I make no bones about it ..I am a geekitroid maximus of the genus trombonillia
I am having a fun (for me at least) word tango of sorts with a newish blogger friend ....
Step right up and read all about her. Even though I have been working blisteringly long hours, I have made the time to fire off a couple of pithy little doodads to her the last couple of days....
Hey kids, fun with words!!!!
I have been trying to woo her into thinking I am not a cad for not answering a piece of e-mail she sent me.............(OK so I am a cad for not answering her promptly, but I am trying to dazzle her with my 17 watt wit to try to convince her otherwise.)
It has culminated with this little ditty
For Meghan:
"On first reflections"
To sarabande in airy twirl, a beor happy out.
A soul embraced by flight and light, in joyful roundabout.
Drawing elemental strengths from earth and sky and heart,
to promenade the universe until the stars go dark.
Soon I will have upgraded myself in her mind to the point that she will think of me as a pathetic loser....
Bwaaahahahahahahahaaaaa
I Am WINNING!!!!!!!!!!
I posted this story over at Irish-Girl's
in response to one of her always entertaining rambles of wit.
I thought I would re-publish it here as well...as for the 2nd crayon story I allude to...I will try to get to that this weekend.
Here it is.................................................
I have 2 great crayon stories. One is too long to put here, so if you are interested, keep an eye out on my site and I'll try to get it told in the next few days.
The other one is as follows...(this is according to both my memory of this event, and the story as told by my mom.)
My mother was called by my 1st grade teacher to come down to the school to discuss a "very serious problem". I remember this event very clearly, as Mrs. Ozga had me scared to death and sitting after school by myself. She kept saying, "Your mother is on her way to straighten you out" eeeek....
Mom shows up and asks what's wrong. Mrs, Ozga goes into this rant about how I was disobeying her. I refused to color just inside the lines. It seems, I liked drawing objects that were not in the pre-outlined pictures. She showed my mom a number of pictures that had outlines for flowers and grass. I had added to the drawings by putting extra flowers or leaves where there were none and I also would draw rocket ships and butterflies and other things. (not well mind you, cause in truth I suck at drawing. But that was not the point.) She also was quite concerned because I simply refused to use the "right" colors for things no matter how many times she told me I was using the wrong colors.
Mrs. Ozga said, "Everyone knows grass is green and the sun is yellow, and look here, he has made every leaf on this tree a different color...that is just wrong! ..he just refuses to do things the right way...I am quite concerned about his inability to follow instructions and his willfullness against me..... you must nip this in the bud and tell him he needs to do things as I or other teachers instruct him to... we are here to teach the right way.
Mom sat there for a second, then got up, motioned for me to come over, put her arm on my shoulder and looked at me smiled and then turned to my teacher and then they had this exchange. "Is he disruptive??" .."no"..."Is he disrespectful??" .."no never".... "And this is for art class?" .."arts and crafts, yes"....
Just so I am clear on this, you brought me down here to tell me that in an art class, an ART class, in 1ST GRADE, my son is not only creative and thinking outside the lines, but he is also secure enough in himself that he was willing to go on drawing what he wanted to, including things that were not part of the orginal assignment, even after you told him not to, and that his ART was wrong????? And you want me to punish him for doing so????? Is that what you are saying???
Mrs Ozga, clearly aware things were not going the way she expected, said "Yes... but he draws red grass and we need to teach the children to follow the rules and conform with...mom interrupted her and said "Are you kidding me??????? In ART??? You want to teach kids to conform..in art? (My mom taught music and so did my dad who also played trumpet in the Minneapolis Symphony so this subject was a hot button for her)
I now see where the problem is...and it is NOT with Jack. Here is how we are going to handle this. If Jack misbehaves or becomes unruly or refuses to do assignments, please call me and I will come down immediately and we will straighten things out. HOWEVER, if Jack ever comes home and says you so much as hinted to him that something he is doing in ART is WRONG, I will come down here and we will be having a very loud, very angry discussion that will include the principal, and a refresher on not discouraging creativity. w will also talk about the importance of encouraging free expression and thinking...
Are we very clear on this??
Good!..Good afternoon!!!
It never came up with Mrs. Ozga again.(Although I learned many years later that my parents actually did go down to the school and had a rather lengthy meeting with the principal and Mrs. Ozga to "clarify" things.
