The Non-permanence of Arrangements

http://xkcd.com/659/

Live it while you got it! Be ready to let it go.

Romancing the Road

540,000 miles from one car, one owner. And they are both pretty cool! The owner is 89 and the car is a 1964 Mercury Comet. She aways gets lifetime warranty replacement parts (16 free batteries so far) and carries a pistol (licensed) for protection on the long trips. Really worth watching.

These are the people and cars that made America great. I guaranty this car has done less damage to the environment for all those miles of travel than the average Prius owner does today. Why? Because once it was built, it was never discarded. If you really want to help the earth, rescue an old classic from the junkyard and pay a local hard working mechanic to restore it.

Best advice I've heard in a long time...

If you hear that the world is ending and the Messiah has arrived, first plant a tree, and then see if the story is true.

Top 10 Reasons why Same-Sex Marriage is "wrong"

Please note: If you are one of my friends, and this offends you, you either aren't that close a friend, or you are suffering from sarchasm: the gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.

Top 10 Reasons why Same-Sex Marriage is "wrong"

10) Same-Sex marriage will change the foundation of society; we could never adapt to new social norms. Just like we haven't adapted to cars, the Internet, the service-sector economy, or longer life spans.

9) Children can never succeed without a male and a female role model at home. That's why we as a society expressly forbid single parents to raise children, require both mom and dad to spend time equal time with kids rather than making the mom the primary care giver.

8 ) Same-Sex marriage is not supported by traditional religion. In a theocracy like ours, the values of one religion are imposed on the entire country. That's why we all, without exception, go to church on Sunday.

7) Obviously same-sex parents will raise gay or lesbian children, since straight parents only raise straight children.

6) Straight marriages are valid because they produce children. Same-sex couples, infertile couples, and old people shouldn't be allowed to marry because our orphanages aren't full yet, and the world needs more children.

5) Straight marriage will be less meaningful if same-sex marriage were allowed; the sanctity of Brittany Spears' 55-hour just-for-fun marriage would be destroyed.

4) Marriage shouldn't change now because it has never changed before; women are still property, blacks still can't marry whites, and divorce is still illegal.

3) Legalizing same-sex marriage will open the door to all kinds of crazy behavior. People may even wish to marry their pets; this is entirely possible since dogs and cats have legal standing and can sign marriage contracts.

2) Same-sex marriage will encourage people to be homosexual, in the same way that hanging around tall people will make you tall. If you are absolutely convinced that being homosexual is a choice, standing on the street corners protesting "gay" marriage and generally ensuring it is a topic on the news every day will certainly keep your kids from thinking about it or becoming curious as to why anyone would want to be anything other than straight.

And the number one reasons why same-sex Marriage is "wrong":

1) Being homosexual is not natural. Real Americans always reject unnatural things like eyeglasses, polyester, medicine, and air conditioning.

~ Modified from the original, which is copyright Mana Bear on facebook

What HAVE seniors done for the new generation?

I got this email from the stogies about a young man complaining to a senior that old folks can't understand because they grew up in a world without all the modern tech that has shaped our new generation; and how the old guy says (in less pleasant words) "yeah, we didn't have those things, so we invented them; what are you going to do for the next generation?"

That is only half of the story...

Young people today are:
- Dying in wars our senior citizens started in countries that have never lifted a finger against us. How did you vote? When did you last attend an anti war rally?
- Dealing with the environmental, health, and economic impact of the “I care for nothing but profit” industries our seniors have left behind. Do you have solar panels on your home? Planted a fruit tree? Feed your kids organic foods? Taken a bus or train instead of driving?
- Going to jail in numbers unmatched by any country in the world, which I blame to a large degree on the selfish lack of involvement of seniors with needy kids in our neighborhoods. How many kids have you tutored after school? Donated to your local library? Boys and girls club? Anything?
- Trying to figure out what hope they have of paying off the mind-numbing national debt all of those issues have caused. Add up the minutes you've spent thinking about your retirement and compare it to the minutes you've spent thinking about what kind of life is left for your children.

