nest,we should soon be comparatively clear of the scourges.

[HoraceGreeley, WHAT I KNOW OF FARMING]

__________

»KillingBigfoot

"Thisissue brings up a longstanding debate within the Bigfoot community:Would be ethical to shoot and kill a Bigfoot?" …

-----

AlecBaldwin drops sugar

thepaparazzi might likes da profile shot.

-----

MARYTYLER MOORE BRAVE LAST DAYS

TVlegend MARY TYLER MOORE is bravely facing the end, friends fear.

Ravagedby a decades-long battle with diabetes, the beloved 75-year-old staris going blind, has difficulty walking and suffers fromlife-threatening heart and kidney problems, sources say.

-----

IdiotMan-Child Destroys The Set Of Jeopardy

-----

MichelleObama Turns On Lights In Middle Of Night To Discover Bedroom Full OfSilent Obese Children Staring At Her

-----

RICHMOND,IN—Self-proclaimed strict constitutionalist and freethinker RickCrawford told reporters Monday he is supporting Ron Paul in the 2012Republican presidential primaries because of the way the candidatelooks people directly in the eye, doesn't mince words, and tells itlike it will never, ever be in a million years. "Ron cuts rightthrough the fat and doesn't sugarcoat anything when he talks aboutpolicies that would be absolutely impossible to implement, likeabolishing the federal income tax, eliminating Medicare, or puttingthe nation's currency back on the gold standard," Crawford saidas he pounded a hand-painted "Ron Paul 2012" sign in hisfront lawn. "He's not afraid to give Americans no-nonsensestraight talk about his completely delusional fantasy world. That'swhy I'm part of the highly unlikely Ron Paul revolution."

-----

ArethaFranklin Calls Off Her Engagement

-----

Nasalaunches vital new mission to recover its stolen moon rocks

Internalreport says 517 rocks and 'astromaterial' samples have been stolen orare missing

TheAmerican space agency, Nasa, is not as busy as it once was sendingastronauts into orbit aboard its recently retired shuttle fleet,which means it has time to attend to other urgent business, liketrying to track down countless samples of moon rock it has handed outover the years that have gone missing.

Anew internal report depicts an agency that has generously distributedextra-terrestrial flotsam, including moon rock, to government leadersand scientific institutions promising to use them for research. Butit has also been peculiarly lax about monitoring the whereabouts ofthe moon rock and ensuring the bits on loan were returned.

-----

Spellingon Chuck Grassley’s Twitter Finally Improves After Being Hacked

WOAHHEY, how did an intelligible phrase sneak into the stream ofnotoriously incomprehensible re-imaginings of the English languagethat we are usually treated to on Senator Chuck Grassley’s Twitterfeed? Did science up and find a cure for “teabagger?” Kind of!It’s known in this case as “hacking.”

'Now there is one property that animals are found to have in common with plants...'

2012-01-22T23:34:00.001-05:00

TheOriental may be inscrutable, but he is no more puzzling than

theaverage American. We admit that we are hard, keen, practical,

--theadjectives that every casual European applies to us,--and yet

anybook-store window or railway news-stand will show that we

prefersentimental magazines and books. Why should a hard race--if

weare hard--read soft books?

HenrySeidel Canby, DEFINITIONS]

==========

Nowthere is one property that animals are found to have in common

withplants. For some plants are generated from the seed of plants,

whilstother plants are self-generated through the formation of some

elementalprinciple similar to a seed; and of these latter plants

somederive their nutriment from the ground, whilst others grow inside

otherplants, as is mentioned, by the way, in my treatise on Botany.

Sowith animals, some spring from parent animals according to their

kind,whilst others grow spontaneously and not from kindred stock;

andof these instances of spontaneous generation some come fromputrefying

earthor vegetable matter, as is the case with a number of insects,

whileothers are spontaneously generated in the inside of animals

outof the secretions of their several organs.

Aristotle,HISTORIA ANIMALIUM]

==========

Those

partsof Italy which have so long languished under the lazy tyranny

ofpriests and viceroys, had been afflicted only by the more tolerable

calamitiesof war; and the first symptoms of decay which they

experienced,were amply compensated by the rapid improvements of the

CisalpineGaul. The splendor of Verona may be traced in its remains: yet

Veronawas less celebrated than Aquileia or Padua, Milan or Ravenna. II.

Thespirit of improvement had passed the Alps, and been felt even in the

woodsof Britain, which were gradually cleared away to open a free space

forconvenient and elegant habitations. York was the seat of government;

Londonwas already enriched by commerce; and Bath was celebrated for the

salutaryeffects of its medicinal waters. Gaul could boast of her twelve

hundredcities; and though, in the northern parts, many of them,

withoutexcepting Paris itself, were little more than the rude and

imperfecttownships of a rising people, the southern provinces imitated

thewealth and elegance of Italy. Many were the cities of Gaul,

Marseilles,Arles, Nismes, Narbonne, Thoulouse, Bourdeaux, Autun,

Vienna,Lyons, Langres, and Treves, whose ancient condition might

sustainan equal, and perhaps advantageous comparison with their present

state.

EdwardGibbon]

==========

Themost recent discoveries made in 1843 by Mr. Middendorf, a

distinguishedRussian naturalist, and which he communicated to me in

September,1846, afford more precise information as to the climate of

theSiberian lowlands, at the period when the extinct quadrupeds were

entombed.One elephant was found on the Tas, between the Obi and

Yenesei,near the arctic circle, about lat. 66° 30' N., with some parts

ofthe flesh in so perfect a state that the bulb of the eye is now

preservedin the museum at Moscow. Another carcass, together with a

youngindividual of the same species, was met with in the same year,

1843,in lat. 75° 15' N., near the river Taimyr, with the flesh decayed.

Itwas imbedded in strata of clay and sand, with erratic blocks, at

about15 feet above the level of the sea. In the same deposit Mr.

Middendorfobserved the trunk of a larch tree (Pinus larix), the same

woodas that now carried down in abundance by the Taimyr to the Arctic

Sea.There were also associated fossil shells of living northern

species,and which are moreover characteristic of the drift or glacial

depositsof Europe. Among these Nucula pygmæa, Tellina calcarea,

Myatruncata, and Saxicava rugosa were conspicuous.

Sofresh is the ivory throughout northern Russia, that, according to

Tilesius,thousands of fossil tusks have been collected and used in

turning;yet others are still procured and sold in great plenty. He

declareshis belief that the bones still left in northern Russia must

greatlyexceed in number all the elephants now living on the globe.

Weare as yet ignorant of the entire geographical range of the mammoth;

butits remains have been recently collected from the cliffs of frozen

mudand ice on the east side of Behring's Straits, in Eschscholtz's Bay,

inRussian America, lat. 66° N. As the cliffs waste away by the thawing

ofthe ice, tusks and bones fall out, and a strong odor of animal matter

isexhaled from the mud.

[CharlesLyell, PRINCIPLES OF GEOLOGY]

==========

Thatseems to settle it.

Butthat is the way of the scientist. He will spend thirty years in

buildingup a mountain range of facts with the intent to prove a

certaintheory; then he is so happy in his achievement that as a rule

heoverlooks the main chief fact of all--that his accumulation proves an

entirelydifferent thing. When you point out this miscarriage to him he

doesnot answer your letters; when you call to convince him, the servant

prevaricatesand you do not get in. Scientists have odious manners,

exceptwhen you prop up their theory; then you can borrow money of them.

Tobe strictly fair, I will concede that now and then one of them will

answeryour letter, but when they do they avoid the issue--you cannot

pinthem down. When I discovered that the bee was human I wrote about it

toall those scientists whom I have just mentioned. For evasions, I have

seennothing to equal the answers I got.

Afterthe queen, the personage next in importance in the hive is the

virgin.The virgins are fifty thousand or one hundred thousand in

number,and they are the workers, the laborers. No work is done, in the

hiveor out of it, save by them. The males do not work, the queen does

nowork, unless laying eggs is work, but it does not seem so to me.

Thereare only two million of them, anyway, and all of five months

tofinish the contract in. The distribution of work in a hive is

ascleverly and elaborately specialized as it is in a vast American

machine-shopor factory. A bee that has been trained to one of the many

andvarious industries of the concern doesn't know how to exercise any

other,and would be offended if asked to take a hand in anything outside

ofher profession. She is as human as a cook; and if you should ask the

cookto wait on the table, you know what will happen. Cooks will play

thepiano if you like, but they draw the line there. In my time I have

askeda cook to chop wood, and I know about these things. Even the hired

girlhas her frontiers; true, they are vague, they are ill-defined, even

flexible,but they are there. This is not conjecture; it is founded on

theabsolute. And then the butler. You ask the butler to wash the dog.

Itis just as I say; there is much to be learned in these ways, without

goingto books. Books are very well, but books do not cover the whole

domainof esthetic human culture. Pride of profession is one of the

boniestbones in existence, if not the boniest. Without doubt it is so

inthe hive.

[MarkTwain, WHAT IS MAN?]

==========

Apatch of brilliant green drew us, and I soon identified this lushgrowth as the winter rosettes of the finest edible thistle thatgrows, Cirsium altissimum. The prickles on these winter leavesare as soft and tender as the rest of the leaf. The fat, white rootswere as large as organically grown carrots. We gathered one bagful ofthe tops and another of the roots. We detoured on our way back to thecar to examine the old spring that had furnished water for mygrandparent’s house. There wasn’t a trace of the old springhouse,but where it had stood was now a lush bed of watercress. We filledthe rest of our bags. …

Thethistle tops were a mile – and excellent – cooked greenvegetable, and the white roots, which cooked perfectly tender in tenminutes, were superb, resembling artichoke hearts in flavor. Thisplant is closely related to the cultivated artichoke and the familyresemblance is obvious to the taste buds.

[EuellGibbons]

==========

Alittle over a hundred years ago, on April 28, 1834, Thomas Nuttallcollected the first specimen of this handsome species known toscience, between Independence and Westport, Missouri, not far fromthe border of Kansas. Only fifteen days after Nuttall’s discovery,Maximilian, Prince of Wied, also collected one of these birds on theMissouri River. It was not until 1840, however, that Nuttallpublished his discovery of the ‘Mourning Sparrow’ as he calledit. On May 4, 1843, nine years after Nuttall’s discovery, Audubonand his friend Edward Harris were near Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, whenthe latter collected a sparrow which Audubon thought a new speciesand which he therefore named ‘Harris’s Sparrow’.

Fora long time nothing was known of the breeding habits of thisconspicuously marked bird. In 1902 E. A. Preble collected young birdsrecently out of the nest, at Churchill on the west coast of HudsonBay. In 1907 Ernest Thompson-Seton found a nest containing nearlyfledged young, in the Barren Lands of Canada near Great Slave Lake.In 1930 P. A. Taverner found a nest, also containing young, atChurchill. The following year Dr. George M. Sutton went to Churchillto study the species, and the first nest with eggs was found on June16, 1931, almost one hundred years after the taking of the firstspecimen of the bird.

Therange of Harris’s Sparrow is perhaps unique among North Americanbirds.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

__________

»JoePaterno dies at 85; transformed Penn State into football power

JoePaterno, the Ivy League-educated coach who transformed sleepy PennState University into a national football power with anacademics-based philosophy only to see his career end abruptly andhis legacy tarnished by a child sex abuse scandal involving a formerassistant coach, has died. He was 85.

Paternodied Sunday morning in State College, Pa., his family announced.

Hewas diagnosed with lung cancer in November, only days after PennState's board of trustees fired the legendary coach in the wake ofthe arrest of his former defensive coordinator, Jerry Sandusky, onmultiple felony counts of sexual abuse of boys.

-----

Laterin life, [Dawn] Powell did most of her writing in an apartment at 95Christopher Street.

Powelldied slowly and painfully of colon cancer which afflicted her in 1964and killed her the following year, in the same week as the firstgreat New York blackout. She donated her body to the Cornell MedicalCenter, which offered to return parts of it five years later forburial. Her executrix, Jacqueline Miller Rice, refused to claim theremains, which were then buried on Hart Island, New York City'spotter's field.

WhenPowell died, virtually all of her novels were out of print. Herposthumous champions included Matthew Josephson, Gore Vidal, andespecially Tim Page, who joined forces with her family to free hermanuscripts, diaries, and copyrights from her original executrix. Theresult was a revival in the late 1990s, when most of Powell's bookswere made available once more. Her papers are now at the ColumbiaUniversity Rare Books and Manuscripts Library in her beloved NewYork.

Sheis referenced in the Gilmore Girls episode Help Wanted, wherein Roryexpresses sadness over her relative obscurity.

-----

SmallBird Lands On Performer During Concert

MUSICBUZZ This one time in 2011 Josh Williams and his bluegrass band wereplaying in North Carolina. Around 1:30, he gets an extra band member.

-----

OneYear After Shooting, Gabrielle Giffords To Step Down From Congress

-----

GeorgiaAdds Swastika, Middle Finger To State Flag

-----

DrunkPilot Going To Pull Over Onto Cloud Until He Sobers Up A Little

-----

AverageSwede likes sweets, booze, and TV

DespiteSweden's reputation as a home for attractive young blondes, theaverage Swede is 40+, munches on a weekly bag of sweets, washed downwith a glass or two of alcohol, while relaxing in front of the TV, anew report shows.

-----

Detectivewho led OJ Simpson murder case and Roman Polanski child sex probedies at 70

PhilipVannatter, who was among the first detectives on the scene at formerfootball star OJ Simpson's mansion in June 1994, died in aCalifornian hospital of complications from cancer.

-----

Wheredid all the colored toilet paper go?

RIPPink Toilet Paper, Cherished Friend, Companion, and Always There WhenYou Needed It Most; 1950-?

Thinkabout it for a second – When was the last time you reached for someTP and saw anything but the standard white roll? Probably around thesame time tie dyed t-shirts and Birkenstocks were still in style,right?

30years ago colored toilet paper wasn’t the rarity it is today. Introduced in the 50’s and popular throughout the 70’s, manymanufacturers produced a variety of colors including pink, blue,yellow, lilac, tan, and black. Homeowners loved matching the colorof their toilet paper to the color of their bathrooms (it was the70’s after all!). So besides the obvious reason that what was hipin the 70’s isn’t anymore, where did all the colored TP go?

'As I cannot go upon a Northwest Passage, then I will find a passage round the actual world where I am'

2012-01-21T01:04:00.000-05:00

Duringsubstantially the whole of her short life of five or six years

thequeen lives in Egyptian darkness and stately seclusion of the royal

apartments,with none about her but plebeian servants, who give her

emptylip-affection in place of the love which her heart hungers for;

whospy upon her in the interest of her waiting heirs, and report and

exaggerateher defects and deficiencies to them; who fawn upon her and

flatterher to her face and slander her behind her back; who grovel

beforeher in the day of her power and forsake her in her age and

weakness.There she sits, friendless, upon her throne through the long

nightof her life, cut off from the consoling sympathies and sweet

companionshipand loving endearments which she craves, by the gilded

barriersof her awful rank; a forlorn exile in her own house and home,

wearyobject of formal ceremonies and machine-made worship, winged child

ofthe sun, native to the free air and the blue skies and the flowery

fields,doomed by the splendid accident of her birth to trade this

pricelessheritage for a black captivity, a tinsel grandeur, and a

lovelesslife, with shame and insult at the end and a cruel death--and

condemnedby the human instinct in her to hold the bargain valuable!

Huber,Lubbock, Maeterlinck--in fact, all the great authorities--are

agreedin denying that the bee is a member of the human family. I do not

knowwhy they have done this, but I think it is from dishonest motives.

Why,the innumerable facts brought to light by their own painstaking

andexhaustive experiments prove that if there is a master fool in the

world,it is the bee. That seems to settle it.