My mom rocks.
P.S. I still suck at drawing, but I also still draw outside the lines with my red crayon.
Calling occupants of interplanetary craft
Antiques for Sale!
The sign above the door waving in the wind, called to us; "Come on in, wherever you are from". It is weathered and bleached of its color by the unrelenting time warp that cohabitates with most small rural towns in it's never ending square dance of seasons. The sign is, in itself, the truest harbinger of the world to be explored inside.
I pause at the door, always a little afraid of the odd mixture of emotions I sustain when I am inside places like this. You see, do not go inside to shop for "TREASURES TO BE SCORED", or "BOOTY TO BE SCAVANGED", or "DEALS TO BE MADE", nor "LOW, LOW, WE ARE CRAZY NUTS!" prices.
No, I am going to go inside to spend some time reverently walking among the last remains of the long forgotten. To try to slip inside, in tiny hyper-cognizant bursts, the events reflected by these heirlooms of life.
To be sure, there are the "what's left after spring cleaning" and the "discounted goods that didn't sell all that well to begin withs"....... But what makes up the bulk of the inventory of these stores, is the unwanted detritus of estate sales from people who's lives on this planet have fought age and time, and lost.
There are so many lives represented here, so many families, and generations. And every single piece, whispers a memory.
After all, these things were once BELONGED to. They have an energy and story that is part of them forever. Everywhere I look there are thousands of items, and in each item there are lives lived.
Take as an example a small silver teaspoon frame I found. It was sitting with dozens of others that seem to be exactly like it. And they are similar, except they are also very not the same in one simple way. These are the spoons of three very specific people on this planet.
Somewhere, there are two brothers and a sister named Jonathan, Elsibeth and Theodore. They were born, loved and cherished. The evidence lies here in my hands, in the form of 3 sterling silver spoons, engraved with their names, honoring their delivery onto this planet.
I wonder, where are you now?.......
There is joy and pride here. There is love and pain too. All represented by these small tokens of new life. The life stories are there for anyone to read, sunken into the tarnished silver ...a loose tooth, cub scouts, ballet lessons, scarlet fever, first kisses, graduations. Someone cherished the memories these tokens represent so much, that they are still in perfect condition. The box is perfect. In fact, all these decades later even the ribbons wrapped around the handles are perfect.
I wonder, John, Ellie and Theo, what events in your lives led you to where you don't have these spoons?
I turn left and look up to the top shelf on this row behind me. I see a full set of cobalt blue martini glasses and a pitcher. I ring two glasses together and transport those glasses and myself back to a different decade and place. I imagine them being joyously purchased to help celebrate a family triumph like the buying of a first home or a big promotion. Or, maybe these glasses were just the thing to put the taste of gin on your tounge, because it was a beautiful summer day and you were with the most gorgeous woman anywhere ever, and all of life was so, so joyful....
I wonder who's hand toasted that promotion? Is she still gorgeous...in someones eyes? Doesn't someone from that life need these glasses anymore?
Everywhere I look memories and emotions rise up.....
A picture magazine in black and white, mourning the death of an assassinated president jerks me quickly back into my own past. I can clearly remember my mother, a woman not prone to crying, sobbing for days.......My eyes rest on a pipe. I pick it up and it has a smell that reminds me of someone who's face I can't quite make out, yet I am positive I can remember the sound of him laughing.....A kitchen utensil sits one shelf below the pipe. It is an odd looking contraption. The only reason I have the vaugest idea of what it does, comes from my earliest recollections of sitting in a kitchen long ago and waiting for the best apple crisp I ever ate to cool.....
These were all once the proud personal possessions of grandmas, or poppops, or nanas, or nice old ladies from down the block. These are people who at one point in their lives, were doctors and business tycoons, politicians, movers and shakers and war hero's. These were our moms and dads. Maybe they had a little more to do with their parents and grand parents then we do with ours...maybe not.
Because now..... these people are forgotten....and we, the children and grandchildren, are the mover and shakers. And the cycle of life continues it inevitable grind...... to what exactly? A funky smelling antique shop in rural Iowa?