I personally will be amazed if our young people are able to even sustain what we currently have for the next generation. I will be proud of my kids if they survive.

love our kids more than we hate our enemies

I came upon this quote: Golda Meir said, "The only way to eliminate war is to love our children more than we hate our enemies."

If you believe that, and you see that we still have war, then you understand that we really don't love our children as much as we think we do.

Women shave legs and appear to be little girls.

When children grow, at a certain age, they start to grow more hair all over. We always have hair all over, but at some age, we grow thicker, stronger, more noticeable hair. This age is the age of puberty, when our bodies change. In the USA, the normal age for puberty is between 8 and 13^. At that age, girls and boys start to grow more noticeable hair on their legs. It is almost always before the age of 18.

So, when a women of 20 or 30 or so on, in order to appear more attractive, as our society defines attractiveness^, shaves her legs, what age is she attempting to appear to be? She is NOT attempting to appear to be 18. She is not thinking about what age she is attempting to appear to be at all, but she is attempting to appear to be 13 or so.

Why does our society, here in the USA, want women to appear to be 13?

My first thought was that it must be a marketing campaign designed to sell razors. And there does seem to be some proof of that. The first mention I can find of women removing hair for any reason started in May, 1915 with a fashion spread in Harpers Baazar showing a women in a sleeveless gown with bare armpits. Under it is an ad for a hair removal powder.

Razors for women didn't appear anywhere until 1917 and in the Sears and Roebuck catalog until 1922.^

Leg shaving seems to have started soon after that, but really became popular around WWII with rising hemlines and pinup girls "to inspire our boys."

At the start of the war, nylon stockings were popular, but the nylon was needed for the war effort, so believe it or not, some women would shave their legs, then draw a line up the back of the leg to imitate the seam that was always present in stockings of that time. This does not, however, seem to be the start of leg shaving; hair under stocking is uncomfortable and shows so the shaving of legs started first, nylons came after.

It has been said that leg shaving was promoted by a razor company reeling from the lack of men buying razors since so many where "over there" fighting WWI^

Women in europe didn't start shaving until years later. After WWII one woman I spoke to came to the USA from Holland. She first noticed that American women had "weak" legs. They looked thin and frail to her. It was pointed out to her that her legs looked "stronger" because they were hairy and the women here were shaving. Her friend said she shaved because if she didn't, she would "look like an ape." My friend from Holland wasn't going to be a slave to fasion, but while at the denstist office, in the chair, she noticed that he kept lookin at her legs, and she thought: "He thinks I look like an Ape!" That's all it took; she started shaving her legs that night.

Leg shaving happens in Brazil, North America, Australia, Middle East, and Europe. Women in Europe, while they do shave their legs (even in France!) are not as religious about it as they are in the USA. It does not happen in Asia

Could it be simply related to the age old desire for women to look different from men? Since women generally have less hair than men, making a women have less hair, makes her less like a man and, supposedly, more womanly. There are certainly many examples of this, and not just since breast implants and high heels took hold; ancient peoples did everything from lopping off little girls toes (women have smaller feet) to stretching out necks (women have thinner necks). This tendancy for each sex to try to look less like the other is called artifical sexual dimorphism. Sexual dimorphism is very common, and there isn't anything wrong with helping it along. The problem is that in leg shaving, we have picked something that is not only makes women look less like men, it makes them look more like little girls.

As shaved legs became the standard of beauty in the USA, men became trained to find them attractive. As a result, men are no longer sexually attracted to the naturally hairly legs of mature women, but instead are attracted to a version of legs that are naturally found on underage girls. This doesn't excuse the actions of molesters, but it is one more small step in the wrong direction.

See also:

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/1280795/origin_of_pantyhose_why_women_shave_their_legs/ the video shows some of the pictures of the original ads and photos.

Thich Nhat Hanh says:

“My right hand has written all the poems that I have composed. My left hand has not written a single poem. But my right hand does not think, ‘Left Hand, you are good for nothing.’ My right hand does not have a superiority complex. That is why it is very happy. My left hand does not have any complex at all. In my two hands there is the kind of wisdom called the wisdom of nondiscrimination. One day I was hammering a nail and my right hand was not very accurate and instead of pounding on the nail it pounded on my finger. It put the hammer down and took care of my left hand in a very tender way, as if it were taking care of itself. It did not say, ‘Left Hand, you have to remember that I have taken good care of you and you have to pay me back in the future.’ There was no such thinking. And my left hand did not say, “Right Hand, you have done me a lot of harm — give me that hammer, I want justice.’ My two hands know that they are members of one body; they are in each other.”