[MarkTwain, WHAT IS MAN?]

==========

AlthoughI was four years at the University, I did not take the

regularcourse of studies, but instead picked out what I thought would

bemost useful to me, particularly chemistry, which opened a new

world,and mathematics and physics, a little Greek and Latin, botany

andgeology. I was far from satisfied with what I had learned, and

shouldhave stayed longer. Anyhow I wandered away on a glorious

botanicaland geological excursion, which has lasted nearly fifty

yearsand is not yet completed, always happy and free, poor and rich,

withoutthought of a diploma or of making a name, urged on and on

throughendless, inspiring, Godful beauty.

Fromthe top of a hill on the north side of Lake Mendota I gained a

lastwistful, lingering view of the beautiful University grounds and

buildingswhere I had spent so many hungry and happy and hopeful days.

Therewith streaming eyes I bade my blessed Alma Mater farewell. But

Iwas only leaving one University for another, the Wisconsin

Universityfor the University of the Wilderness.

THEEND

==========

Infact, in the weeks and months which followed the completion of Warand Peace, Tolstoy was happiest when he did not have to think atall. Games of bezique with his aunt were a pleasant diversion on coldwinter evenings, and a sign that he was unwinding (he generallyswitched to playing patience compulsively when he was at the start ofa new work), but what he really enjoyed was cross-country skiing outin the woods, and skating on the big pond below his house. He gavelessons to his six-year-old son Sergey, and spent hours masteringcomplicated manoeuvres on his own. When summer arrived he worked inthe garden, digging up nettles and burdock and tidying up theflowerbeds. He also took himself off to the fields to spend wholedays mowing with the peasants … when he was writing AnnaKarenina, the novel’s most lyrical passages are devoted to theecstasies of scything … With the return of autumn Tolstoy wenthunting as usual, mostly for woodcock and hare, but the followingyear he shot two wolves while on an expedition with friends.

[RosamundBartlett]

==========

March18 [1852].

Awise man will not go out of his way for information. He might as wellgo out of nature, or commit suicide.

Iam glad to hear that naked eyes are of any use, for I cannot affordto buy a Munich telescope.

March28. I heard, this forenoon, apleasant jingling note from the slate-colored snowbird on the oaks inthe sun on Minott’s hillside. Apparently they sing with us in thepleasantest days before they go northward. …

AsI cannot go upon a Northwest Passage, then I will find a passageround the actual world where I am. Connect the Behring Straits andLancaster Sounds of thought; winter on Melville Island, and make achart of Banks Land; explore the northward-trending Wellington Inlet,where there is said to be a perpetual open sea, cutting my waythrough floes of ice.

[Thoreau,JOURNAL]

==========

Isaw them coming, an army of two with banners. He was tall, pale, eyesnarrowed from cigarette smoke of his own making (an eighty-a-day manfor years); she was small, round faced, somewhat bloated. … Theyear, 1964.

Shesaid in a loud clear voice, ‘You’, and then I ceased tounderstand her, ‘chung, cheers boog sightee Joyce yearsen roscoeconkling’. I am certain that I heard the name of thenineteenth-century New York senator, and I turned to the man – thesenator’s biographer? – and saw, like infected buttonholes, eyesI dare not meet in dreams. ‘Tchess’. He took up the refrain.‘Boog Joyce venially blind, too, bolder’. I had been drinking,but not that much, while the tall man appeared sober. Obviously, Iwas having my chronic problem with English voices: the low rapidmumble, the urgent wheeze, the imploding diphthong, vowels wronglystressed …

Wewere separated. I was told that I had been talking to Anthony Burgessand his wife, Lynne. Burgess had written some comic novels about lifeeast of Maugham – or Suez; now there was a new book called AClockwork Orange. I knew nothingof him except for one splendid anecdote. Under another name, he hadreviewed one of his own books in a British paper. The Brits werehorrified. I was delighted: Whitman had done the same. Besides …shouldn’t there be at lest one review in all of England written bysomeone who had actually read the book?

[GoreVidal]

==========

FORAN eater of weeds and gatherer of wild herbs, December may seem apoor month for an expedition, but that partly depends on thedirection in which you go. …

Iloaded my cousin’s car with minnow net, waders, a camp cooking set,and a spade. For a companion I took along my cousin’s littledaughter, who had been a fan of my books and is well on her way tobeing a wild food freak. We took along some butter and a little saltand drove into the country.

Ieasily found my grandfather’s old place. A slight depression wherethe rainwater cistern used to be was the only sign of a long-gonehouse. The plants hadn’t changed. The blackberry vines appeared tobe the same ones that I had gathered wild fruit from when I was a boyand from which my grandmother made crusty cobblers topped with thickcream from the springhouse. …

Thenwe came upon a hackberry tree crowded with hard red berries. It wasvery near here, under a hackberry tree now long dead, that I inventedmy first wild food recipe. When I was only five years old, I shelledsome hickory nuts and pounded them in a cloth with some of thesesweet hackberries, squeezing the resulting sticky paste into a ball,then unwrapped and ate it. It was a wild candy bar. We have hickorynuts and hackberries in Pennsylvania, where I had tried the sametrick. The result was so poor that I thought it must take a childishtaste to appreciate this delicacy. But when I tasted the hackberriesfrom this Texas tree I knew what had been wrong with my recentattempts. These berries were ten times sweeter than those fromPennsylvania trees. We gathered the dried berries in a bag.

[EuellGibbons]

==========

Onbright June days, when heat waves reflected from the warm groundshimmer over the landscape, the EASTERN FIELD SPARROW sings. Theclear, sweet, pensive chant carries far on still days, and comes downto the valley from bushy, hillside pastures and dry old fields alongthe edges of the woods. He sings from a huckleberry bush, from a tallweed, a fence-top, or some small birch or other pasture tree. The layis simple but it is one of the sweetest of the sparrow songs. …

Insteadof nesting about the domiciles of man, the usually retire to oldfields and bushy pastures, or low thickets along the edges ofwoodlands, though occasionally a pair may select some neglectedgarden for the home-site.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

__________

»JoePaterno -- Reportedly Near Death

JoePaterno, the legendary former coach at Penn State University, is onhis death bed ... this according to several reports. A spokesman forthe family says doctors have "characterized his status asserious."

-----

The14 Most Interesting Facts About Kim Dotcom, The Founder Of Megaupload

-----

TypographerHates "Mission Impossible -- Ghost Protocol" Font

Typedesigner Matthew Butterick was put off by the use of Microsoft’sVerdana font in “Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol.” So hedid what any movie fanatic would do: Wrote the director to explainwhy the use of IKEA’s favorite font was an utter failure.

-----

Newtmania!Gingrich Wins South Carolina, Will Lose 80%-20% To Obama

Thatwas faster than dumping an ex-wife in the cancer ward! Whiningjewelry piglet and serial divorcing sac of ethics violations NewtGingrich has just been projected as the Big Wiener of the SouthCarolina confederate primary. Should we live blog this historicmoment, which comes exactly 15 years after the last historic momentfor Gingrich? That was when he “became the first Speaker of theHouse to be disciplined for his ethics violations by his owncolleagues,” a violation that cost the Newt $300,000 in penalties —enough to buy a suitcase of tacky Tiffany bling for at least one morenew adulteress!

-----

TheGOP’s South Carolina nightmare

NewtGingrich just made life miserable for Mitt Romney – and for hisparty

-----

MittWashes His Magic Underwear For Good Luck in South Carolina Primary

ABrief History of Rick Perry's Epic FAIL Campaign

-----

Ifwe asked someone in 2002 what they thought the Internet would looklike today, they'd probably guess we'd all be "Digging"each others "Friendster" posts that we'd "Napstered"to each other's "AOL." Things change on the Internet, and10 years from now probably won't look anything like today.

-----

Forthe first time, scientists are beginning to understand how exerciseworks on the body and mind to make us healthier. It seems thatphysical exertion helps promote autophagy, derived from the Greek for'self-eating', which is the body's process of recycling worn-out ormalformed proteins. In research conducted in Texas, mice which ran ontreadmills produced more autophagosomes in their muscles and mice whocould not produce autophagosomes became more easily fatigued andprocessed less sugar from the bloodstream.

…

Exerciseis about as close as it comes to a panacea, protecting the body andmind against a host of ailments. And if autophagy is the process bywhich exercise benefits us, then we may have found the first step toprolonging life in dramatic fashion. Autophagy's process of recyclingproteins helps slow the aging process by getting rid of "wonky"mitochondria, the power stations of the cell, and would reducefree-radical production resulting from the oxidation of molecules inour bodies.

-----

RomneyCements Status As Candidate Who Can Somehow Lose To Newt Gingrich

ExitPolls Reveal Majority Of South Carolina Voters Had EmotionalBreakdown In Voting Booth

WoodenFruit Hoping To Become Real Fruit One Day

-----

HeidiKlum to File for Divorce From Seal

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EARTHTO COLLIDE WITH NIBIRU ON JULY 21, 2012!

NASAscientists reportedly have confirmed that the planet Nibiru willcollide with Earth in July of 2012.

TheNibiru collision with Earth in 2012 had been predicted for a while,but astrophysicists, cosmologists and astronomers around the worldhave come to a consensus that Earth will collide with the planet,which lies just outside Pluto.

-----

JimmyCastor, Musician Who Mastered Many Genres, Dies at 71

…

Withanother band, the Jimmy Castor Bunch, he moved on to funk, combininga big beat with spirited storytelling on records like “Troglodyte(Cave Man)” on RCA, which hit No. 6 on the pop charts in 1972 andsold a million copies.

-----

Isthis really fun for all the family? The giraffe hunters who pay£10,000 to shoot the gentle giants with guns and bows for sport

Touristtrophy hunters are paying thousands of pounds to go and shootgiraffes with high-powered guns and bows.

Thegentle giants are loved around the world for their comical appearanceand gentle nature.

Butshocking images show how scores of big-spending men and women - andeven families - travel from across the globe, some even from Britain,to kill them for sport.

-----

SaudiArabia. Nigeria. Venezuela. Canada?

Isour neighbor to the north becoming a jingoistic petro-state?

-----

OfficialAnnouncement: Picnik is closing

-----

…9.54pm. I'm done now. Enjoy your Saturday night. My take away? This isthe Republican crack-up people have been predicting for years.Gingrich is on a roll. I think he can win this - and then lose thisin a way that could change America history. That is a briefimpression in one moment of time. But I cannot see Romney winningthis at this point. They are just not into him, and he's an awfulcandidate.

'Whosoever shall put to Sea in a stoute and well-conditioned ship, having an honest Master, and loving Seamen, shall not neede to feare'

2012-01-20T23:58:00.000-05:00

March10 [1852]

Isee cup lichens (cladonias) with their cups beset inside and out withlittle leaflets like shellwork.

[Thoreau,JOURNAL]

==========

THEBEE

Itwas Maeterlinck who introduced me to the bee. I mean, in the

psychicaland in the poetical way. I had had a business introduction

earlier.It was when I was a boy. It is strange that I should remember a

formalitylike that so long; it must be nearly sixty years.

Beescientists always speak of the bee as she. It is because all the

importantbees are of that sex. In the hive there is one married bee,

calledthe queen; she has fifty thousand children; of these, about one

hundredare sons; the rest are daughters. Some of the daughters are

youngmaids, some are old maids, and all are virgins and remain so.

Everyspring the queen comes out of the hive and flies away with one of

hersons and marries him. The honeymoon lasts only an hour or two; then

thequeen divorces her husband and returns home competent to lay two

millioneggs. This will be enough to last the year, but not more than

enough,because hundreds of bees are drowned every day, and other

hundredsare eaten by birds, and it is the queen's business to keep the

populationup to standard--say, fifty thousand. She must always have

thatmany children on hand and efficient during the busy season, which

issummer, or winter would catch the community short of food. She lays

fromtwo thousand to three thousand eggs a day, according to the demand;

andshe must exercise judgment, and not lay more than are needed in a

slimflower-harvest, nor fewer than are required in a prodigal one, or

theboard of directors will dethrone her and elect a queen that has more

sense.

Thereare always a few royal heirs in stock and ready to take her

place--readyand more than anxious to do it, although she is their own

mother.These girls are kept by themselves, and are regally fed and

tendedfrom birth. No other bees get such fine food as they get, or

livesuch a high and luxurious life. By consequence they are larger and

longerand sleeker than their working sisters. And they have a curved

sting,shaped like a scimitar, while the others have a straight one.

Acommon bee will sting any one or anybody, but a royalty stings

royaltiesonly. A common bee will sting and kill another common bee,

forcause, but when it is necessary to kill the queen other ways are

employed.When a queen has grown old and slack and does not lay eggs

enoughone of her royal daughters is allowed to come to attack her, the

restof the bees looking on at the duel and seeing fair play. It is a

duelwith the curved stings. If one of the fighters gets hard pressed

andgives it up and runs, she is brought back and must try again--once,

maybetwice; then, if she runs yet once more for her life, judicial

deathis her portion; her children pack themselves into a ball around

herperson and hold her in that compact grip two or three days, until

shestarves to death or is suffocated. Meantime the victor bee is

receivingroyal honors and performing the one royal function--laying

eggs.

Asregards the ethics of the judicial assassination of the queen, that

isa matter of politics, and will be discussed later, in its proper

place.

[MarkTwain, WHAT IS MAN?]

==========

Poe’sreputation continued to grow in the years immediately after hisdeath, especially in England and in France. He profoundly affectedVerlaine and Rimbaud; Mallarmè and Baudelaire both translated ‘TheRaven’ …

Tennysondescribed him as ‘the most original genius that America hasproduced’, worthy to stand beside Catullus and Heine. Thomas Hardyconsidered him to be ‘the first to realize in full the possibilityof the English language’, and Yeats believed that he was ‘certainlythe greatest of American poets’. The science fiction works of JulesVerne and H.G. Wells are heavily indebted to him, and Arthur ConanDoyle paid tribute to Poe’s mastery of the detective genre.Nietzsche and Kafka both honoured him, and glimpsed in his sad careerthe outline of their own suffering souls. He was admired by FyodorDostoyevsky, Joseph Conrad, and James Joyce, who saw in him the seedsof modern literature. The orphan, in the end, found his true family.

[PeterAckroyd]

==========

EASTERNCHIPPING SPARROW | Spizella passerina passerina

Itsreiterated chipping is one of the earliest bird-songs of the dawn,heard by the farmer as he rises for his day of toil in the fields. Itis a simple, monotonous, soothing chant, sung hour after hour withthe vigor, enthusiasm and abandon of the most accomplished musician;but it is rarely indeed that the bird produces any sound more musicalthan the simple strings of CHIPS. When the little birds are abundant,one singer regularly answers another on a slightly different key, sothat the sound softened by distance seems gently to come and go likethe breath of a sleeper in the fields.

Chippyis an early riser, often singing even before the Robin, and thusleading the morning chorus, but he does not antedate the Robin in hisspring arrival. In fact he usually appears much later, in late Aprilor May, after the early sparrows have come. We seldom see manyChipping Sparrows in New England before mid-April …

Likethe Robin it commonly nests in an apple tree in the back yard andfeeds all summer about the house and barn, and some especiallyconfiding individuals have learned to feed from the hand. Its ratherfragile nest, which in good weather is built in three or four days,is composed chiefly of fine grasses and rootlets, and lined usuallywith horsehair, and is so lightly attached to the twigs that a suddengust of wind may upset it or blow it away.

Theegg of the Cowbird is very often deposited in the nests of ChippingSparrows, which do not seem to resent the imposition, but, like thegood foster parents that they are, tend and feed the young Cowbirduntil the great pot-bellied nestling is well able to care for itself.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

==========

Whosoevershall put to Sea in a stoute and well-conditioned ship, having anhonest Master, and loving Seamen, shall not neede to feare, but heshall finde as good content at Sea, as at Land.