Walking the rows, I become conscious of the smells of time. Tired is the word that comes to mind....tired and old. Grandparent attic and basement old. This is not a bad smell. However it does seems to tingle old memories somewhere in my head. Walking down the last isle which was populated by bedding and tablecloths and the faint scent of mothballs and lavender. It reminds me of sitting on a cedar closet floor as a young child and playing, while clothes hung on bars above me.
Lost in all the smells and nearing the dead-end of a row, my eye was pulled to an old book that looked to me like it had been lying there for a long time. As I came closer, I felt it calling me, as though it had been waiting for me, knowing I would be coming. Heavy and dark, it smelled of that wonderful, musty old book smell that I love so much. I opened it to discover it was a well worn family Bible.
The front pages are taken up with a family tree. It is filled with wedding joy and birth announcements and baptisms. I turned to the back of the book, to the last entries and I read. And I suddenly knew that this was what I was brought here for. This book needed me to find it.
I sat down with the bible cradled in my lap and read it again, slowly.
All three children of this family, are entered here. They all appeared to have died within 6 months of each other in 1945. They were 2,3 and 5. Though all of the earlier entries were quite thorough, these were noticeably different. The reasons given were only "after short illnesses". The final entry says simply, "My wife and the mother of my 3 children died quietly in 1946 at the age of 29". In handwriting made almost illegible by emotion, it says..."reason: broken heart".
I do the math..she would have been in her late 80's if she had lived. Presumably her husband, the only surviving member of the family would be roughly that age as well. The only reason I can imagine it would be here, would be on account of his death, and there being no one left in the world to claim what marked this family's passing....this book, the lonely record left behind.
I think of him being alone, and without his wife and children all those years and I find my eyes are burning with tears. I close the Bible and put it gently back on the dusty shelf I took it from.
What happened to this man? I don't know. It does not say.
There are absolutely no more entries in the Bible.
I think I am through looking at antiques for a while.
It is always nice to be home.
It is sometimes nicer to be away.
The latter was the case as I spent this weekend in Okoboji Iowa.
Okoboji is about 200 hundred miles South and West of Minneapolis almost directly on a line to Souix City Iowa. It is resort town. It is also the hometown and birthplace of the parent's of my friends Bill, and his wife Michelle(No blog yet.... come ON Michelle.). Generations of Bill's family can be traced to this area. In fact, the family has maintained a presence there for a long, long time. Bill's folks, (recently retired) have in the last couple of years, torn down the old homestead and rebuilt in it's place, a fabulous home with ALL the amenities and awesome panoramic views of the lake.
I tell you all this because Bill and Michelle generously invited Jeremy and I to accompany them to this Shangri-la in Okoboji, for a weekend of fun and relaxation.(Bill's folks were away while we were there this time, though in the past, we have been invited down while they were there. )
All I can say is this. Anyone that KNOWS me, knows I do not sleep well, nor do I relax very easily in my life.
I slept like a log this weekend.
Bill and Michelle are like family to me, and the more I know Jeremy, the more I really like him, so as far as being relaxed is concerned....as they say..fuhgiddaboudit. I was in relaxation heaven.
We just basically had a walkabout weekend. No agenda, no plans, we just goofed around. It was grand. Started Friday night, Bill drove so he and Michelle picked Jeremy and I up, and off we went, walked the dog, dj'd (badly but enthusiastically)in the car with Jeremy's iPod(not his fault it was filled with goodies I just sucked at it...lookit all the pretty lights!!duh!!!), walked the dog, ate subs, took pictures of Happy Chef the super stoner, walked the dog( he had a bit of a....let's just call it a butt leakage issue and leave it at that), arrived, unpacked, snacked on nuts and chips, read, slept, went antiquing, drove the shoreline, went pawn shopping, visited Bill's Grandma Bunch, scarfed enough chips, salsa and nuts to feed a small army, walked the dog.... ate Bill's "from scratch" pasta, talked, read, surprised(me) with a birthday cake, watched a movie(bad) in front of a roaring fire, fell asleep during same, talked about school, nodded off in front of the fire more, read some more, enjoyed the atomic supermegajet multi headed turbo orgazmo shower.....twice, (a sybriatic experience you ALL should have...and no I really didn't.. ;-) , eggs and veggies and goodies for breakfast (again from Bill's hand), played video games(played so poorly the dog beat me..then I found out I was driving a pod ship that was severely handicapped...sorta like me, duh.....switched to a MUCH better car...and promptly got my ass kicked by the dog again...I don't even want to tell you how badly Michelle creamed me..sigh...but I blowed up real good....) , packed up, drove home, more dj-ing(this time by Jeremy, still not sure about that "all-American plastic bango tango band" thingie), more butt leakage (it WAS funny..sort of....trust me..you had to be there), FINALLY got to pay for something, (a couple of drinks and some Nutter Butter's...big deal ...Grrrr we are gonna have a talk about that, I mean it..) more dog walking, arrived home, said good bye's, unpacked ......in other words, we did nothing and yet we did everything.