“When you plant lettuce, if it does not grow well, you don’t blame the lettuce. You look for reasons it is not doing well. It may need fertilizer, or more water, or less sun. You never blame the lettuce. Yet if we have problems with our friends or our family, we blame the other person. But if we know how to take care of them, they will grow well, like the lettuce. Blaming has no positive effect at all, nor does trying to persuade using reason and argument. That is my experience. If you understand, and you show that you understand, you can love, and the situation will change.”

“In order to rally people, governments need enemies. They want us to be afraid, to hate, so we will rally behind them. And if they do not have a real enemy, they will invent one in order to mobilize us.”

“We really have to understand the person we want to love. If our love is only a will to possess, it is not love. If we only think of ourselves, if we know only our own needs and ignore the needs of the other person, we cannot love. “

“Because of your smile, you make life more beautiful.”

John Stewart says it all on gay marrage.

John Stewart makes some really good points about gay marrage in this... It's amazing how far people will go to safe the definition of a word. As far as I can tell, not re-defining marrage is the only defendable point left for the 8ers.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Mike Huckabee Pt. 2

Barack Obama Interview
John McCain Interview

Sarah Palin Video
Funny Election Video

Silly 8rs, you need 2/3rds to revise.

Thanks to Blanca for sending me this news from the ACLU:

In an order issued Wednesday, the California Supreme Court agreed to hear the legal challenges to Proposition 8, the ballot initiative that would end marriage for same-sex couples in California. It passed narrowly on November 4th.

On November 5th, the ACLU, the National Center for Lesbian Rights, and Lambda Legal filed a lawsuit challenging the validity of Proposition 8 in the California Supreme Court on behalf of six couples and Equality California. The City of San Francisco, joined by the City of Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, and Santa Clara County, filed a similar challenge, as did a private attorney in Los Angeles.

The lawsuits allege that, on its face, Proposition 8 is an improper revision rather than an amendment of the California Constitution because, in its very title -- which was "Eliminates the right to marry for same-sex couples" -- the initiative eliminated an existing right only for a targeted minority.

If permitted to stand, Proposition 8 would be the first time an initiative has successfully been used to change the California Constitution to take away an existing right only for a particular group. Such a change would defeat the very purpose of a constitution and fundamentally alter the role of the courts in protecting minority rights. According to the California Constitution, such a serious revision of the state constitution cannot be enacted through a simple majority vote but must first be approved by two-thirds of the legislature.

Ok, my "Yes on 8" neighbors, if you are going to change the law, learn how the law can and can not be legally changed. In the end, the will of the people will be done, but the people of today must follow the rules set down by our founders. If you really want to descriminate against a minority, do it legally.

Lets see, 2 divided by 3 is 0.666... OMG: It's the work of the devil!

Half Baked Idea: Cleaning the Homeless

I'm proud to say that my Half Baked Idea:
http://www.halfbakery.com/idea/Cleaning_20the_20homeless for Cleaning the Homeless: "Offer secure, private, single person showers at low or no cost." has made it to the second page on the list of all time best ideas at the Half Bakery. It's one of the few somewhat political ideas that have been allowed to stay on the site (the owner doesn't allow politics). Other best ideas on the site from other authors include "Preformed Cream Cheese Rings for Bagels " and a "Tumbleweed Dispenser: For when idiots talk" so you can see that it's one of the few "best" ideas that isn't sort of tongue in cheek. There are serious ideas on the best list, such as "A Google 'minus' button for each listed result. " so humor isn't a requirement, but funny ideas usually do better in the voting results.

A word of warning about the Half Bakery: You can loose hours of your life, reading and laughing and thinking about the great ideas posted here.

My buddy is afraid he might accidentally marry a guy.