Itis too common with many to feare the Sea more than they neede, andall such as put to Sea, confesse it to be lesse tedious than theyeither feared or expected. A ship at Sea may well be compared to aCradle, rocked by a carefull Mothers hand, which though it be movedup and downe, yet is it not in danger of falling: So a ship may oftenbe rocked too and againe upon the troublesome Sea, yet seldome dothit sinke or over-turne, because it is kept by that carefull hand ofprovidence by which it is rocked. It was never knowne yet, that anyship in that voyage was cast away, or that ever fell into the Enemieshand.

Forthe health of Passengers it hath beene observed, that of sixe hundredsoules, not above three or foure haue dyed at Sea: It is probable insuch a company, more might have dyed either by sicknesse orcasualities, if they had stayed at home. For Women, I see not butthat they doe as well as men, and young Children as well as either;having their healths as well at Sea as at Land: Many likewise whichhave come with such foule bodies to Sea, as did make their dayesuncomfortable at Land, have beene so purged and clarified at Sea,that they have beene more healthfull for after-times; their weakeappetites being turned to good stomackes, not onely desisring, butlikewise disgesting such victuals as the Sea affords.

[WOOD’SNEW-ENGLAND’S PROSPECT]

__________

»ETTAJAMES, whose powerful, versatile and emotionally direct voice couldenliven the raunchiest blues as well as the subtlest love songs, mostindelibly in her signature hit, “At Last,” died on Friday morningin Riverside, Calif. She was 73.

-----

RICHARDM. KETCHUM, an author and editor who co-founded Country Journal, amagazine that offered a blend of the bucolic and the practical,particularly to city folk who had opted for the rural life, died onJan. 12 in Shelburne, Vt. He was 89 and until four years ago hadlived on his nearly 1,000-acre farm, Saddleback, in Dorset, Vt.

Originallycalled Blair & Ketchum’s Country Journal — it was started in1974 by William S. Blair and Mr. Ketchum, both expatriates from thepublishing world in New York City — the magazine provided down-homewisdom on topics like wood stoves, potato farming and ice fishing. Itdelved into issues like the damage done to drinking water by salt onrural roads, the loss of farmland and the availability of medicalservices in remote areas.

-----

It'sOver: Chuck Norris Has Endorsed Newt Gingrich

NewtGingrich is going to win the South Carolina presidential primarytomorrow. Not just because he yelled at two debate moderators forasking him debate questions this week, which brought him up about 20percentage points in the polls. That wasn't enough to close the deal.But now that Chuck Norris has endorsed him in a meditative World NetDaily piece, Romney's got no chance.

-----

LesbianOlive Oil

Whilemost popular dieting advice revolves around watching carbs or cuttingsugar, author Simon Doonan reveals to Slate viewers one of the bigsecrets to a slim physique that he writes about in his book, Gay MenDon’t Get Fat. … And what exactly is lesbian olive oil? …

-----

MarthaStewart urges end to factory farming

Jewelsaves energy and water

scuzeme… do i watch you when you’re sleeping in the sink?

Izfeelin’ sad Coz Carl Sagan said no apple pie until inventzuniverse!

-----

BenRoethlisberger Settles Sexual Assault Lawsuit

Itlooks like Ben Roethlisberger has bought his way out of a stickylegal situation …

-----

ObamaSings Al Green -- Al Says He 'Nailed' My Song

AlGreen just told TMZ ... he thinks President Barack Obama's version of"Let's Stay Together" was "terrific" and, "Henailed it."

-----

Rihannawas hanging by a few small threads in Hawaii yesterday -- testing thestructural integrity of a tiny black thong bikini, while sunning her23-year-old buns in the ocean ... on a paddleboard.Whatever floatsher butt.

-----

Canshe keep her clothes on? Kathy Griffin strips on live TV yet AGAINduring interview

Shestunned the nation by stripping to just her bra during CNN's NewYear's Eve broadcast.

Andnow Kathy Griffin has flashed her body yet again on live TV.

Duringher interview with David Letterman on Thursday the comedienne shedher clothes and unveiled her toned stomach and cleavage for theaudience.

-----

NewspaperEditor Suggests Israel Assassinate Obama

AndrewAdler, who owns an Atlanta-based newspaper called the Atlanta JewishTimes, wrote an op-ed last week in which he theorized on what Israelcould do about its relationship with the United States vis à visIran. As Adler sees it, Israel has three options, and one of theminvolves “ordering a hit on” President Obama. Uhhhh.

'An elephant is 10,000 times the size of a guinea pig' ...

2012-01-19T00:04:00.000-05:00

… whilean elephant is 10,000 times the size of a guinea pig, it needs only1,000 times as much energy.

==========

Afather had not the right of bringing up his offspring, but had to

carryit to a certain place called Lesché, where the elders of the tribe

satin judgment upon the child. If they thought it well-built and

strong,they ordered the father to bring it up, and assigned one of the

ninethousand plots of land to it; but if it was mean-looking or

misshapen,they sent it away to the place called the Exposure, a glen

uponthe side of Mount Täygetus; for they considered that if a child did

notstart in possession of health and strength, it was better both for

itselfand for the state that he should not live at all.

[Plutarch]

==========

Butamong insects and fishes, some cases are found wholly devoid of

thisduality of sex. For instance, the eel is neither male nor female,

andcan engender nothing. In fact, those who assert that eels are

attimes found with hair-like or worm-like progeny attached, make

onlyrandom assertions from not having carefully noticed the locality

ofsuch attachments. For no eel nor animal of this kind is everviviparous

unlesspreviously oviparous; and no eel was ever yet seen with an

egg.And animals that are viviparous have their young in the womb

andclosely attached, and not in the belly; for, if the embryo were

keptin the belly, it would be subjected to the process of digestion

likeordinary food. When people rest duality of sex in the eel on

theassertion that the head of the male is bigger and longer, and

thehead of the female smaller and more snubbed, they are takingdiversity

ofspecies for diversity of sex.

Thereare certain fish that are nicknamed the epitragiae, or capon-fish,

and,by the way, fish of this description are found in fresh water,

asthe carp and the balagrus. This sort of fish never has either roe

ormilt; but they are hard and fat all over, and are furnished with

asmall gut; and these fish are regarded as of super-excellent quality.

[Aristotle,HISTORIA ANIMALIUM]

==========

Forsome years I have been haunted by a story of [William Dean] Howellsand that most civilized of all our presidents, James A. Garfield. Inthe early 1870s Howells and his father paid a call on Garfield. Asthey sat on Garfield’s veranda, young Howells began to talk aboutpoetry and about the poets that he had met in Boston and New York.Suddenly, Garfield told him to stop. Then Garfield went to the edgeof the veranda and shouted to his Ohio neighbors. ‘Come over here!He’s telling about Holmes, and Longfellow, and Lowell, andWhittier!’ So the neighbors gathered around in the dusk; thenGarfield said to Howells, “Now go on’.

Todaywe take it for granted that no live president will ever have heardthe name of any living poet. This is not, necessarily, and unbearableloss. But it is unbearable to have lost those Ohio neighbors whoactually read books of poetry and wanted to know about the poets.

Forthirty years bookchat writers have accused me of having written thatthe novel is dead. I wrote no such thing but bookchat writers havethe same difficulty extracting meaning from writing as presidents do.What I wrote was, ‘After some three hundred years the novel inEnglish has lost the general reader (or rather the general reader haslost the novel), and I propose that he will not again recover his oldenthusiasm’. Since 1956, the audience for the serious (or whateverthis year’s adjective is) novel has continued to shrink. Arguably,the readers that are left are for the most part involuntary ones,obliged by the schools to read novels that they often have littletaste for.

[GoreVidal]

==========

Thelocal people, even the Indians, considered us daft when we told themwe were trying to find enough wild foods to live on in this arid,barren overgrazed, high-altitude land in the middle of April. I hadbeen a teenager in this same country back in the 1920s and had rangedthe length and breadth of this big land on horseback. Then one couldfind places where a horse could eat his fill in the circle covered bya thirty-foot lariat rope tied to a stake. I could find enough wildfood to stave off starvation for a week at the time, and I knew farless about wild food then than I know now.

Butthe country has deteriorated. Rainfall has decreased and overgrazinghas increased. We encouraged the Indians to build costly housesrather than cost-free hogans. We encouraged them to drive expensivepickups that eat high-priced gasoline, rather than horses that raisedthemselves on the open range, fueled with grass. We gave these nobleRed Men a taste of processed food, store-bought clothes, hamburgers,and whiskey. It needs cash, in considerable quantities to supportsuch a life, so each Indian family increased its herds and they viedwith one another for the scanty grass this land produces. The landretaliated by producing even less. I was able to locate a few of theidentical spots where I tethered my horse to eat his fill forty-fiveyears ago, only to find them bare and gullied now.

[EuellGibbons]

==========

CHRISTMASSTAR ORCHARD | Angraecum sesquipedale

Darwinstudied this species in 1862 and reckoned that a yet-to-be-discoveredlong-tongued moth was the pollinator … in 1903 the mystery moth wasdiscovered by a person presumably named Morgan and given the name ofXanthopan morganii praedicta … not hardy … can be grownindoors amidst bright light and high humidity … the potting soilshould consist of 50% fir bark …

==========

SWEDISHIVY | MINTLEAF | Plectranthus madagascariensis ‘VariegatedMintleaf’ (syn. P. coleoides ‘Marginatus Minimus’, P.coleoides ‘Variegatus’)

… theymake ‘incredibly easy houseplants’ … stem cuttings at anyseason … ‘immensely popular for containers, and understandablyso’ … the stems hang down from the hanging basket 30 inches or more …

[ANNUALSFOR EVERY PURPOSE]

==========

TheEASTERN LARK SPARROW is a handsome, well-marked, unmistakable bird,and one of the finest singers of the sparrow tribe. It is not soterrestrial as some of the other ground-sparrows, as it alights intrees, frequenting them much after the breeding season, and in somecases nests in bushes or low trees. In spring it frequents roadsides.Hence the name ‘Road-bird’, which is applied to it in the West. …

Thesong of the ~ is somewhat like that of the Indigo Bunting, butlouder, clearer, and much finer. …

Thenest site is usually in a grassy field, a pasture, or a prairie inthe neighborhood of bushes and trees. The nest is built mostly ofgrasses, lines with rootlets, fine grass and long hairs, and iseither on the ground or in a low tree or bush.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

==========

Mostherbs are watered in early morning or at evening, so that they maynot be dried up; but basil is watered even at noon, for it is saidthat it grows more quickly if it is watered at first with warm water.In general water seems to be extremely beneficial, especially if itis mixed with dung; for, they say, pot-herbs often are hungry, andexperienced gardeners can recognise when this is so.

Allherbs grow finer and larger if transplanted; for even the size ofleeks and radishes depends on transplantation. Transplanting is doneespecially in view of collecting seed: and, while most herbs bear itwell, as long onion, leek , cabbage, cucumber, celery, turnip,lettuce, others bear it less well. All however make better growth andare larger if the seed is planted rather than scattered.

[Theophrastus]

__________

»PETATrying To Turn OJ's Foreclosure Into A Murder Museum

Well,PETA certainly knows how to spin a gruesome murder and possiblemiscarriage of justice into a parody of itself. They are appealing toJP Morgan bank, asking them to donate the house to be turned into a“Meat Is Murder” Museum.

-----

RickSantorum Actually Won That Critical First State in the PresidentialRace

TheIowa Republican party has a minor update to the results of thisyear's caucuses, something it discovered while going through theformality of certifying Mitt Romney's 8-vote victory: Someone elsewon. Eh, don't sweat it, Iowa Republican officials. We all change thecourse of a major party's presidential nominating process out ofsheer incompetence from time to time.

-----

NewtGingrich’s Ex-Wife Drops the Bomb: He Wanted an ‘Open Marriage’

-----

EastmanKodak Co filed for bankruptcy on Thursday in a bid to survive aliquidity crisis after years of falling sales related to the declineof its namesake film business.

-----

AppleLisa Launched (1983)

In1983, after five years of development, Apple released the Lisa, thefirst personal computer with a graphical user interface. Although theLisa was a commercial failure—due in part to its initial price tagof $9,995—it had a significant impact on the computer industry. Itis often rumored to have been named after the first daughter ofApple's Steve Jobs, though several acronyms have been ascribed to thename. What project did Jobs join after being forced out of the Lisaproject? Discuss …

-----

PresidentObama Demands to See Betty White's Birth Certificate in the MostAdorable Way Possible

WILDPOSSUM ON THE LOOSE IN NYC!

Kodakbankruptcy action 'won't affect New Zealand'

Pantlessprisoner walks out of Swedish jail

-----

'Yourbaby looks like Saddam Hussein'

Anadministrator at the Swedish Migration Board is facing disciplinaryaction after telling a family of Iraqi asylum seekers that theirnewborn baby looked like Saddam Hussein.

-----

ManArrested for Stealing Saddam Hussein’s Buttock

-----

Threeyears ago to the day, Barack Hussein Obama stood before a crowdshivering in the frigid January air and took the oath of office thatmade him the 44th president of the United States.

-----

KenLivingstone overtakes Boris Johnson in race to be London mayor

-----

… It’sno mystery why the audience of Republicans so instinctively andpassionately rallied to Gingrich’s defense. His final line was thekey: that the liberal media is out to get Republicans and will stopat nothing to destroy them is an absolute article of faith on theright. It’s why so many conservative leaders claimed that HermanCain was the victim of a liberal smear when he was confronted withsexual harassment charges in November. Never mind that the conspiracytheory made no sense (why would liberals take down a candidate they’dlove to face in the general election?); logic has little to do withthis. Likewise, the left would be thrilled to face Gingrich nextfall, but that didn’t stop Rush Limbaugh from arguing on Thursdayafternoon that the Marianne Gingrich interview was part of a mediaplot to take out the former speaker.

WhatGingrich did brilliantly on Thursday night is to articulate thisparanoid victimhood in a clear and compelling (for his audience, atleast) way. It’s the same basic trick he pulled in this week’sother debate, when he connected with another strain of thepersecution complex: that honest, tax-paying Republicans are thevictims of a dependency class of poor people and minorities thatDemocrats intentionally enable. Thus did Monday’s crowd rejoicewhen Gingrich insisted to Fox News’ Juan Williams that there wasnothing remotely insulting about his statement that the NAACP shouldbe asking for paychecks instead of food stamps, or his suggestionthat children in poor neighborhoods don’t understand the value ofwork.

-----

Cheating,Serial-Divorcing Pig Upset By Adultery Question

Wasthere a highlight to tonight’s GOP debate? No. But CNNnumber-reader John King did manage to really get the amoraljewelry-debt piglet Newt Gingrich in full squeaking rage because, boohoo, somebody asked Newt about his endless adultery and divorcing andbanging other ladies while he’s married, etc.

'Girls are very stuck up and dignefied in their maner ... and like to play with dowls and rags' ...

2012-01-18T00:19:00.000-05:00

ONGIRLS

Girlsare very stuck up and dignefied in their maner and be have your.

Theythink more of dress than anything and like to play with dowls and

rags.They cry if they see a cow in a far distance and are afraid of

guns.They stay at home all the time and go to church on Sunday. They

areal-ways sick. They are always funy and making fun of boy's hands

andthey say how dirty. They cant play marbels. I pity them poor things.

Theymake fun of boys and then turn round and love them. I dont beleave

theyever kiled a cat or anything. They look out every nite and say oh

antthe moon lovely. Thir is one thing I have not told and that is they

al-waysnow their lessons bettern boys.