There is something about hanging around with people that you honestly love or really care about that is so amazing. You don't really have to DO anything to have fun. It is the company you keep that makes doing anything fun..
It reminds me of something we should never ever forget.
It is not the what or the where or the when that is important, it is the who...it is always the who. If you are really lucky in your life, you get that part right..
My love and thanks go out to my friends for a most wonderful weekend.
For me? I want to say to the rest of you reading this, you should all be so lucky.
I got home late from editing today, and found my little answering machine blinking happily away with the number 13 in the window. This tells me that there were a whole lotta people calling me today....Wooo! Wooo!!! I am So Mr. Popular.
I hit the playback button, just waiting for the love.......The result?
1 call from Arc of Hennepin County asking if I have anything to donate this month. (this is a great organization..and although I have been donating to them for years and years, it never seems as if the pile gets smaller..sigh)
But I digress.
1 call from a phone company offering me better rates.(How would they know?)
2 calls from home remodellers.
2 call for replacement windows (I don't think of these as home remodellers for some reason.)
1 call from a very happy guy named Marshall that urged me to call him back for information that could change my life. (This was actually a recording, but he was SUPER glad to talk to me.)
4 dead air messages.
1 of those "Operator recordings".."If you'd like to make a call, please hang up and then try again"
And finally, a message that just played bad musak, ( a horrible, even bad for in an elevator, cover version of Clapton's Tears in Heaven...ewww) until the digital chip on my recorder was full and had to shut itself off. (made extra weird by the fact that the caller ID box said the call number was 0-000-000-0000.
Nice to know we have a law in place to keep phone sales calls to a minimum...... huh?
After checking around my (admittedly small) blogging world this morning, I have learned that I am woefully undereducated. It seems, there is what appears to be, an unwritten law, a vital piece of web log etiquette that I did not know....
Pandering is a required prerequisite for successful online relations....(in case anyone is reading this.. ;-) )
My problem with pandering is that it is not honest. It suggest's that the person you are pandering to is not worthy of real praise..
So, with this thought in mind, I have decided to go against the tide, (big surprise) and only speak and write the absolute truth here. No false gushing or petty fawning here. No pandering, even if it is all the rage at "all the other blog's" Only the truth and nothing but the truth..
I wish to publicly retract my personal "2nd or maybe 3rd" ranking of Irish-Girls slam performance.
WHAT WAS I THINKING??
Number 1!!!!!! Number 1!!!! Number 1!!!!!!!
Her one woman show of poetry, was the highlight of all time, for all wordsmiths everywhere. A confluence of genius and beauty such as the world, nay, the universe has ever seen. (and yes I am willing to admit I made a mistake in my 20 greatest genius's of all time..and I have rectified that) Sorry to all involved for my misunderstanding.
All Hail Irish-Girl!!! Queen of the Universe!!..
P.S. I will be following this post with others. I will soon be exclaiming ALL my blogging friends to be magnificent beings....except for the one leaking personal data ... ;-)
P.S.S. Does anybody sleep?
P.S.S.S. I gotta go. My first lesson just got here. Time to spread a little larnin around.. later
Hoooboy!
Holy crank loads of fun Batman!
Jeremy and I went to see a Poetry Slam last night...and........ JUST WHERE THE HELL HAVE I BEEN ??????? AND HOW COULD I HAVE MISSED THESE GOING ON ALL THIS TIME?????....
It has been a very long time since I have had that much fun being on the other side of the lights of a performance. A poetry slam for the uninitiated is when a bunch of people get together and ..um..well...slam it to the audience. It is a whirligig of styles and language and meter and beat. ZOWZIE!!