There are apparently a large number of people in California, who are so unsure of themselves that they believe they need to government to keep them from accidentally marrying people they don’t want to marry. I have a neighbor, a man, (not the brightest bulb, but a nice guy) who is a Christian and feels that it would be wrong to marry another guy. So he voted YES on this prop 8 amendment to the state constitution that would prevent him from accidentally marrying another man. It’s amazing to me how people want the government to protect them from themselves…

He is a really nice guy and never tried to convert me to his religion, so I know that he isn't worried about OTHER people who might feel it is OK for a man to marry a man or a women to marry a women; he wouldn't be so pushy as to try to force his morals on another when it does him NO damage at all if a gay marriage happens.

His kids are all grown and out of school, so what they teach in school can’t be bothering him… and even if it was, the California Educational Code section 51240 specifically states that a student will be excused from teachings in conflict with the religious or moral code the parents. Any public school that failed to follow that directive is breaking the law.

And although he isn't all that smart, he does understand the separation of church and state guaranteed by the First Amendment to the US Constitution and agrees that having the government enforce religious ideals could be a real problem. After all we are one nation under whose God? I mean the Christians wouldn't want the government telling people they have to confess their sins on a regular basis. And the Catholics wouldn't want the government selecting only married men to lead their services. No, I’m sure he didn't vote for it as a way to make the government get into the business of religion.

My best guess is that he is worried about transgendered or hermaphroditic people. He might meet someone who he thinks is a women and then have it turn out that this is actually a man or someone who has both male and female organs. Like Thomas Beatie, the pregnant man. If my friend had a sister, and she happened to fall in love with Thomas, wouldn't it be horrible if the state didn't stop them from getting married, since he happens to have a womb and has given birth… twice… I mean, how would she know? He looks like a man, hairy chest and all. Of course, a background check would reveal that he used to be a she and was surgically altered to become man looking… so does that mean my male friend COULD marry him? Err… her… Or will the church/state decide that no one can marry Thomas since s/he brought all this on his/her self?

But then what about Lynn Edward Harris who was born with both sets of sexual organs. No surgery, no drugs, but today appears to be a man, after appearing to be a really cute girl (beauty pageant contestant at 18) through high school. If my friend had married her would the church/state annul the marriage when she turned into a he?

Anyway, the state law is now being tied in knots. Legal experts are expecting millions of dollars and years of lawsuits. The attorney general of the state of California has said that this proposition has pushed the state into a constitutional crisis with one part of the state constitution saying you can’t discriminate based on sexual orientation, and another part saying that only those of heterosexual orientation are allowed to marry.

I don’t think the government is going to do a very good job of protecting my buddy from accidentally falling in love and marrying a guy…

M.A.S.H.

I've cried, and laughed, and cried for 2 hours tonight. There was a show on about M.A.S.H. (the TV series about a medical unit in the Korean war, but really just about all war) that reminded me of so many things.

- The most important is that our boys are still going through that hell. They are ALL coming back wounded, if they come back at all. Either dead, wounded in body, wounded in their minds, or wounded in spirit. Another generation with scars instead of innocence.

- I grew up watching that show, 30 years ago. I watched them talking about the insanity. How everyone was wounded. How Hawkey encouraged the strangling of a child who wouldn't stop crying when the enemy was near and he was afraid they would be heard and found. How, when it was cold, the surgeons would cut open the soldiers at the start of the operation and steam would escape and they would warm their hands over it. How so many innocents were lost. And I still joined the Navy and helped to kill people in the Gulf. I hope you and your children and young friends are smarter, better able to learn.

- There are so many examples, in the show, in real life, in war, and in peace where you don't understand what you are doing until it is done. So many times when we forget to thing about the consequences of our actions. I don't mean the times when we couldn't possibly know. I'm talking about the times when we figure out that if we had just pulled our head out of our own ego for a few seconds and thought about what the things we were doing was going to screw up the rest of the world. And then it's done. And it can't be taken back. And it can't be made right. That's where we are right now. They 9/11 terrorists were Saudi, not Iraqi. No WMDs in Iraq. No ties to terror. They used our fear to get us to put our boys and girls in harms way.