[MarkTwain]

==========

Cartilaginousfish sleep at times so soundly

thatthey may be caught by hand. The dolphin and the whale, and all

suchas are furnished with a blow-hole, sleep with the blow-hole over

thesurface of the water, and breathe through the blow-hole while

theykeep up a quiet flapping of their fins; indeed, some mariners

assureus that they have actually heard the dolphin snoring.

Molluscssleep like fishes, and crustaceans also. It is plain also

thatinsects sleep; for there can be no mistaking their condition

ofmotionless repose. In the bee the fact of its being asleep is very

obvious;for at night-time bees are at rest and cease to hum. But

thefact that insects sleep may be very well seen in the case of common

every-daycreatures; for not only do they rest at night-time from

dimnessof vision (and, by the way, all hard-eyed creatures see but

indistinctly),but even if a lighted candle be presented they continue

sleepingquite as soundly.

[Aristotle,HISTORIA ANIMALIUM]

==========

He had also removed himself from the city. … The tranquility andpurer air of the countryside were also deemed necessary for VirginiaPoe’s slowly fading health. In February the Poe household settlednear the East River. A nine-year-old neighbour recalled how Poe would‘run over every little while to ask my father to lend him ourrowboat, and then how he would enjoy himself pulling at the oarsover to the little islands just south of Blackwell’s Island, forhis afternoon swim’. …

Fourmonths later the Poe family moved further out to Fordham, a villagethirteen miles to the north of New York, where they found a smallcottage half-buried in blossom and fruit trees.

[PeterAckroyd]

==========

I’VEBEEN daydreaming again. Forty-five years ago I lived on a homesteadin the Navajo Indian country of northwestern New Mexico, a fairlyhigh altitude region with severe winters. How we welcomed spring –and not least because it meant a change of diet! Those who have grownup in these days of supermarkets and frozen foods may have troubleunderstanding how we craved fresh, green vegetables.

Thefirst green edibles were never domesticated plants, for nature offerswild greens at least a month before it is time to even plant thegarden. We fairly gobbled salads made of peppergrass, wild mustards,and dandelions. Plants we would fight as weeds later were welcomenow. Russian thistle, just peeping through the ground, was gatheredand cooked like spinach, and after a winter of vitamin-deficientmeals these greens tasted like ambrosia. No wonder I grew up with ataste for wild foods!

[EuellGibbons, STALKING THE FARAWAY PLACES]

==========

Ofthe Republic’s major literary and intellectual figures (thedivision was not so clearly drawn then between town, as it were, andgown), only one took a public stand. At forty-nine, William DeanHowells was the author of … Indian Summer; he was alsoeasily the busiest and smoothest of America’s men of letters. Yearsbefore, he had come out of Ohio to conquer the world of literature;and had succeeded. He had been the first outlander to be editor ofthe Atlantic Monthly. In the year of the Haymarket Squareriot, he had shifted the literary capital of the country from Bostonto New York when he took over Harper’s Monthly, for which hewrote a column called ‘The Editor’s Study’; and a thousandother things as well. That summer Howells had been reading Tolstoy.In fact, Tolstoy was making a socialist out of him; and Howells wasappalled by Chicago’s judge, jury, and press. He was also turningout his column, a hasty affair by his own best standards butpositively lapidary by ours.

Inthe September 1886 issue of Harper’s,Howells, who had doneso much to bring Turgenev and Tolstoy to the attention of Americanreaders, decided to do the same for Dostoevsky, whose Crime andPunishment was then available only in a French translation. SinceHowells had left school at fifteen, he had been able to become verylearned indeed. He had taught himself Latin and Greek; learnedSpanish, German, Italian, and French. … He was different from us. …

[GoreVidal]

==========

Thevalue of the pitch pine in winter is that it holds the snow sofinely. I see it now afar on the hillsides decking itself with it,its whited towers forming coverts where the rabbit and the graysquirrel lurk. It makes the most cheerful winter scenery beheld fromthe window, you know so well the nature of the coverts and the sombrelight it makes.

[Thoreau,JOURNAL]

==========

MONKEYPUZZLE TREE | Araucaria araucana

… itsname refers to the frustrating situation a monkey would find himselfin if said monkey ever tried to climb the tree to consume the tastyfruits … an individual needle of this tree may exist for more thana decade … does not like summer heat; does not like wet feet insummer or any other time; does not like hot or dry soils … full orpart sun … zones 6-7 … from an ancient lineage – ‘it is …likely that this ancient “living fossil” was trying to thwartherbivorous dinosaurs from devouring it with its abundance of stiff,sharp leaves’ . … the Araucano people of Chile collect the seedsand eat them … they exist in the wild only in the mountains ofcentral Chile and over to Argentina … has grown successfully insouthern England, southeastern Australia, New Zealand, the PacificNorthwest, and Cape Cod … ‘If you have the suitable microclimateand the space to grow it, it makes a riveting addition to thelandscape. Plus it may confuse monkeys, and who doesn’t love acomically perplexed monkey?’ …

HONEYLOCUST | Gleditsia triacanthos

… inthe 1970s, one Daniel Janzen hypothesized that the fruits of thistree were eaten mostly by now-extinct Pleistocene creatures – giantsloths, camels, elephants, giant beavers, and the like … few if anyliving mammals will condescend to eat the fruits … ‘Otherexamples of modern American tree fruits that belong to an earliertime include Osage orange, Kentucky coffee tree, and giant mossy-cupoak’. …

[BIZARREBOTANICALS]

==========

Mid-Marchhas passed and winter seems to have departed. Where but yesterday theeye swept the unbroken snowy mantle of the hills, the earth now liesbare and sodden, and here a faint vernal tinge and there a littlepatch of snow. Swollen streams rush murmuring to the sea. RobustRobins flutter among the crimson sumac berries, taking toll of thesupply of fruit, dried on the stem. A Bluebird warbles his soft lovesong as he flutters from tree to tree in the old orchard, and faraway, from the hill pasture, comes an ‘earth-song’, a pastoralplaintive and sweet, the fine strain of the EASTERN VESPER SPARROW. …

Inopen pastures with short grass the nest is usually sunk in a littlehollow, so that its edge is about level with the surface of the sod.When a nest is built in a tussock or a clump of weeds or bushes,sometimes it is raised somewhat above the ground. Occasionally thelittle domicile is built among standing grain …

Anyonewalking along a country road or through an upland pasture in springor summer may see the bird, a plain, rather dingy, striped sparrow,running on ahead, flying only when closely approached, and now andthen showing its white outer tail feathers in flight. It is a bird ofthe drier, upland fields, usually keeping away from houses for the most part, and rather seldom approaching swamps and watersides, butis fond of daily dust baths in country roads.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

__________

»StupidHigh School Kids (and Teachers) Freak Out Over Wikipedia Blackout

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PaulaDeen Is a Greasy Villain

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Secretaryof State Hillary Clinton today appointed basketball legend KareemAbdul-Jabar as a State Department Cultural Ambassador.

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DidNewt Gingrich Out Brit Hume’s Dead Gay Son?

Outof nowhere, the Miami Herald has dusted off and expanded upon one ofWashington's oldest and juiciest political rumors: The one about arising young beltway journalist and his gay affair with a powerfulGOP congressman, and how the journalist shot himself in the head whenhis lover's political rival threatened to out them. According to theHerald, that rival may have been Newt Gingrich.

Therumor, in brief, is as follows: In the summer of 1997, the Hill'sSandy Hume—the then-28-year-old son of Fox News' Brit Hume—brokea blockbuster story about four GOP congressman who plotted, andfailed, to overthrow Newt Gingrich as Speaker. One of those men wasBill Paxon, a New York Republican who was married to fellowCongresswoman Susan Molinari. Another of the plotters, MajorityLeader Dick Armey, scuttled the coup when he learned that Paxon, andnot he, would replace Gingrich. Armey later disavowed the wholeattempt and claimed not to have been involved.

Afew months later, in February 1998, Paxon launched an attempt tounseat Armey from his leadership position. Just days later, SandyHume killed himself with a gunshot to the head. Just days after that,Paxon suddenly and inexplicably resigned and never returned to publiclife. Almost immediately, rumors began flying that Hume and Paxon hadbeen having an affair, and that Armey had threatened to out them.Hence the suicide and the sudden resignation. The theory was commonknowledge among the D.C. press corps, but it never made it to print(as far as I can tell) beyond the dark corners of the internet and anangry passage, years later, in Joe Scarborough's Rome Wasn't Burnt ina Day accusing Armey of smearing Hume.

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Girl,6, survives on crisps for 5 days after mum abandons her

Asobbing girl of six was left home alone for five days in a cold anddisgusting flat.

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CaseyAnthony’s Hideout?

Sourcestell Diane Dimond she may have been given sanctuary at a church inFlorida.

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Newt'sNewest "Elite": Subway Riders

Courtesyof Matt Yglesias, I read this hilarious Newt Gingrich declaration ofcultural war …

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ORGIES!DRUGS! 3-WAYS! BRITNEY SPEARS BODYGUARD TELLS ALL

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ANTHONYBOURDAIN

RIPSPaula Deen --

She'sa Diabetic Scam Artist!

AnthonyBourdain is putting Paula Deen ON BLAST -- mocking the butter-lovingchef for poisoning Americans with unhealthy food ... and now tryingto profit off of their illness.

Inan ultra-transparent Twitter attack -- Bourdain wrote, "Thinkingof getting into the leg-breaking business, so I can profitably sellcrutches later."

The"Kitchen Confidential" author is presumably pissed thatDeen -- who built an empire off her high-fat, high-sugar recipes --announced she has diabetes ... and subsequently revealed she's becomea paid spokeswoman for a diabetes medication.

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BATBOY SELLS VACATION CAVE

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EverythingAbout Rick Santorum Is Gross, Like His ‘Creamcup Trust’

Today’sSantorum scandal du jour — which means “a frothy mix, etc.,” inSantorum’s native language of Gay Obsessed — involves the variousmansions he purchases through shady mortgages, in Virginia. Butreally, did he need to name his sketchy tax dodge “The CreamcupTrust,” and did he have to involve somebody named “James Sack”?

Pig's Ears ... Cow's Udder ... Nipple Fruit ... Fox Face ...

2012-01-17T00:12:00.000-05:00

OnMay 1, 1886, American workers in general and Chicago’s workers inparticular decided that the eight-hour workday was an idea whose timehad come. Workers demonstrated, and a number of factories werestruck. Management responded in kind. At McCormick Reaper strikerswere replaced by ‘scabs’. On May 3, when the scabs left thefactory … they were mobbed by the strikers. Chicago’s policepromptly opened fire and America’s gilded age looked to be crackingopen.

Thenext night, in Haymarket Square, the anarchists held a meetingpresided over by the mayor of Chicago. A thousand workers listened tomany thousands of highly incendiary words. But all was orderly untilHis Honor went home; the the police ‘dispersed’ the meeting withthat tact which has ever marked Hog City’s law-enforcementofficers. At one point, someone (never identified) threw a bomb; anumber of policemen and workers were killed or wounded. Subsequently,there were numerous arrests and in-depth grillings.

Finally,more or less at random, eight men were indicted for ‘conspiracy tomurder’. There was no hard evidence of any kind. One man was noteven in town that day while another was home playing cards. By andlarge, the great conservative Republic felt no compassion foranarchists, even the ones who had taken up the revolutionary game ofbridge; worse, an eight-hour workday would drive a stake through theeconomy’s heart.

OnAugust 20, a prejudiced judge and jury found seven of the eight menguilty of murder in the first degree; the eight man (who had not beenin town that night) got fifteen years in the slammer because he had abig mouth. …

Duringthe short hot summer of 1886, the case was much discussed. Thepeculiar arbitrariness of condemning to death men whom no one hadseen commit a crime but who had been heard, at one time or another,to use ‘incendiary and seditious language’ was duly noted inbookish circles. Yet no intellectual of the slightest nationalimportance spoke up. … Mark Twain maintained his habitual silenceon any issue where he might, even for an instant, lose the love ofthe folks.

[GoreVidal]

==========

Havingthus honoured and dignified the married state, [Lykurgus]

destroyedthe vain womanish passion of jealousy, for, while carefully avoiding

anydisorder or licentiousness, he nevertheless permitted men toassociate

worthypersons with them in the task of begetting children, and taught

themto ridicule those who insisted on the exclusive possession of their

wives,and who were ready to fight and kill people to maintain their

right.It was permitted to an elderly husband, with a young wife, to

associatewith himself any well-born youth whom he might fancy, and to

adoptthe offspring as his own.

Andagain, it was allowable for a respectable man, if he felt any

admirationfor a virtuous mother of children, married to some one else,

toinduce her husband to permit him to have access to her, that he might

asit were sow seed in a fertile field, and obtain a fine son from a

healthystock. Lykurgus did not view children as belonging to their

parents,but above all to the state; and therefore he wished his

citizensto be born of the best possible parents; besides the

inconsistencyand folly which he noticed in the customs of the rest of

mankind,who are willing to pay money, or use their influence with the

ownersof well-bred stock, to obtain a good breed of horses or dogs,

whilethey lock up their women in seclusion and permit them to have

childrenby none but themselves, even though they be mad, decrepit, or

diseased;just as if the good or bad qualities of children did not

dependentirely upon their parents, and did not affect their parents

morethan any one else.

Butalthough men lent their wives in order to produce healthy and useful

citizens,yet this was so far from the license which was said to prevail

inlater times with respect to women, that adultery was regarded amongst

themas an impossible crime. A story is told of one Geradas, a very old

Spartan,who, when asked by a stranger what was done to adulterers among

them,answered, "Stranger, there are no adulterers with us." "Andif

therewere one?" asked the stranger. "Then," said Geradas,"he would

haveto pay as compensation a bull big enough to stand on Mount Täygetus

anddrink from the river Eurotas." The stranger, astonished, asked

"Wherecan you find so big a bull?" "Where can you find anadulterer in

Sparta?"answered Geradas. This is what is said about their marriage

ceremonies.

[Plutarch]

==========

GERMANIVY | Delairea odorata (syn. Senecio mikanioides)

… inthe hanging basket this plant will ‘cascade straight downward whenthey reach the edge of the pot, creating a dense waterfall ofgreenery that can drop 10 feet or more. … Breathtaking!’ …pinch young plants … grow as a tender annual … leaves have awintergreen-like scent – ‘Try it and see what you think!’ … anative of South Africa; Germans absconded with it and named it afterthemselves … Senecio macroglossus is similar but hasglossier and waxier leaves … propagate by stem cuttings at anyseason …

[ANNUALSFOR EVERY PURPOSE]

==========

Anotherplant of the southern seacoasts … [is] the shrubby Yaupon, orCassina [Ilex vomitoria], a seaside relative of out commonChristmas holly. Its leaves make the finest wild-plant tea availablein North America. This tea actually contains appreciable amounts ofcaffeine, making it slightly stimulating like Oriental tea … itmakes a mildly stimulating tea that is delicious and as wholesome asthe commercial tea and coffee we buy. It is a close relative of matéor Paraguay tea, which is highly appreciated in South America …

Ourown Yaupon is a small shrub, 1 to 3 feet high, stiffly branched, andoften forming small thickets … It is an evergreen, and can begathered any time of the year. … it bears small red berriesresembling those of the related hollies. I tried making tea of thegreen leaves, but found it herby and unpleasant. Just dried in theshade it was little better, but when I put a large bake pan full ofthe leaves in an oven, turned the heat very low, propped open theoven door, and roasted them until they were dry and crumbly, theymade very fine-tasting tea … Crumble the … leaves, remove thestems and mid-veins, and make the tea exactly as you make ordinaryOriental tea. …

Onecould go on and on.