Think of mixing up in a Mosh pit, whacked out english majors, both Dylan's, Andy Warhol and Pee Wee Herman...extrude the results and you will get an idea of the mayhem
The quality of the poetry was, I thought, amazingly high. There were a few "mediums", a couple of "bads" and one sucked extra crispy, but when you consider how many poems were read, (like 50 total) I was drop down astonished.
Some of you know that I have been away from stage performance for too darn long. I have spent most of my life on stage. Between my band, The Guthrie and The Children's Theater, I have spent most of my life peforming. It has just been in the last couple of years that I have been lost and away from it. I NEED to get back to it...
I am so completely wired.....I have not slept since last night's slam..Hell, I did not SIT at last night slam....at least till the 3rd round..I was too juiced.
I will have to think of some VERY nice thing to do for my new friend Irish-Girl. She is the one who mentioned this event to me. She also competed. It is clear she is a veteran at this stuff. Her pieces were moving and real. She won 5th place. The only thing that is a bit screwy at these deals is the judges. Picked at random from the audience, I felt the judges were more that a bit arbitrary. I personally would have had Irish-Girl at 2nd or maybe 3rd. If you took all 3 poems she read cumulatively, her stuff felt more complete and mature to me than anyone elses there, except one guy. (interestingly enough to me anyway, this was NOT the guy that won)
A bit about Irish-Girl... I have come to know her a bit through my friend Jeremy's blog. (he had her as one of his links) We have traded barbs and tidbits back and forth since I started blogging the 1st of January. Now I think you can learn a great deal about some one when you read a bunch of their poetry. She has a bunch of her stuff posted. enjoy So, between her writing, blogging and general kibutzing, it quickly became evident to me that this was someone that I couldn't let stay an anonymous cypher at the end of a ethernet cable... gotta meet the real thing..So we packed up and went over...I have to add here that it didn't hurt that Jeremy was also pouring gas on the "let's go meet her" wagon as well. She was there, with her posse and holding court at the table right in front of us. It was fun to match up the written voice with the person.
Having read her and experienced her remotely, my expectations were high............. they were exceeded.
Thanks again to her for shining a light on this stuff so that I could experience it.
So, I spent all night writing, then I worked all day Saturday(today), had dinner with my whole family including all the kids, ( we number 21 when we are all there) then went out with Bill, Michelle and Jeremy to see DareDevil.
Ok I am starting to flag a bit but, I want to get a couple of things out before falling over. I AM going to read at the NEXT slam..count on it. I have already written a bunch of stuff to try and I can't wait. I don't exactly understand why I am so wired about this. I have been going a mile a minute since last night. I think I blew the guys ears off tonight ..I couldn't shut up ...sorry guys.........I'm sure they were like ..to much speed, cocaine, sugar and coffee Jack?
I dunno..I have spent my whole life being this creative person.....made a living my entire life doing just that. Singing, playing, acting.........and then phhht what? I just stop??? It's time to get back to it.
I about being inspired, plain and simple......creating, inventing, imagining......all killer stuff for me...this is what I was put on this earth to do...seriously........I've got the major Mojo going again and it is ALLLLL GOOD !!!
Miguel Estrada Filibuster..
It's time to Rock and Roll Kiddies!!!
The Democrats have finally decided to pull their collective heads outta their butts, to ante up and be an active and participating part of our government!
It is a big gamble politically, and shows that SOMEBODY finally grew a pair, and is willing to stand up to the Bush Presidency.
(Which I have taken to calling)
The Assault on America!...
Kinda catchy huh?
Ultra-conservative lawyer Miguel Estrada has been nominated to the influential Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
His former supervisor in the Justice Department concluded that Estrada “lacks the judgment” and is “too much of an ideologue to be an appeals court judge.”
The Congressional Hispanic Caucus and the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund are opposed to Estrada’s confirmation.
Estrada’s record shows:
Estrada has expressed the disturbing view that Americans should not be permitted to turn to the judicial branch when legislative decisions harm fundamental constitutional freedoms. In fact, it is precisely when a legislature has used its power to violate the freedoms of the less powerful that judicial review becomes crucial.