I would trade all that stupidity for the answer to this one: How do we avoid those times when we just aren't sure and it eats at us. When we are thinking, learning, knowing, and we still aren't sure. What if? If only I had, then maybe?

I can accept that a soldiers lot is, well, not very good. I can accept that I'm apparently incapable of learning from the examples of others (and therefor doomed to repeat their mistakes) and I can accept that I get so wrapped up in myself that I forget what I'm doing to others.

What I can't accept is that there isn't anything else I could have done. All the people I've talked to, the letters to my congress people, the politicians I've voted for, the web pages I've written, the pictures I've collected... the signs I put on my car... the T-Shirt I designed.

Could I have done something else to stop this war?

Please?

Everyone...

I truly believe this:

My Unca Glen runs the Roseville Big Band (how many guys can say they've run a big band these days?) and this is him singing his big band version of "Monster Mash." Although we can certainly act as silly as the next bunch, in general, we Newtons don't dance (my wife's genetics have apparently spared my kids since they are both in ballet) but Glen does a pretty good monster here... And "Igor" nails the voice... And the band is great of course; over all it's a fun bit for the big band crowd.

Sick, sad, world. Shaved legs molest girls.

Women abhor pedophiles, and rightfully so, yet they continue to shave their legs and wear lipstick, blush, and false eyelashes.

*pause for a moment to let the apparent disconnect in that statement settle in with the confused reader*

The average age where a young woman's leg hair becomes visible is between 12 and 18 depending on hair color, genetics, etc...

What other reason is there for shaving ones legs, besides wanting to appear to be jail bait?

*pause to really allow the increasingly shocked reader to think hard about that*

Take your average 13 year old girl and stand her next to a 30 year old women while neither is wearing makeup. Notice that the 13 year old has ruby red lips, blushed cheeks, and strong dark eyelashes. The 30 year old has pale lips, sallow cheeks and thinning eyelashes. Now ask the 30 year old to go put on her make up. Compare again and feel slightly sick to your stomach. Don't take my word for it. Go see for yourself. 

*hurries on to reassure the now outraged reader of the limits of my insanity* 

Please note, I am not blaming women for this, I am trying to point out how sick our society is. I am not saying that women are knowingly encouraging men to look at jail bait, nor am I saying that men are knowingly pressuring women to look like jail bait in order to be attractive. I am also not attempting to excuse the actions of your local neighborhood child molester. We are all responsible for our actions, and must pay the consequences, no matter to what bad influences we are exposed. I am also NOT saying that I am sexually attracted to girls, just on the off chance that someone is getting worried here... I'm all about the MILF and specifically, my wife.

But something is wrong here. Very, very wrong. In Europe, or at least in the non-westernized parts of Europe, women do not feel a compulsion to do these things.

It may be that the problem is an unintended consequence of the advertising engine that must needs accompany each industry in our consumer driven economy. I once saw an interview where an experienced older man who had lived through the 60's and remembered it was asked why "blonds have more fun?" His answer was surprising to me: He said "Well, originally it was to sell hair care products." Apparently that saying was started by ads placed for a company that had come up with a new non-bleach hair coloring product and who wanted to create a greater demand. By convincing women that they would have more fun as a blond, they created a feedback loop where the women who wanted more fun, perhaps unknowingly advertised the fact by dying their hair. Men then saw dark eyebrows and blond hair, knew that the woman wanted to have "more fun" and so were more likely to ask her out. It was a self fulfilling prophecy.

I think the same sort of thing may have happened in the makeup industry. Makeup has several functions, including accentuating the difference between men and women, or sending that same "I want to have fun" signal, but mostly it is designed to mask the effects of aging. When an older lady caked on the powder to hid a few wrinkles or age spots, she was perhaps returning her appearance to that of a healthy 30 year old. No problem there. But how to sell lipstick, for instance, when the lips of a 30 year old are really no more red than those of a 50 year old? And why sell only to 50 year olds? 