[EuellGibbons]

==========

PIG’SEARS | COW’S UDDER | NIPPLE FRUIT | FOX FACE | Solanum mammosum

… fullsun … not hardy … keep evenly moist … fairly heavy feeder …fruits are ‘reportedly’ poisonous … leaves are spiny … to 3feet … when the fruits turn orange or yellow one can ‘harvest thestems of the plant with the weird fruits attached’ … ‘This ishow the fruits are sold in cut flower markets, especially in Japanand Taiwan. Then let the interpretations begin’. …

[BIZARREBOTANICALS]

==========

HENSLOW’SSPARROW | Passerherbulus henslowi sururrans

Thereis a great green hill east of the city of Worcester, where farmersused to pasture cattle half a century ago, and there at the hillfoot, where a never-failing spring sent forth a rivulet that watereda green field, I first made the acquaintance of this little fowl.Where the rill spread out over the meadow, keeping the roots wellwatered so that the grass grew rank and tall, the little male,clinging to the upper grass stems, sent forth his weak but emphatic‘FLEE-SIC’ hour after hour. His mate kept mostly under cover ofthe grass, stealing along like a tiny mouse, and so well was the nestconcealed that I never found it.

Rankgrass in moist lowlands seems to be chosen usually by these birds asa nesting-place. Usually, I have found the bird on moist land nearwater, but in migration or in the South in winter it often frequentsdry fields or open piney woods near some sheltering thicket. …

Onewho knows its note may find it without difficulty, but its activitieson the ground, where it spends most of its time, are well hidden bythe waving grass. If pursued it runs swiftly or squats and hides itshead under leaves or other vegetation, or it may flutter along closeto the ground until it reaches the shelter of some thicket of busheswhere it sits motionless and concealed until it believes that alldanger has passed. … Some of the males have the habit of singing,if singing it can be called, after dark; sometimes they sing untilmidnight, and in some cases nearly all night.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

__________

»Listento Italy's Most Cowardly Captain Refuse to Return to His Sinking Ship

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KimJong-il’s Fat Playboy Son Totally Jealous of Cool Dictator Brother

Thelate Kim Jong-il's oldest son, the Ferragamo-wearing Chad KimJong-nam, lost out on a power struggle with his youngest brother, KimJong-un, years ago, and has since spent most of his time in Macau andChina, doing whatever it is international playboy dictator relativesdo. (Eat, apparently.) Not that he's jealous, or anything …

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BettyWhite turns 90 today …

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SineadO’Connor has checked herself into hospital to be treated fordepression.

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LosAngeles to porn industry: wear a condom

LAcity councilors approved an ordinance that makes the use of condomsin porn mandatory …

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CrazyStoned Woman Goes Topless at Apple Store

What'sthe only thing more exciting than a new Core i7 MacBook Air at yourlocal Apple Store? No, not the Genius Bar helping you out with acracked iPhone screen—a ranting, pot-smoking lunatic crashing aQ&A. Naked.

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Busylizzies take summer off after mildew outbreak

Britain'sbiggest garden centres will not be selling the country's favouritesummer plant this year after it was nearly wiped out by disease.

Thompsonand Morgan, a leading plant and seed supplier, has also withdrawn thehanging basket favourite from sale.

Theentire population of busy lizzies is being threatened by impatiensdowny mildew, a fungal disease which has developed a resistance tothe fungicide being used to treat it.

Theairborne disease appears as a white powder on the underside ofleaves, causing them to yellow and fall off, leaving a bare stem.

Gardencentres hope that not stocking it will give the plant a chance torecover and botanists time to find a cure.

'I live in an age when men have agreed to say ‘God’ instead of "Jove"'...

2012-01-16T23:09:00.002-05:00

Thesentimental connotation of "scab" is as terrific as that of"traitor" or "Judas," and a sentimentaldefinition would be as deep and varied as the human heart. It is fareasier to arrive at what may be called a technical definition, wordedin commercial terms, as, for instance, that A SCAB IS ONE WHO GIVESMORE VALUE FOR THE SAME PRICE THAN ANOTHER.

[JackLondon]

==========

Their[the Lacedaemonians’] marriage custom was for the husband to carry

offhis bride by force. They did not carry off little immature girls, butgrown up

women,who were ripe for marriage. After the bride had been carried off the

bridesmaidreceived her, cut her hair close to her head, dressed her in

aman's cloak and shoes, and placed her upon a couch in a dark chamber

alone.The bridegroom, without any feasting and revelry, but as sober as

usual,after dining at his mess, comes into the room, looses her virgin

zone,and, after passing a short time with her, retires to pass the

nightwhere he was wont, with the other young men. And thus he

continued,passing his days with his companions, and visiting his wife

bystealth, feeling ashamed and afraid that any one in the house should

hearhim, she on her part plotting and contriving occasions for meeting

unobserved.This went on for a long time, so that some even had children

bornto them before they ever saw their wives by daylight.

[Plutarch]

==========

Jan.30 [1852]

Therhymes which I used to see on the walls of privies, scribbled byboys, I have lately seen, word for word the same; in spite [of]whitewash and brick walls and admonitions they survive. They are nodoubt older than Orpheus, and have come down from an antiquity asremote as mythology or fable. So, too, no doubt older than Orpheus,and have come down from an antiquity as remote as mythology or fable.So, too, no doubt corporations have ever struggled in vain to obtaincleanliness in those provinces. Filth and impurity are as old ascleanliness and purity. To correspond to man completely, Nature iseven perhaps unchaste herself. Or perchance man’s impurity begets amonster somewhere, to proclaim his sin. The poetry of the jakes, –it flows as perennially as the gutter. …

Ilive in an age when men have agreed to say ‘God’ instead of‘Jove’. …

Jan.31. We hear the sounds ofscreech owls in our nostrils, and the snoring of men is perhaps notto be distinguished from that of pigs.

[Thoreau,JOURNAL]

==========

TheEASTERN GRASSHOPPER SPARROW is a queer, somber-colored, big-headed,short-tailed, unobtrusive little bird. It did not come by its namebecause of its fondness for grasshoppers, though it is never averseto making a meal of them, but because of its grasshopper-like attemptat song – if song it can be called. It si so persistent andpersevering in giving forth its attempts at melody that it not onlysings and sings unnoticed during daylight hours, but even awakens inthe night to sing. When the novice first hears this stridulationcoming out of the grass he naturally ignores it or does not connectit with a bird.

Thislittle sparrow is not so uncommon as most people believe it to be,but its insect-like song is barely audible at one hundred yards, andif the hearer is at all tone-deaf, he will not hear it at all, eventhrough he passes by the singing bird at a distance of twenty feet.Then again the bird keeps out of sight for the most part and runsthrough the grass like a little mouse. Also it is very local in itshabitat. It may disappear from one town and suddenly appear inanother where it was previously unknown. It may be common in onelocality and unknown in a similar region near-by.

Itis a bird is the coastal plain, river valleys and the lower uplands.It is rarely found at levels much above one thousand feet. Althoughit often nests on rather low ground, even at the edge of saltmarshes, the nest is always on dry land. If in or near a meadow, itis on a rise of ground. It prefers dry, sandy fields and pastures,where the white daisy and the red sorrel grow, and I have never seenone in the woods. It is a ground bird; it eats, nests, sings andsleeps on the ground, but also sings from weed-tops, tussocks,driftwood, stones and fences. Rarely it alights in trees, andsometimes sings from a low tree-top, and in migration it may be seenat times in gardens or orchards.

Itshabits are much like those of the Savannah Sparrow, but it may bereadily distinguished from that species by its unstreaked breast, theyellow at the bend of its wings, and the rapid, fluttering, wren-likeflight close to the ground.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

==========

Violetsand gilliflowers … when the frosts draw near,you should replant inpots, at a season when the moon waneth, in order to set them undercover and keep them from the cold in a cellar, and by day set them inthe air or in the sun and water them at such time that the water maybe drunken up and the earth dry before you set them under cover, fornever should you put them away wet in the evening.

[‘TheGoodman of Paris’]

==========

SENSITIVEPLANT | Mimosa pudica

… whentouched, the leaves of this plant fold up modestly … tender annual… full sun … soil should be kept moist to wet … said to groweasily when started from seed … HATES cold; keep above 60° at alltimes … ferny leaves; curious flowers …

[BIZARREBOTANICALS]

==========

Ihad not intended to mention that the heart of the Palmetto … is oneof the finest vegetables and salads in the plant kingdom, for inorder to get this delicacy one must destroy this beautiful palm.However, on a recent trip … I observed many Palmettos being cutdown to make room for new superhighways, supermarkets, supermotels,and parking lots. Since these palms were being destroyed anyway, Idetermined that at least some of the delicious palm hearts would notgo to waste, and gathered as many as I could use from the felledtrees. …

Thedelicious heart, vulgarly and insultingly called a ‘cabbage’, isreally the terminal bud found in the center of the leaf cluster. Itis composed of tightly folded, unborn leaves, and is snow-white,crisp, tender, sweet, and delicious.

Palmheart can be cooked and eaten like cabbage, but you will find it farbetter than that plebeian vegetable. Thinly sliced, chopped,orshredded, it makes a wonderful addition to almost any tossed salad.Even better, serve shredded palm heart alone with your favoritedressing.

[EuellGibbons]

==========

Inearly June [1844] the household took lodgings in a farmhouse somefive miles outside New York, in a rural spot now to be identified asthe corner of Eighty-fourth Street and Broadway. Here, in the wordsof a contemporary, was ‘a wilderness of rocks, bushes, and thistleswith here and there a farm house’. But the front windows lookeddown into the valley of the Hudson, and took in the sweep of theriver. He described the place later as ‘a perfect heaven’ …

[PeterAckroyd]

==========

Everynow and then, usually while shaving, I realize that I have livedthrough nearly one third of the history of the United States, whichproves not how old I am but how young the Republic is. The Americanempire, which started officially in 1898 with our acquisition of thePhilippines, came to a peak in the year 1945, while I was still partof that army which had won us the political and economic mastery oftwo hemispheres. If anyone had said to me then that the whole thingwould be lost in my lifetime, I would have said it is not possible tolose so much so quickly without an atomic catastrophe, at least. Butlose it we have.

[GoreVidal]

__________

»ADreary Look Back at Jon Huntsman's Failed Presidential Campaign

It'sa tearful day in the world of cosmopolitan magazines and televisionstudios, as the infamously sane Republican presidential candidate JonHuntsman has dropped out of the race, due to a near-total void ofinterest in his campaign among Republican primary voters. How didthis relatively competent-seeming person lose his support sodramatically? Well, he didn't; he never had any support.

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EltonJohn and Madonna Are Fighting Again

EltonJohn had a sour puss on all night at the Golden Globes, but it goteven worse when Madonna's shitty "Masterpiece" won for BestOriginal Song over some crappy ballad Elton wrote for Gnomeo andJuliet. Then his husband started talking shit about Madonna onFacebook.

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IdiotPropagandist James O'Keefe Screws Up Voter 'Fraud' Stunt: His 'Dead'Voter is Still Alive

Lastweek conservative "film-maker" James O'Keefe pulled anothersupposedly muckraking stunt, attempting to prove that voter fraud isrampant by having colleagues commit voter fraud in the New Hampshireprimary by obtaining ballots using the names of dead people. WhatO'Keefe and his pals succeeded in doing was bringing an investigationagainst them, pissing off a number of local officials and injuringthe families of the recently dead.

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AstronomersGetting Ready to Take The First-Ever Photo of a Black Hole

Iwuz cold so… i mades a igloo

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MADONNAPUNCHES OUT ELTON JOHN

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Italy'smost hated man: Facebook anger at skipper of doomed cruise liner who'abandoned ship hours before passengers'

Thecaptain of the Costa Concordia has become the most hated man inItaly.

FrancescoSchettino, 52, is at the centre of a Facebook hate campaign afterbeing squarely blamed for the cruise liner running aground.

Thousandshave taken to the web to vent their fury at the so-called ‘CaptainCoward’, who is now claimed to have ‘skimmed’ past the Tuscanisle of Giglio not just to salute a retired officer but also toimpress his head waiter’s family on shore.

Manyscorned his decision not to remain with his stricken ship.

Theofficial death toll rose to six yesterday when a man’s body waspulled from the tilting wreckage. The number of those stillunaccounted for rose to 29 – 25 passengers and four crew.

-----

Cancer-strickenVenezuelan president Chavez given 'less than a year to live'

Happy70th birthday, Muhammad Ali.

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TribalismKilled Huntsman

ByronYork put it best:

Huntsman'sproblem was that, whatever his position on some key issues, he sentout political and cultural signals that screamed NPR, and not FoxNews, that screamed liberal, and not conservative. Even thoughconservatives agreed with Huntsman on many things, they instinctivelysensed he wasn't their guy.

Andwhat does that mean? It means he thought gay people's relationshipsdeserved recognition if not civil marriage; that climate change wasreal, with the question being what to do about it, if anything; thatevolution was not something still up for serious debate. These areculturally and religiously anathema to the current GOP, for purelytribal reasons. Not because these things aren't true, but purelybecause Democrats or liberals and the vast majority of educated humanbeings take them for granted.

Whatyou see in the rejection of Huntsman is the Republican body rejectinga sanity transplant. Based on unreason and hatred of the other halfof America. It's irrational and degenerate. But it's what they have,sadly, become.

Graham bread, spirit-rappings, phrenology ...

2012-01-15T23:34:00.001-05:00

Iwas fond of reading, but father had brought only a few

religiousbooks from Scotland. Fortunately, several of our neighbors

hadbrought a dozen or two of all sorts of books, which I borrowed and

read,keeping all of them except the religious ones carefully hidden

fromfather's eye. Among these were Scott's novels, which, like all

othernovels, were strictly forbidden, but devoured with glorious

pleasurein secret. Father was easily persuaded to buy Josephus' "Wars

ofthe Jews," and D'Aubigné's "History of the Reformation,"and I

triedhard to get him to buy Plutarch's Lives, which, as I told him,

everybody,even religious people, praised as a grand good book; but he

wouldhave nothing to do with the old pagan until the graham bread and

anti-fleshdoctrines came suddenly into our backwoods neighborhood,

makinga stir something like phrenology and spirit-rappings, which

wereas mysterious in their attacks as influenza. He then thought it

possiblethat Plutarch might be turned to account on the food question

byrevealing what those old Greeks and Romans ate to make them strong;

andso at last we gained our glorious Plutarch. Dick's "Christian

Philosopher,"which I borrowed from a neighbor, I thought I might

ventureto read in the open, trusting that the word "Christian"would

beproof against its cautious condemnation. But father balked at the

word"Philosopher," and quoted from the Bible a verse whichspoke of

"philosophyfalsely so-called." I then ventured to speak in defense of

thebook, arguing that we could not do without at least a little of

themost useful kinds of philosophy.

"Yes,we can," he said with enthusiasm, "the Bible is the onlybook

humanbeings can possibly require throughout all the journey from

earthto heaven."

"Buthow," I contended, "can we find the way to heaven withoutthe

Bible,and how after we grow old can we read the Bible without a

littlehelpful science? Just think, father, you cannot read your Bible

withoutspectacles, and millions of others are in the same fix; and

spectaclescannot be made without some knowledge of the science of

optics."

"Oh!"he replied, perceiving the drift of the argument, "there will

alwaysbe plenty of worldly people to make spectacles."

Tothis I stubbornly replied with a quotation from the Bible with

referenceto the time coming when "all shall know the Lord from the

leasteven to the greatest," and then who will make the spectacles?

Buthe still objected to my reading that book, called me a

contumaciousquibbler too fond of disputation, and ordered me to

returnit to the accommodating owner. I managed, however, to read it

later.