As a lawyer in private practice, Estrada has sought to defend so-called anti-loitering statutes and ordinances, which have been demonstrated to disproportionately harm African-Americans and Latinos in much the same manner as racial profiling. Federal and state courts, including the Supreme Court, have invalidated a number of these provisions as violating the First Amendment freedom to assembly and the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Estrada has even argued that the NAACP should not even be allowed to challenge such ordinances.
Estrada has sought to use the First Amendment as a shield for a large company that had been found guilty of deceptive advertising by the Federal Trade Commission. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, including several judges appointed by Republican presidents, unanimously rejected his line of reasoning.
Despite his troubling record, Estrada refused to answer any questions at his Senate Judiciary Committee hearing about his judicial philosophy, such as his views about important Supreme Court decisions. For example, he refused to name a single Supreme Court decision in the last 50 years that he thought was wrong.
In light of the Senate’s co-equal role in judicial appointments, the Senate should not confirm a nominee who refuses even to answer such critical questions.
This guy has got to go bye bye
This is a perfect example of Little Lord Fauntleroy's attempt to stack the courts with very young (42) ultra-conservative judges that will then be around for a very long time
We've got to support this filibuster.
Please call your Senators now, at:
Senator Dayton (D)
Local Phone: 612-727-5220
DC Phone: 202-224-3244
FYI Dayton supports the filibuster.
Senator Coleman (R)
Local Phone: 651-645-0323
DC Phone: 202-224-5641
FYI Coleman has already come out in favor of Estrada...big surprise
I got into a very interesting discussion with my friend Pat the other day.
The question was simple, the answer is not.
What is Genius? What makes a Genius?
Who were or are, our greatest Geniuses?
I put it to you all.
Give me a list of who you feel are the top 20 geniuses in the world of all time, living or dead.
Or give me your best take on what you think genuis is.
You may use whatever criteria you wish, and your choices can come from ANY discipline. You can explain some, all, or none of your nominees. You may list them in no particular order, or you can put them in some hierarchy from number 1 super best genius to ummm... number 20 super best genius...
Ready, Set, Go!!!
Now I realize in advance, that there is only 1 woman on my list, and also that no one on this list has been born within the last 100 years, but don't kill the postman...(also 3 of my 20 choices were named Charles..what's up with that??)
Better yet, make a case for other woman..or a younger entry...anybody you think is deserving of the title of one of the World's Top 20 Geniuses............ I am open minded.. ;-)
So.....Here is my list in no particular order..
EXCEPT for the first one.
I think Leonardo is, hands down, the greatest genius of all time...
Questions? Reactions? Arguments? After Dinner Mint?
JACK"S GENIUS LIST
*.5) Irish-Girl
1) Leonardo DaVinci
2) Michelangelo Buonarroti
3) Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
4) Socrates
5) Thomas Jefferson
6) Thomas Edison
7) Galileo
8) Albert Einstien
9) Aristotle
10) Marie Curie
11) Charlie Chaplin
12) William Shakespeare
13) Karl Marx
14) Issac Newton
15) Charles Darwin
16) Napoleon Bonaparte
17) Charles Dickens
18) Fredric Chopin
19) Srinivasa Ramanujan
20) Robert Heinlein
Ok Boys and Girls...start listing
* this is a recent addition (2/16) after careful reconsideration...
slowly chipping away
And so continues the efforts of our Executive Branch, spearheaded by John "I am such a tool, I lost a Senate election to a dead man" Ass-croft, to erode the Constitutional Rights of all Americans.
ARRGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!
I am posting this at the NY Times site as well
A Dead End? A Failed Mission?
Darwin Lives!!
And the proof is in Paul Krugman. I am so utterly disgusted with the small minded and short sighted comment made here by this guy.
All I can say, is that it's a very good thing that we were not relying on the likes of Paul to advance this world in any way..... at any time .........EVER.
Unfortunately, the world is filled with too many of his type. Fortunately, Darwin was right, and the slower dumber ones eventually die out. After reading his comment today it is clear which side of the evolutionary scale Paul occupies..
RIP Paul..you dumb sheep.
"People are a nuisance"??? Only some people Paul.