By presenting the women of the USA with an idealized, sexuallized, version of a younger than legal Brooke Shields or Kate Moss, companies could then push the sale of more lipstick. And so enlist the women who buy it in the consequence of training the men to be pedophiles. Please note that I am in NO way attempting to excuse men who molest children. This idea that men have no control over their actions is insulting and disempowering. Men (everyone) are responsible for their actions, in any case. 

Face it, or tell my why I'm wrong in an unemotional, rational, and logical argument backed up with references and facts. Hysterical rants, unsupported denials, and blame deflecting accusations will be deleted. 

I'm tired of just accepting the sickness.

I sing, you just suffer.

My dear uncle Glen sent me a song list he had reciently played as a DJ at a company funciton and asked if I and his daughter had performed any of them: I thought my answer was amusing enough to share. Professional music, or rather the reaction people have to those who are not professionals, has been a sore point with me for years. I long for the days of the entire pub singing along with the one guy who can play the piano. Everyone "sings"; thats the way it should be.

The only songs on that list that I’ve “performed” are “Dancing Queen” (the ABBA version, ‘cause I’m in touch with my feminine side) and “Rock around the clock” ‘cause I’m a big enough dork to think I can pull that off. And by “performed” I mean sang along with the radio or CD. And by “sang” I mean croaked.

What I’ve performed in front of people, other than with the church choir (which the entire family is now in: S.A.T.B. Allie, Maria, Remy, Me) includes “Brother Can You Spare a Dime” and “Power to the People” (aka “Bomb the World to Peaces”) both of which were recorded and both recordings will remain mercifully hidden.

There was also “Country Roads” with two other guys and ukes; another guy playing one he made and me on the one I inherited from dad, We lost our place about ¾ of the way through. I mean, how do you loose your place in “Country Roads”?

And I sang “Morning has Broken” with a nice older lady from the church and I’m fairly sure I didn’t break it, but there was no recording so I can keep fooling myself.

4 of us did a arrangement by a 5^th of the barbershop classic “On the Banks of the Wabash”; we worked on it so hard we almost quit, we got to the point that we hated it. But we sang it _perfectly_ several times. Then when we performed it, our bass got off on the wrong note and it sucked all the way through. We haven’t been able to find a new bass. We were nice; he doesn’t want to do it anymore.

In the near future, I hope to again embarrass myself, by singing something well beyond my technical ability; and enjoy the heck out of it. Because that is my terrible secret: No matter how totally incompetent I am, I truly love singing. I just love it.

Y’all can just suffer. 

Is that human life?

When you get the chance, read "Freakonomics" (an absolutely brilliant book) and pay attention to the chapter that shows the link between Roe v Wade and the decline in the crime rate just prior to the turn of this century.

In summary, the numbers show that crime declined at a rate inversely proportional to the number of abortions granted women who did not wish to become mothers but who had, nonetheless, gotten pregnant. True enough; if those women had been raised better, perhaps they wouldn't have found themselves in that position, but then that just takes us back to who raised them and to wondering if they were really wanted by their mothers.

Yes, partial birth abortion is sickening. But it is not, IMHO, as sickening as the life of an unwanted child. And that is a failure of our society as much as it is a failure of the mothers. All those people with "right to life" bumper stickers should be legally required to show proof of adoption before they can put that on their cars.

That "life", the thing they call a right, is horrible.... Period. Anyone who thinks otherwise is wearing rose-colored contact lenses. If there were enough love and caring to go around, I would feel otherwise, but the bald truth is that even more than a deficit of food, shelter, clothing, we have a much larger deficit of love, kindness, and caring. And Harlow's monkeys (as well as many studies on "failure to thrive") have shown that love is just as important as food to the survival of a human. With food, and not love, you might have a thing that breaths, walks, even talks, but it isn't really human.

What is more horrible: A bloody mass of tissue in a bucket, or a thing that steals, kills, consumes and can produce more creatures just like itself? Welfare gave us a prison population of 1 in 100 citizens here in the USA. No where else in the world has there been a welfare system that paid women to have children they didn't really want, and no where else in the world do every 99 people pay to incarcerate the 100th.

Life should be filled with love, joy, and happiness. If it isn't, then it isn't the thing I want to call life. Were it my choice, I would rather be a bucket of bloody parts.