[JohnMuir, THE STORY OF MY BOYHOOD AND YOUTH]

==========

Theafternoon of June 9, 1907, was a fine sunny Sabbath as my wife and Idrove along the country road leading from Dixbury, Massachusetts, tothe part of Marshfield known as Green Harbor. Just after we hadcrossed the Dyke Meadow Bridge and were nearing the seashore, myattention was attracted to an unknown bird which was feeding by theroadside with a small flock of English Sparrows. My first thought wasthat it was a partial albino Red-winged Blackbird or a freakBobolink. The bird was quite tame and allowed a prolongedobservation, with glasses, at the width of a country road, and wewere able not only to take note of all the plumage markings but tosee the shape of the bill very clearly, so that the bird wasrecognized as a finch of some kind. The bird was feeding avidly uponthe seeds of wayside dandelions, which it procured by jumping up fromthe ground and nipping, with its powerful beak, through the base ofthe ripening flower heads, each time alighting with a beakful ofwhite pappus. After we had watched it for some time, during which itfrequently interrupted by passing carriages and autos, it flew offacross the grassy meadows and disappeared behind a knoll. It was anadult male LARK BUNTING in full breeding plumage.

TheLark Bunting is a characteristic bird of the great western plains.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

==========

BEEHIVEGINGER | Zingiber spectabile

… fullsun outdoors … even moisture during the growing season; less wateras the summer wanes; winter it in an ‘unheated sun room’ for thewinter … ‘An arrangement of beehive ginger cones may be just thething to stir the heart of your honey’. …

[BIZARREBOTANICALS]

==========

Toclean an Octopus turn it upside down, sever the few muscles that holdthe viscera, then turn the ‘head’ inside out. Remove the visceraand the dark ink sacs that you will find inside. Turn it right sideout again, place it in a pan, and cover it with coarse salt. Scrub itwith the dry salt; this will cause a slimy lather to appear thatshould be rinsed off whenever ti becomes bothersome. Continue to rubit with salt until no more lather appears and the skin begins tearingoff in strips. Remove the skin, cut the tentacles intoconvenient-sized strips , and your Octopus is ready to cook. …

TheHawaiians eat Octopus raw, and, far from being horrible, it is atleast as good as the raw Cherrystone Clams we relish. … TheHawaiians eat it with poi, but that is a delicacy unobtainablehere. …

Whenthe cleaned meat is run through a food chopper, the resultingOctopus-burger can be used in any of the ways recommended forpreparing ground-up whelk, clam, or other tough shellfish.

[EuellGibbons]

==========

InApril 1844 the Poe household was on the move again, its destinationbeing once more New York. …

Withina week of his arrival he had sold a story of sensation to the NewYork Sun. On April 13 that newspaper carried the headline,ASTOUNDING INTELLIGENCE BY PRIVATE EXPRESS FROM CHARLESTON VIANORFOLK! THE ATLANTIC OCEAN CROSSED IN THREE DAYS!! ARRIVAL ATSULLIVAN’S ISLAND OF A STEERING BALLOON INVENTED BY MR. MONCKMASON!! …

‘TheBalloon Hoax’ is one of his most celebrated stories, not leastbecause it opened the path for later writers of science fantasyincluding Jules Verne and H.G. Wells. … ‘The Balloon Hoax’reports to be the journal of Mr. Monck Mason, a real aeronaut who hadalready flown by balloon from Vauxhall Gardens to Weilberg inGermany. So Poe adopts his name and contrives a fantastic adventurefor him; Mason performs what was then considered an impossible featand, by ingenious arrangement of valves and air, manages to steer hisballoon across the Atlantic. Poe was a century ahead of the actualachievement, but there is nothing in his account that strainscredulity. … Poe had perpetuated a similar hoax some nine yearsbefore in ‘Hans Phaall – A Tale’, in which a journey by balloonto the moon is outlined in some detail … They were a form of satire… But they were also a form of ratiocination, a challenge to createa suitable and perfectly plausible set of circumstances by which theimpossible could be conveyed with the utmost verisimilitude.

[PeterAckroyd]

==========

Relentlesshunting soon practically exterminated the [sea otter], though in the1920’s an occasional pelt was sold … Protected by internationaltreaty after 1911, however, the almost extinct species began toincrease so rapidly that by 1936 it was estimated there were one ortwo thousand in American waters. In 1938 a small herd, the first in acentury, appeared at Carmel, California, where they have been eversince …

Butat the end of the eighteenth century, the possible extinction of abeautiful and interesting species troubled the Pacific traders not awhit. They simply rushed in where there was a chance for profits …A single cargo might be worth a million dollars. One guileless Indiantribe traded $8,000 worth of furs for an old chisel. Discovering theeagerness of the Indians for one-inch chisels, and blue beads (inpreference of all other colors), the traders made them standardmediums of exchange, at great advantage to themselves.

[EYESOF DISCOVERY]

==========

Allthe pot-herbs are lovers of water and of dung, except rue, which doesnot at all like dung; this is true of the winter no less than of thesummer herbs, and of the tender no less than of the strong ones. Thedung which is most commended is that which is mixed with litter,while that of beasts of burden is held to be bad, because it is mostapt to lose its moisture. Dung which is mixed with the seed is mostin request, but some cast the manure on while they are sowing, andthey also use fresh human dung as a liquid manure.

[Theophrastus]

__________

»TimTebow -- Even Jesus Is Piling On

TimTebow and the Broncos got beat so badly by Tom Brady and the NewEngland Patriots yesterday ... even Jesus is taking shots at Timmynow!

-----

He-Man:"I'm Sexy And I Know It"

PrinceAdam wouldn't miss a dance party.

-----

Attending‘Price Is Right’ Taping Apparently Sailors’ Best Idea For ShoreLeave

-----

FailedRussian Mars probe crashes into the Pacificc

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WithTom Cruise at work on the Pittsburgh set of his latest film One Shot,Suri and Katie are having some mother-daughter time alone at thefamily's New york apartment.

OnFriday evening the ladies enjoyed a production of Mary Poppins onBroadway.

Cheeky:The five-year-old stuck her tongue out at nearby photographers

Cuddlefor mummy: Katie scooped up her daughter for a hug as they made theirway to the car

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Peoplestill actully care about Norton? AVG, CCleaner and Malwarebytes areall I need and I've never had a single virus or any adware andmalware get through to my system.

-Damian, Bham, 16/1/2012 03:00

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Anyonewho installs Norton Anti-virus must seriously know very little aboutcomputers. It's just a scare tactic that works on people with limitedknowledge of computers. It in itself is a virus!! It's a shame wecan't better educate users against this trash.

-what-a-lad, Chester, 16/1/2012 02:56

-----

Iam senior programmer for a major I.T company , I have worked withthousands of I.T professionals over the years and do you know howmany of us use norton?None! Norton is widely hated in the industrybecause it does more harm than good , it is itself a virus . The onlyreason people think its good is because of Nortons aggressivemarketing , most laptops come with it installed and its heavilypromoted in PC stores etc. so people assume it MUST be good if laptopmakers trust it and it's expensive .... but the fact is PC makersdon't 'trust' Norton , they just promote it due to financialtransactions between hardware manufacturers and Norton . When Iworked for a leading laptop brand our call centre staff were sent ona 'training course' where they we're taught to answer customersquestions about anti viruses as such : "we are not allowed topromote any specific brand madam , but just between you and me I useNorton at home"

-Ginny, Sussex , 16/1/2012 01:16

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Monsantoto face biopiracy charges in India

LOVE-IN-A-PUFF ... HEARTS-A-BURSTIN' ...

2012-01-14T23:28:00.001-05:00

Lawnswere often planted in cloister garths. Grass was just as troublesomeduring the Middle Ages as it is today, for it had to be weeded,mowed, and rolled. The complicated process of making a beautiful lawnfor a pleasure garden was described by Albertus Magnus in thethirteenth century: first weeds were dug up by the roots and thenboiling water poured over the earth to kill any remaining roots andseeds. After that, turf was laid down and beaten with wooden malletsto compress the grass. The ideal lawn was level and thick.

Albertusrecommended planting trees around the lawn for shade, but he warnedthat they should not be planted in the middle of a lawn, where peoplewere apt to walk, for ‘spiders’ webs stretched from branch tobranch would interrupt and entangle the faces of the passers-by’.

[SWEETHERBS AND SUNDRY FLOWERS]

==========

LOVE-IN-A-PUFF| Cardiospermum halicacabum

… isinvasive in the cotton south … not hardy … can be grown in acontainer …

STRAWBERRYBUSH | HEARTS-A-BURSTIN’ | Euonymus americanus

… zones5-9 … shade-sun … the seeds are ‘screaming orange’; birds‘think’ they are ‘fabulous’ … native plant; related tobittersweet …

[BIZARREBOTANICALS]

==========

Thereare literally hundreds of stories about Octopuses attacking divers,holding swimmers until the tide came in and drowning them, and evenoverturning boats to get at the occupants. I would hesitate to saythat every one of these stories is pure fabrication, but I havecaught dozens of Octopuses, and have seen hundreds caught, and I haveyet to see a diver or fisherman even slightly endangered by thiscreature. The ~ is clever, evasive, agile, and strong, yes, butdangerous, no. it might be humiliating to my own species, but it ismy opinion that the ~ views human beings with the same kind of horrorthat most human beings view it – and with good reason. A creaturethat has been accustomed to dine on the very finest of crustacean andmolluscan shellfish would hardly fine ordinary human flesh palatable.

InHawaii, we caught Octopus by dragging shiny lures made of cowrieshells across the bottom. We also speared them on the reef during theday, or went out at night and speared them by torchlight. Wesometimes speared Octopus while diving for Spiny Lobster of fish. InCalifornia, I have caught them with spears and gaff hooks by pokingaround in likely holes at extremely low tide.

[EuellGibbons]

==========

REDCROSSBILL | Loxia curvirostra pusilla

… ‘handsome’… ‘strange’ … ‘erratic’ … ‘seemingly irresponsible’… has a hankering for salt – ‘it eats almost anything that iswell salted’ … it may start the nesting process anywhere fromJanuary through midsummer; nest may be built in a dense conifer or anaked branch … the birds are (were) tame – ‘I have lain on theground under a tree watching Crossbills feeding among the twobranches only a few feet away, and they completely disregarded mypresence’. …

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

==========

Inthe autumn of 1843 Poe told a fellow writer in Philadelphia that ‘hiswife and Mrs. Glemm were starving’. So fifteen dollars werepromptly raised from journalists and others; an hour after the moneyhad been given to Poe, ‘he was found in a state of intoxication inDecatur Street’.

[PeterAckroyd]

==========

Thoughthe forests of the Pacific coast provided furs of almost every kind,the great prize was the sea otter, found nowhere else in the world.Herds of several hundreds at a time splashed about from Kamchatka toAlaska and all the way down the American coast to Lower California.The animals were about four and a half feet long, with a looselyfolded skin that could be stretched to a full six feet. They hauntedthe thick beds of kelp near reefs and rocky islands. The Pacific kelpformed a kind of submarine jungle in which the animals were safe fromtheir only enemies – sea lions, sharks, and killer whales. Said tobe able to swim under water for a mile at a time, they lived almostentirely in the water, almost fearless of man. The Indians had alwayskilled a few; but as late as 1803 the otters were still tame enoughto allow boats to come very close before they dived. After the whiteman had begun his ruthless killing, they grew so alert that they werebelieved to flee from smoke or human scent several miles down wind.Like all otters, they were playful, juggling bits of seaweed as theylay on their backs in the water, or playing with their pups, whichpaddled about in the water with their mothers, ‘when no larger thanrats’. John R. Jewett, a sailor captured and enslaved by theIndians about 1803, wrote after he had been rescued: ‘Nothing canbe more beautiful than one of these animals when seen swimming,especially when on the lookout for any object. At such times itraises its head quite above the surface, and the contrast between theshining black and the white, together with the sharp ears and a longtuft of heir rising from the middle of its forehead, which look likethree small horns, render it quite a novel and attractive object’.

[EYESOF DISCOVERY]

==========

Inthat day, for a

manto speak out openly and proclaim himself an enemy of negro slavery

wassimply to proclaim himself a madman. For he was blaspheming against

theholiest thing known to a Missourian, and could NOT be in his right

mind.…

RobertHardy was our first ABOLITIONIST--awful name! He was a journeyman

cooper,and worked in the big cooper-shop belonging to the great

pork-packingestablishment which was Marion City's chief pride and sole

sourceof prosperity. He was a New-Englander, a stranger. And, being a

stranger,he was of course regarded as an inferior person--for that has

beenhuman nature from Adam down--and of course, also, he was made

tofeel unwelcome, for this is the ancient law with man and the other

animals.Hardy was thirty years old, and a bachelor; pale, given to

reverieand reading. He was reserved, and seemed to prefer the isolation

whichhad fallen to his lot. He was treated to many side remarks by

hisfellows, but as he did not resent them it was decided that he was a

coward.

Allof a sudden he proclaimed himself an abolitionist--straight out

andpublicly! He said that negro slavery was a crime, an infamy. For a

momentthe town was paralyzed with astonishment; then it broke into a

furyof rage and swarmed toward the cooper-shop to lynch Hardy. But

theMethodist minister made a powerful speech to them and stayed their

hands.He proved to them that Hardy was insane and not responsible for

hiswords; that no man COULD be sane and utter such words.

SoHardy was saved. Being insane, he was allowed to go on talking.

Hewas found to be good entertainment.

[MarkTwain, WHAT IS MAN?]

__________

»JoelJ. Tyler, Judge Who Pronounced ‘Deep Throat’ Obscene, Dies at 90

JoelJ. Tyler, who as a Manhattan judge ruled, in a particularly explicitand colorful opinion, that the pornographic film “Deep Throat”was obscene and that the New York City theaters showing it werebreaking the law, inadvertently helping it become perhaps the mostpopular X-rated movie of all time, died in Yonkers on Nov. 9. He was90.

…

OnMarch 1, 1973, Judge Tyler came down stridently against the film,though not without literary flourish. In an opinion that came with along appendix, he called “Deep Throat” “this feast of carrionand squalor,” “a nadir of decadence” and “a Sodom andGomorrah gone wild before the fire.”

“Oh,yes! There is a gossamer of a story line — the heroine’sall-engrossing search for sexual gratification, and when all sexualendeavors fail to gratify, her unique problem is successfullydiagnosed to exist in her throat,” he wrote, adding, “The allegedstory lines are the facade, the sheer negligee through which clearlyshines the producer’s and the defendant’s true and only purpose,that is, the presentation of unmistakably hard-core pornography.”

JudgeTyler fined Mature Enterprises $100,000, which was later reduced onappeal.

-----

HulkWant Money. Hulk Need Money. Hulk Hold Up Bank To Get Money.

-----

Teenatheist showered with Christian love …

IHATE ATHEISTS AND LIBERALS COME FUCKING FIND ME WEIRDOS

WhenI take over the world I’m going to do a holocaust to all theatheists …

Ihonestly think I’d rather be a Satan worshiper than an atheist…

Heyguys I fucking hate atheists too …

forthe record, when you die you will NOT grow into a tree or some otherbullshit athiests believe in …

-----

Anew Pew Research Center poll suggests that most voters have littleidea about even the most basic facts regarding the backgrounds of themen seeking the Republican presidential nomination this year.

Pewasked registered voters four questions: 1) “Which candidate servedas the speaker of the House” 2) “Mitt Romney was the governor of___” 3) “After Iowa and New Hampshire, the next primary is in____” 4) “Which GOP candidate opposes U.S. involvement inAfghanistan”

Prettybasic stuff right? Um, no.