I suspect Mister Krugman would have been sitting fat assed in some cave, while some forward thinking Neanderthal was out gambling his life on trying to figure out how to kill that "big meat with big teeth", so his tribe, (including Paul) could survive the winter. How did he do this? He pushed his limits...Human limits.
I suspect Paul would have been one of those sitting fat assed in Europe waiting for the "adventurers" to come back from the "New World" with new opportunities (for Paul) to reap profit and benefit from. How did they do this? Humans pushed their limits...Humans.
I suspect that Paul would have been sitting fat assed in Virginia on a plantation waiting to see what new things those crazy pioneers traveling out to the west might bring back (for Paul) to capitalize on. How did they do this? Humans pushed the limits...Humans.
I suspect that Paul was sitting fat assed watching TV, while some guys were pushing the envelope in computers...computers that Paul would no doubt be using for profit soon. How did they do this? Humans pushed the limits...Humans.
In fact, I can guarantee that Paul and those like him were exactly the type to be sitting fat assed waiting..waiting..waiting till somebody else.... our earliest ancestors...our very first EXPLORERS, crawled from the muck and persevered till they could stand upright...then and only then would the Paul's of the world wade to shore to see what had been made safe for them.
Since then, millions of pioneers, explorers, scientists, engineers, test pilots, soldiers, doctors, astronauts and everyday people have devoted and yes even given their lives to pushing the physical, mental, and mechanical limits of what we know today.
WHY did they do this? Because humans push the limits...Humans.
"The shuttle is an unglamorous bust" Paul???
Given the distance and time AND a calculator, I doubt you could even figure a simple average rate of speed for this launch. But just for fun, how's about you calculate the PE q-planes values the minimum primary air-flow and thrust calibrations for the allowable psi ballistic verticle stress loading on the trailing edge of the airleron of the tail stabilizer at variable v1 of 3900 fps/s, at a launch pad weight of 4.5 million lbs. minus 15.674 seconds of maximun launch-to-orbit boost at a maximum of 104 percent of rated power level, with each engine developing 2,174,286 Newtons of thrust, at sea level, at 56 degrees celsius, with a 15 mile an hour NNW wind, using the 51.6 degree inclination low orbit payload launch modality....can you do that Paulie?????
You should SHUT UP!
This Space Shuttle, is the culmination of 100 years of science, math, experimentation and the blood sweat and tears of uncountable human lives. It is so unbelievably complex, that you could not even begin to concieve of the math, technology and methodology necessary to design something as sub minor and peripheral as the anti static coating that is used on the platform of the giant tractor that carries the craft out of the hanger.
You should SHUT UP!
Better yet, why don't you take another crack at programming the VCR. That way you can sit comfortably in your dream world and watch episodes of Firefly while evolution does it's work and gets rid of you by giving you a brain aneurysm filled with your own arrogance.
Have you become so stupid and lazy Paul that you have lost sight of just how we have gotten to where we are? How we know what we know in this world? Do machines ultimately test the limits of cars, planes, vaccines, surgical techniques or of human endurance and capacity? Do machines question, reason, ad lib based on current conditions or analyze based on parameters unknown at the time of programming? Can machines do more than they are programmed to do..of course not..but humans can and do. Plus, machines don't explore, humans do.
And something else...The machine has not been made that can stand at the edge of the world and glory at the wonder of it all...And that is the most wonderous thing of all...the most inspiring, the most human thing of all.
So Paul, you stay sitting on your brain. It appears to be what you are good at. If YOU do not want to go, great. You would probably fall down and break a leg and be useless anyway. Don't however get in the way of those who seek to move the human race forward.
You Paul, certainly do not belong on the list of humans that aspire to greater things. You belittle and dishonour the memories of those that HAVE sacrificed. In fact you do not really even deserve the right to take advantage of the millions of gains made by those that have made those sacrifices. It's ok though. Your arteries are hardening faster than the HUMAN who is EXPLORING new science to fix that particular malady can work, and you will soon be gone.
You will be forgotten with all the other sheep that said that we were the center of the universe, that the world was flat, that man was not meant to fly, that a human organ could not be transplanted from one body to another, that man would never walk on the moon, and that we should wait to explore the universe.
It is humans that go out to explore, humans that will travel faster than light, humans that will walk on Mars and Pluto and Alpha Centauri and wherever else we can dream to go..........Humans.