-----

ScientistsStill Searching for the Beagle 2 Crash Site on Mars

Sinceits disappearance in December 2003, scientists and citizen scientistsalike have continued the search for Europe’s Beagle 2 lander whichlikely crashed on Mars. Its disappearance is a mystery and if thespacecraft could be located, it might be possible to discover whatwent wrong.

TheMars Reconnaissance Orbiter’s powerful HiRISE camera has beenregularly taking high-resolution images of the Isidis basin regionwhere the Beagle 2 lander was supposed to touch down.

“Nothingresembling the Beagle lander has been seen in any of the HiRISEimages …

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WhatEver Happened To Chatroulette?

AustinCarr checks in on the website. How Chatroulette's naked man problemwas solved …

'A WOLF will eat a WOLF now dead, and so do BEARS as I suppose...'

2012-01-13T23:34:00.001-05:00

THEWOLF.

TheWOLF, of which there are two kinds; one with a round-ball'd Foot, andare in shape like mungrel Mastiffs; the other with a flat Foot, theseare liker Greyhounds, and are called DEER WOLFS, because they areaccustomed to prey upon DEER. A WOLF will eat a WOLF now dead, and sodo BEARS as I suppose, for their dead Carkases are never found,neither by the INDIAN nor ENGLISH. They go a clicketing twelve days,and have as many Whelps at a Litter as a Bitch. The INDIAN DOG is aCreature begotten 'twixt a WOLF and a FOX, which the INDIANS lightingupon, bring up to hunt the DEER with.

[NEWENGLAND’S RARITIES]

==========

Thebeach of San Francisco Bay was ‘not clean, but muddy, miry and fullof sloughs’, while San Pablo Bay, to the north seemed to have cleaner beaches. The tableland where today the Presidio stands was ‘verygreen and flower-covered, with an abundance of violets’. Lookingout from this, a missionary priest reflected: ‘If it could be wellsettled like Europe there would not be any thing more beautiful inall the world, for it has the best advantages for founding in it amost beautiful city’. Indians fished or gathered mussels – pilingtheir empty shells about their villages – or collected grasses,herbs, and roots. There was a curse of ‘long-billed mosquitoes’.

TheOakland side of the bay was a mingling of open country, forest andsmall pools with small Indian villages and a thick growth of iris andother plants with edible roots, and just as full of bears as thewestern shore, with occasional large herds of elk. Suisim and HonkerBays, into which the Sacramento River pours a flood of fresh water,puzzled the first Spaniards, who at first mistook them for one hugeriver. Beyond modern Antioch was the tule marsh which still blocksthe way and one could look off northeast across a ‘level plain’,which was actually the lower Sacramento Valley.

[EYESOF DISCOVERY]

==========

Themost disturbing aspect of Make Believe is that Ronnie not onlyis still the president, but could probably be reelected. Almost as anafterthought, Mr. Leamer suddenly reveals, in the last pages of hisbook, the true Reagan problem, which is now a world problem:

What was soextraordinary was Ronnie’s apparent psychic distance from theburden of the presidency. He sat in cabinet meetings doodling. Unlessheld to a rigid agenda, he would start telling Hollywood stories ortalk about football in Dixon. Often in one-on-one conversationsRonnie seemed distracted or withdrawn. ‘He has a habit now’, hisbrother, Neil, said. ‘You might be talking to him, and it’s likehe’s picking his fingernails, but he’s not. And you know thenhe’s talking to himself’.

‘If people knew abouthim living in his own reality, they wouldn’t believe it’, saysone White House aid. ‘There are only ten to fifteen people who knowthe extent, and until they leave and begin talking, no one willbelieve it’.

Ofall our presidents, Reagan most resembles Warren Harding. He ishandsome, amiable, ignorant …

[GoreVidal]

==========

Inthy journal let there never be a jest!

Jan.25 [1852].

Iam struck and attracted by the parallelism of the twigs of thehornbeam, FINE parallelism.

Jan.26. Men have ever associated theverdure of evergreen trees – hemlocks, firs, spruces, etc. – withthe moisture and coolness of mountains. Our word pine is from theCeltic ‘PIN or PEN, a rock or mountain’, from which is derivedthe name of this genus in many languages.

[Thoreau,JOURNAL]

==========

TheOctopus has a chameleon-like ability to change its color and canblend so perfectly into any background that it becomes practicallyinvisible. I have seen an Octopus turn deep pink after being speared,but whether it was flushing with anger or blushing in embarrassmentat being outwitted, I cannot say. The prehensile arms also double aslegs and the Octopus can move at a good rate over rocks or sand onthe beach. Once in the water, the arms straighten out opposite thedirection of travel in an efficient streamlining, and the Octopuspropels itself at great speed with a jet of water ejected from itsmantle. On the under-side of the arms are two rows of suction disksso powerful that even a small specimen is very hard to pull from arock or the side of a boat, once it has gotten a firm hold. Whenthreatened, the Octopus can eject a dense, sepia-colored fluid intothe surrounding water and escape under cover of this ‘smokescreen’.Jet propulsion, streamlining, intelligence, good vision, agility,dexterity, use of tools, ability to change color, use ofsmokescreens, these are all unexpected attributes in a mollusk, yethere they are, all in the same amazing creature. …

Isometimes wonder if the horror with which we commonly view the ~ isnot a little mixed with unadmitted fear that this creature mightsomeday supplant us. The rounded ‘head’ and large eyes give the ~just enough resemblance to a deformed human being to make itextremely repulsive to our sight.

[EuellGibbons]

==========

BATPLANT | Tacca integrifolia, T. chantrieri

‘Batplant – that sounds intriguing’. … the clusters of black fruithanging together ‘look remarkably like clusters of bats roosting’… warmth always; soil should be moist but not ‘sopping wet’ …acidy, peaty soil …

[BIZARREBOTANICALS]

==========

‘Panopliedin jet and gold’ the merry, carefree GOLDFINCHES in cheerycompanies flit in the summer sunshine. They wander happily about,singing, wooing, mating, eating, drinking and bathing until July orAugust without family worries. As Dr. Chapman says: ‘Few birds seemto enjoy life more than these happy rovers. Every month brings them achange of fare, and in pursuit of fresh dainties the nesting-time isdelayed almost until summer begins to wane … Their love-song isdelivered with an ecstasy and abandon which carries them off theirfeet, and they circle over the fields sowing the air with music’. …

Thenest is built chiefly or wholly by the female, while the maleaccompanies her in her labors, caresses her and cheers her with song.When the nest is finished (it, by the way, is often so compactlybuilt as to hold water), and the pretty eggs are laid, the motherbird sits closely while her mate supplies her with food. She quicklyrecognizes his voice among the notes of other Goldfinches and withanticipatory flutterings answers him from the nest. …

Thefondness of the little bird for burdock seeds now and then costs oneits life, when it is caught and held by the strong hooks of the plantand, unable to break away, starves to death. The bird is so smallthat its strength is not sufficient to disengage itself whenentangled by caterpillar silk. …

Amongcultivated plants the Goldfinch eats the seeds of zinnia, coreopsis,bachelor’s button, cosmos, millet, hemp, salsify, turnip, lettuceand sunflower, and some other garden plants.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

»RichardThrelkeld dies at 74; veteran TV anchor and correspondent

Asa broadcast journalist for 36 years, Richard Threlkeld coveredVietnam and the Gulf War, Patty Hearst's kidnapping, Robert F.Kennedy's assassination and numerous presidential campaigns.

ByElaine Woo, Los Angeles Times

RichardThrelkeld, a former CBS and ABC correspondent who covered the fall ofSaigon and helped establish the CBS "Sunday Morning" showwith weekly stories that showcased his prodigious energy and incisivewriting, died Friday in a car crash on Long Island, N.Y. He was 74.

-----

RosieO'Donnell Recalls Hollywood's “Secret Lesbian Parties” Of The 90s

EllenDegeneres, Sara Gilbert, Melissa Etheridge, K.D. Lang, and RosieO'Donnell — sounds like a party to me! On last night's edition of“Watch What Happens Live,” Rosie O'Donnell responded to host AndyCohen's questions about her relationship with Ellen with a tale aboutthe good ol' times when all of Hollywood's closeted lesbians wouldparty together.

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NorthDakota Pulls Its Sad ‘Take Our Cornfed Women, Please’ Tourism Ad

NorthDakota probably regrets hiring a sex-starved 15-year-old boy as theartistic director for their new tourism campaign. They've pulled thisad because it looks like the first paragraph of a rejectedMidwestern-themed Penthouse letter.

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NorthKorea's state news agency reported this week that magpies and bearswere observed mourning Kim Jong Il, who died Dec. 17 and wassucceeded by his son Kim Jong Un.

OnDec. 23, "workers of the Taehung Youth Hero Mine saw three bearson a road when they were coming back from a mourning site afterexpressing deep condolences over the demise of leader Kim Jong Il,"the news agency's English-language website stated. "The bears,believed to be a mother and cubs, were staying on the road, cryingwoefully."

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SineadO’Connor: My marriage is definitely over now

HeatherLocklear in drink and drugs overdose

Hollywoodlegend GENE HACKMAN struck by car, airlifted to hospital!

-----

PaulaDeen to announce Type 2 diabetes diagnosis

PaulaDeen will soon announce that she’s a Type 2 diabetic and has amulti-million dollar contract to represent a diabetes drug …

-----

TheFBI recently released their file on the late rapper Ol’ DirtyBastard … thanks to the Freedom of Information Act, and it’s adoozy.

-----

Everyone,today is Julia Louis-Dreyfus's fifty-first birthday!

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BERSERKMICHELLE RUNS AMUCK!

Showdownat the White House as furious first lady screams at Prez …

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AreaMan Shocked To Learn There Is A Butt-Oriented Magazine He Was NotAware Of

BENTON,AR—According to sources, buttocks-themed periodical aficionado LyleBreslin was surprised and dismayed when he discovered Friday theexistence of a magazine about butts he had not previouslyencountered. "I'm shocked this one got past me," Breslinsaid as he thumbed through the full-color photographs of women's nudeposteriors featured in an issue of Heavenly Can. "As someone whohas every issue of Big Butt, Round Butt, Ass Passion, and Rump Fancy,and is a charter subscriber of the more literary Two ScoopsQuarterly, there's no way they should have gotten to issue number sixwithout me knowing, especially given the fact that they managed tosteal away prominent editor Hersch Steinberg from Nice Pooper."After perusing the magazine for 15 minutes, Breslin dismissed themagazine as a third-tier knockoff of Booty Clap.

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UrinatingMarines Identified

CheapSwedish beer gives Norway a headache

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Anobsessed Kate Bush fan has been deported from Britain after breakinginto her home in an attempt to propose to her.

FrankTufaro, an American, was carrying a £3,000 diamond, sapphire andgold ring bought at Tiffany’s when he arrived at the countrysidehome of the reclusive singer and songwriter.

WhenTufaro realised Miss Bush, who was nominated for a Brit Award thisweek, was not at home, he broke a window and let himself in.

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Early-onsetdementia poster child Rick Perry is still, STILL waging his quixoticbattle to correctly and consistently identify the same three federalagencies he is proposing to excise from government ever since thatmagical debate performance last November.

'That very peak of molluscan evolution, the Octopus'

2012-01-12T23:22:00.000-05:00

Oneof the most delightful medieval treatises on the art of gardening waswritten at the end of the fourteenth century. The author, theMénagier de Paris (Householder, or Goodman, of Paris), was anelderly … burgher who had taken a very young wife. Because he feltthat his inexperienced bride needed training in household management,he wrote a book of instruction to guide her in overseeing hisservants, marketing, cooking, cleaning, entertaining, and gardening.The book gives a fascinating picture of domestic arrangements in theMiddle Ages. Since plants entered into many of the daily operationsof this bourgeois household – from cooking to ridding the house ofvermin – the Goodman of Paris devoted a chapter of his book togardening. His knowledge of the subject was sound. He admonished hiswife not to water in the heat of the sun; to water only the stems andthe earth, not the leaves; to thin young lettuce plants; to throwsawdust on anthills to get rid of the ants; to place cindersunderneath cabbages to kill caterpillars; and not to let greens go toseed. He knew that when plants have wintered over in the cellar theyshould not be brought too quickly into the dry summer air; that deadbranches of sage should be cut off in winter; that marjoram shouldnot be grown in the shade; and that plenty of earth should be leftaround the roots of vegetables when they are transplanted.

[SWEETHERBS AND SUNDRY FLOWERS]

==========

Abook about edible seashore life would be remiss if it didn’t saymore about that very peak of molluscan evolution, the Octopus. Irealize that most Americans are filled with horror at the verythought of eating Octopus, but this is no more than a sectionalprejudice, for the French, the Italians, the Polynesians, and theJapanese all consider Octopus very fine fare indeed. Even thoseAmericans who have given this food a fair trial invariably find itdelicious. Few laymen realize that the mobile and active Octopusreally belongs to the phylum Mollusca, thus making it a relation ofthe sedentary clams and oysters. Its flesh is just as edible as arethose delicacies. …

The~ is conceded to be the most highly developed and most intelligent ofall invertebrates. Although it is a mollusk, the shell is absent orvestigial, and with no limiting skeleton it can squeeze throughopenings that appear far too small to allow it to pass. It has eyesthat are as highly developed as our own, and it has the largest andbest-functioning brain of any invertebrate … The eight prehensilearms give it an agility and dexterity rivaled by no other creaturesexcept perhaps men and monkeys. The Octopus has been observed pickingup small stones and slipping them into the open valves of unalertoysters and clams, wedging the shells apart so they could not beclosed, so the Octopus can feast on fresh mollusk meat at itsleisure. This use of tools shows not only great dexterity but a highorder of intelligence.

[EuellGibbons]

==========

PASSIONFLOWER: the TENDRILS of the plant represent the whips used on Mr. J.Christ; the RADIAL FILAMENTS are the crown of thorns; the CENTRALFLORAL COLUMN is the pillar of scourging; the 3 STIGMAS are the 3nails; the 5 LOWER ANTHERS are the 5 wounds; and the 10 SEPALS andPETALS are the 10 FAITHFUL apostles … ‘Wow! I wonder what otherreligions might see in this flower’.

[BIZARREBOTANICALS]

==========

PURPLEFINCH | Carpodacus purpureus purpureus

Thisfavorite bird is one of the most melodious of American finches. Hepours out his gushing, ecstatic warble from the top of some tree, andwhen performing before his mate his musical efforts transcend hisordinary notes and he launches into the air, fluttering about withquivering wings in lowly emulation of the Skylark, pouring forth acontinuous melody until, exhausted with this most remarkable vocaleffort, he floats down with uplifted pinions toward the object of hisaffections.

Bynature the ~ is a forest bird, and although it adapts itself readilyto civilization it prefers the neighborhood of coniferous trees, andshuns open plains. Before the advent of the English Sparrow in theUnited States, ~ nested in abundance in the region about Boston,building their nest chiefly in Norway spruces and Virginia junipers.The sparrows in time apparently drove a large part of these finchesout of the region and kept them out, as they never have returned intheir former numbers. Those who wish to keep these birds about bothsummer and winter should plant coniferous trees and should feedsunflower seeds, of which these finches are very fond.

[EdwardHowe Forbush]

==========

SanFrancisco Bay, which everyone had missed for more than two hundredyears, was discovered at last – quite by accident. A party ofsoldiers, chasing a deer, reached the crest over which the animal haddisappeared and came suddenly upon a great inland sea at their feet,blue waters stretching away into hills which sheltered distant bays,the extent of which they could only guess at. …

Morethorough exploration a few years later tells what they saw. Much ofthe country around the Golden Gate was forested with laurel, ash,oaks, live oaks, and redwoods – full of bears, deer and elk –with some stretches of sand, marsh or green flats near the shore.Whales were spouting. Sea otter, with priceless pelts, and sea lionsplayed among the rocks. Far down San Francisco Bay stood the tallredwood from which modern Palo Alto takes its name. As redwoods go,it was not a very tall tree – a mere 140 or 150 feet; but it stoodout so clearly, ‘rising like a great tower’, that two Spanishparties paused to measure it. The tree still stands, having in theintervening 175 years added at most a few feet.