Humans push the limits...Humans.
I am not often at a loss for words. Tonight I am just...I don't know...I am exhausted by the events of the day and yet I cannot sleep. My mind is a jumble and my heart is bruised with the loss of the Columbia today.
I am a geek's geek. I can't help it, I was born and not only allowed, but encouraged to look into everything and anything I was curious about...and I have a VERY active curiosity and imagination. Plus my older brother (by 2 years), was a math genius. (think super geek) This practically guaranteed that the two of us would become science, space and Nasa junkies as kids. We did experiments by the thousands. we built a fleet of rockets and planes and fly by wire planes and radio controlled planes and helicopters. Boats, submarine, we breadboarded computers, and always in the backround Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, SkyLab, Soyuz....My brother and I still continue the tradition today by encouraging his kids to geek out, and they are. In fact my brother was probably a bigger air and space geek than I was, he got his pilot's licence at 16 and has owned a number of real airplanes since then. He also ended up marrying a Physics tweak that is also a pilot and was in the Nasa astronaut training program. (She was washed out by space docs after tearing up vertebrae in her back in an accident)...
Anyway, in other words, as kids, we ate it and slept it and drank it. And I have kept my interest all through my adulthood. In fact, if you had asked me before today's tragic event to tell you the names of the crew onboard the Columbia, I could have....see, I told you ..........geek.
But don't think for a moment that I was ashamed of my geekyness.
Oh no! I revelled in it.
I put in some backround only to try to give you a sense of the depth of my feelings when I tell you..I Love Space, and NASA..and it is with a truly heavy heart that I search for the words to express my feelings and thoughts.
Mostly I feel a great pride....is that weird? By not naming grief or horror as my "main" emotion, it almost feels as though I am being ungrateful or selfish or like I am belittling their value or memory in some whispered dishonourable way. It is not like I don't ALSO feel grief and sorrow and loss, but for me, there is something far greater happening here.
I look upon the 7 faces of the crew of the Columbia, and I am overwhelmed by pride with the understanding that we ALL are part of such an amazing race of people. These 7 people ARE our species brightest and best. And what are they doing? EXACTLY what our brightest and best should be doing.
Exploring.
Searching.
Adding to our collective pool of knowledge.
Pushing the known limits of man.
I mean, look at what they were riding in.
This Space Shuttle...this machine ..this uber plane that can fly... jet ...rocket, at almost 4 miles per second, 6 times faster than a rifle bullet.
(Think about it.....that is a trip from Minneapolis to Chicago in a 90 seconds, New York to LA in 12 minutes..
AND, more importantly, once it reaches such incredible, man generated speeds, it can then leave the gravitational well that is the earth.
We have conquered, this impossible physical impediment, this locked door to the unknown, this gravity.
And how did we do this...this defying of the nature of things? ..this "impossible thing"?
It started less than 100 years ago in 1903 in December when 2 bicycle making brothers from Ohio first collared the laws of gravity. Less than 100 years ago! There are people that are still alive today that lived when man could not fly! In the short time since then, we progressed at an unimaginable pace. Flying became routine.......
What then? Then we simply decided one day we wanted to see what was OUT THERE, and so we just did it!! The Moon? Let's go there! How? A single charismatic leader merely challenged us to it. And, "we the people", gathered up the will and within a decade, we were there.
At it's best, the human race is capable of the most breathtaking things. Music, Art, Literature, Science, Architecture, the whole list would be staggering. The largest structure to the smallest nanotechnology, we as a species are built to move forward, to reach, to question. It is our most basic nature to do this.
The human race is imbued with an indomitable spirit and the need to answer the simplest question..... Why?
I will mourn the astronauts that gave humankind their lives today...but I will also take a moment and mourn ALL the seekers that have given their lives in pursuit of knowledge.....and that, my fellow humans is a long long list.
Did the astronauts want to die? Of course not. Did they know they could die pursuing the holy grail of knowledge? Absolutely!
But, (and here is the core of it for me, as I have been writing, I think I just figured it out) ............DID THEY GO ANYWAY??????
You know the answer to that one.
If you asked every member of the current astronaut corp if they would get on a shuttle and fly tommorow?
You know the answer to that one as well.
And so do I.
Any one interested in going to Mars??