[EYESOF DISCOVERY]

==========

Povertyobliged the Poe household once more to move, but in the rightdirection. They decamped … to a three-storey brick house close tothe Schuylkill River. It was a cheaper rent. But Poe felt freer byrivers; he could still swim, and he enjoyed boating expeditions. Heoften floated on the river, in a small craft, lost within a wakingdream.

[PeterAckroyd]

==========

Therest is beginning to be history. ‘In the spring of 1965, forty-onerich businessmen formed “The Friends of Ronald Reagan”’. Forfifty thousand dollars a year, they hired a public-relations firmthat specialized in political campaigns to groom Ronnie. Californiapolitics were carefully explained to him and he was given a crashcourse in the state’s geography, which he may have flunked. Heoften had no idea where he was, or, as a supporter remarked to[Laurence] Leamer, ‘once, he didn’t know a goddamn canal andwhere it went. Another time, he was standing in the Eagle River anddidn’t know where the hell he was’, etc. but he had his dream ofthe city on the hill and he had The Speech and he had such insightsas: the graduated income tax was ‘spawned by Marx as the primeessential of the socialistic state’.

[GoreVidal]

==========

Withregard to the sleeping and waking of animals, all creatures that

arered-blooded and provided with legs give sensible proof that they

goto sleep and that they waken up from sleep; for, as a matter of

fact,all animals that are furnished with eyelids shut them up when

theygo to sleep. Furthermore, it would appear that not only do men

dream,but horses also, and dogs, and oxen; aye, and sheep, and goats,

andall viviparous quadrupeds; and dogs show their dreaming by barking

intheir sleep. With regard to oviparous animals we cannot be sure

thatthey dream, but most undoubtedly they sleep. And the same may

besaid of water animals, such as fishes, molluscs, crustaceans, to

witcrawfish and the like. These animals sleep without doubt, although

theirsleep is of very short duration. The proof of their sleeping

cannotbe got from the condition of their eyes-for none of these creatures

arefurnished with eyelids-but can be obtained only from their motionless

repose.

[Aristotle,HISTORIA ANIMALIUM]

==========

Verywell, Circumstance furnished the capital, and my temperament told

mewhat to do with it. Sometimes a temperament is an ass. When that is

thecase of the owner of it is an ass, too, and is going to remain

one.Training, experience, association, can temporarily so polish him,

improvehim, exalt him that people will think he is a mule, but they

willbe mistaken. Artificially he IS a mule, for the time being, but at

bottomhe is an ass yet, and will remain one.

Bytemperament I was the kind of person that DOES things. Does them, and

reflectsafterward. … I have been punished many and many a time, and

bitterly,for doing things and reflecting afterward, but these tortures have

beenof no value to me; I still do the thing commanded by Circumstance

andTemperament, and reflect afterward. Always violently. When I am

reflecting,on these occasions, even deaf persons can hear me think.

[MarkTwain, WHAT IS MAN?]

»RussianMars Probe to Crash Sunday—Visible as "Surreal Comet"?

DoomedPhobos-Grunt spacecraft has been stuck in Earth's orbit.

Aftercircling Earth for more than two months, the failed Russian Marsprobe Phobos-Grunt will make a kamikaze dive into Earth's atmospheresometime around Sunday, experts say.

TheRussian space agency, Roscosmos, which has given up hope ofrecovering the spacecraft, is now concentrating on figuring out whatwill happen to the pieces that fall to Earth.

Theagency expects about 20 to 30 fragments totaling about 440 pounds(200 kilograms) to reach the ground …

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SeanConnery's Website Looks Like The Internet, Circa '96

Verysurprised there's no link to download desktop wallpaper for The Rockor The Hunt For The Red October.

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FamousPooping Editor Announces New Concept: 'Good News'

AriannaHuffington, internet media mogul and legendary pooper, has "goodnews." She's launching a new Huffington Post vertical, called"HuffPost Good News" …

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IsNorth Korea Punishing People Who Didn't Mourn Hard Enough?

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MortifiedJapanese Department Store Cleans Up 'Fuckin Sale'

AnOsaka department store's Fuckin Sale was one of the classic Engrishgaffes of our time. But the funny signs were quickly taken down afterthe internet freaked out about them.

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WolfBlitzer Defends Politicians’ Honor in Cute Children’s Essay

Haveyou been cracking wise about our cherished field of Republicanpresidential candidates? Perhaps calling them "assholes"when they do and say horrible things? Let's grow up already. Becausestilted CNN misery bot Wolf Blitzer will surely put us in detentionif this goes on much longer.

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Lettermanclose to deal to host through 2014

DavidLetterman is on the verge of signing a new deal with CBS that willmake him the longest running late-night show host in the history ofTV. The new deal will keep him on the air for 32 years, longer thanhis idol Johnny Carson, who left the air as host of “Tonight” in1992 after 30 years on the job.

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HowardStern goes pescetarian

Radioshock jock says he's sticking to a diet of vegetables and fish.

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TinaFey abandons juice diet after allergic reaction

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Hummingbirda rare sight in Chicago winter

Theycall her 'Rufous,' named for the type of hummingbird she is. But whyin the world did she come to the Chicago area in winter?

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KansasHouse Speaker Prays for Obama’s Death

Imissed this the other day somehow. Mike O’Neal, the Republicanspeaker of the Kansas House of Representatives, sent out an email inwhich he urged people to pray for President Obama’s death, andanother where he referred to Michelle Obama as “Mrs. Yomama.”

Earlierthis week, the Lawrence Journal-World was sent an email that O’Nealhad forwarded to House Republicans that referred to President Obamaand a Bible verse that says “Let his days be few and brief.”

Rodeesaid that that email was referring to the president’s days inoffice.

Theemail, which has been posted in various places on the Internet,refers to a bumper sticker that reads “Pray for Obama. Psalm109:8.”

Psalm109:8 says, “Let his days be few and brief; and let others stepforward to replace him.”

Theemail states: “At last — I can honestly voice a Biblical prayerfor our president! Look it up — it is word for word! Let us all bowour heads and pray. Brothers and Sisters, can I get an AMEN?AMEN!!!!!!”

Theverse in question is a prayer for someone to die. The next verse is:“Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.” He issueda notpology for the other email about the first lady, but not eventhat for this far more vile one.

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maybeI seez wy yumanz likes dis

Butai iz stillz yur li’l punkin, rite?

HotChicks of Occupy Wall Street

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NATALEEHOLLOWAY LEGALLY DECLARED DEAD

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BillJanklow dies at 72; South Dakota governor, congressman

BillJanklow served four terms as governor. He resigned as the state'slone member of the House of Representatives after he caused a fataltraffic accident in 2003.

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GermanFarmers Seek their Fortunes in Russia

YevgenyKondakov/ DER SPIEGEL

Inthe 18th century, Catherine the Great invited German farmers to cometo Russia and cultivate the land. Over two centuries later, thecountry is recruiting Teutonic pioneers once again in a bid to putvast tracts of fallow land to use. The land holds great opportunitiesfor agricultural entrepreneurs -- provided they have strong nerves.

'Comes now the tramp'

2012-01-11T22:37:00.001-05:00

Comesnow the tramp. …

Thetramp is one of two kinds of men: he is either a discouraged worker

ora discouraged criminal. Now a discouraged criminal, oninvestigation,

provesto be a discouraged worker, or the descendant of discouraged

workers;so that, in the last analysis, the tramp is a discouraged

worker. Since there is not work for all, discouragement for some is

unavoidable. How, then, does this process of discouragement operate?

Thelower the employment in the industrial scale, the harder the

conditions. The finer, the more delicate, the more skilled the trade,

thehigher is it lifted above the struggle. There is less pressure, less

sordidness,less savagery. There are fewer glass-blowers proportionate

tothe needs of the glass-blowing industry than there are ditch-diggers

proportionateto the needs of the ditch-digging industry. And not only

this,for it requires a glass-blower to take the place of a striking

glass-blower,while any kind of a striker or out-of-work can take the

placeof a ditch-digger. So the skilled trades are more independent,

havemore individuality and latitude. They may confer with their

masters,make demands, assert themselves. The unskilled laborers, on the

otherhand, have no voice in their affairs. The settlement of terms is

noneof their business. "Free contract" is all that remains tothem.

Theymay take what is offered, or leave it. There are plenty more of

theirkind. They do not count. They are members of the surplus labor

army,and must be content with a hand-to-mouth existence.

[JackLondon, WAR OF THE CLASSES]

==========

Aperson may PLAN as much as he wants to, but nothing of consequence is

likelyto come of it until the magician CIRCUMSTANCE steps in and takes

thematter off his hands. …

Circumstanceis powerful, but it cannot work alone; it has to have a

partner.Its partner is man's TEMPERAMENT--his natural disposition.

Histemperament is not his invention, it is BORN in him, and he has no

authorityover it, neither is he responsible for its acts. He cannot

changeit, nothing can change it, nothing can modify it--except

temporarily.But it won't stay modified. It is permanent, like the

colorof the man's eyes and the shape of his ears.

[MarkTwain, WHAT IS MAN?]

==========

BANANA| Musa

… tropicalbanana trees require 18 MONTHS of nonfreezing temperatures before itwill condescend to produce fruit … the JAPANESE FIBER BANANA (Musabasjoo) is hardy to minus 18° C (0° F) … native of China …will die down in winter and resprout from the roots in the spring ifnot brought indoors … ‘we especially like’ the HARDY PINKBANANA (M. velutina) – produces yellow flowers all summerwith pink bracts & pink fruits …

[BIZARREBOTANICALS]

==========

Around1260 Albertus Magnus … wrote a treatise, On Vegetables andPlants, in which he gave instructions on setting out of apleasure garden. The first requirement was a lawn, ‘for the sightis in no way so pleasantly refreshed as by fine and loose grass keptshort’. … Around this lawn are to be planted ‘everysweet-smelling herb such as rue, and sage and basil, and likewise allsorts of flowers, as the violet, columbine, lily, rose, iris and thelike’. …

Medievalgardening techniques were … sophisticated. Young plants were grownin nurseries, the art of grafting was highly refined, rare andunusual plants were cultivated, and gardeners exchanged plants,seeds, and cuttings. Gardeners used implements very similar to ourown, with the exception of power tools. They also had instructionbooks. One of the most popular of these was written around 1300 inItaly by a retired Bolognese lawyer, Petrus de Crescentiis. Histreatise, Opus ruralium commodorum (The Advantages of CountryLiving), was a working manual on botany, animal husbandry,beekeeping, and many other aspects of farming and gardening.

[SWEETHERBS AND SUNDRY FLOWERS: MEDIEVAL GARDENS AND THE GARDENS OF THECLOISTERS]

==========

Thecommon NORTHERN LOBSTER, Homarus americanus, is easily themost important crustacean inhabiting the coastal water of the NorthAtlantic States and the Maritime Provinces of Canada. In this arealobstering is a major industry, with millions of pounds being caughtand sold annually. Stand on almost any headland in Maine and try tocount the Lobster buoys that can be seen through a pair ofbinoculars. The chief problem that confronts a Maine Lobster isdeciding which of thousands of Lobster pots he will walk into when hereaches marketable size. The end product of this industry isuniversally recognized as one of the finest of all seafoods, the veryname LOBSTER being synonymous with luxurious dining, except to thoseunfortunate few who are allergic to its flesh.

Iwas surprised to find that lobstering, besides being an importantindustry, was also an outdoor sport or recreation of no mean order. Iwas formerly under the impression that lobstering was the monopoly ofsalty old professionals whose wisdom in the ways of boats and the seawas handed down through generations, and that breed actually doesexist … However, there are others, just as salty and seagoing inappearance, who engage in this activity as a part-time occupation orhobby.

[EuellGibbons]

==========

Thereis no evidence that anyone else visited California and Oregon …until, in 1579, Francis Drake … came sailing north through thePacific. He had left Plymouth in 1577, crossed the Atlantic, passedthrough the Straits of Magellan ‘with its hell-darke nights and themercyles fury of tempestuous storms’, and then had sailed northalong the South American and Mexican coasts, raiding as he went. Hisarrival was a painful surprise to the Spaniards, who, supposingthemselves completely secure in a Pacific that was all their own, hadtaken no defensive precautions whatever. Off Peru, the astounded crewof an unarmed treasure galleon watched with disgust while Draketransferred to his own holds … [and] brought home to Englandplunder worth $4,000,000. …

Withhis little ships loaded to the gunwales, he turned northward to carryout … one of his two assigned missions, a search for thenon-existent Strait of Anian.

[EYESOF DISCOVERY]

==========

Nowfor the payoff …

Foreight years, Ronnie was GE’s host and occasional actor; he alsobecame the corporate voice for General Electric’s conservativeviewpoint. During Reagan’s tours of the country, he gave The Speechin the name of General Electric in particular and free enterprise ingeneral. Gradually, Reagan became more and more right wing. But thenif his principal reading matter told him that the Russians were notonly coming but that their little Red brothers were entrenched inCongress and the school libraries and the reservoirs (flouride at theready), he must speak out. Finally, all this nonsense began to alarmeven GE. When he started to attack socialism’s masterpiece, the TVA(a GE client worth 50 million a year to the firm), he was told tostart cooling it, which he did. …

Duringthis period, Reagan was not only getting deeper and deeper into thepolitics of the far right, but he and Nancy were getting to know someof the new-rich Hollywood folk outside show biz. Car dealers such asHolmes Tuttle and other wheeler-dealers became friends. The wiveswere into conspicuous consumption while the husbands were into moneyand, marginally, conservative politics which would enable them tomake more money, pay less tax, and punish the poor.

[GoreVidal]

==========

Theapple-grower should never forget that every producer needs to be fedin proportion to his product. If a cow gives twenty quarts of milkper day, she needs more grass or other food than if she gave but twoquarts; and an acre of orchard that yields a hundred barrels ofApples per annum needs something given to the soil to balance thedraft made upon it. Nature offers us good bargains; but she does nottrust and will not be cheated. When she offers a bushel of Corn for abushel of dirty Salt, Shell Lime, or Wood-Ashes, a load of Hay for aload of Muck, we ought not to stint the measure, but pay her demandungrudgingly.

Andnow a last word on Insects.

[HoraceGreeley]

»HowTo Disable Google's New "Personal" Search Results

Lastnight (most likely while you were sleeping) Google rolled out its new“Personal Search” feature. Do you loathe it as much as I do?

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C-SPANCaller: ‘Do You Believe That Mitt Romney Has a Big Penis?’

Thisis simply no way to address New Hampshire Republican Party ChairmanWayne MacDonald on his big day. He was not amused.

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OutgoingMississippi Gov. Haley Barbour pardoned nearly 200 people, includingconvicted murderers

Amongthose getting full pardons was brother of former New York Jetsquarterback Brett Favre

Bitterfamily members angrily blasted Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour afterhis 11th-hour pardons freed four murderers who savagely killed theirloved ones.

“I’mtotally disgusted,” said Glenda Walker, whose son was shot to deathin 1993 by ex-inmate David Gatlin. “... One man can’t put you injail. I don’t think it’s right for one man to remove you fromjail.”

Herire was shared by the families of other victims after the quartet ofkillers was released Sunday night. Barbour’s office said nothingabout the pardons until the family members went public with theirdisgust.

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Weiz Friendz!

ADRIAN,MI—After a week of precipitation, Kelly Knoke has started using"snew" as the past tense of "snow," just to mixit up a little.