SAT 07 OCT 2000

Thought for the Day
"Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of the time he will pick himself up and continue on."
--Winston Churchill

Surreal Estate

Spanish architect Antoni Gaudi has been called "the Dante of architecture." Gaudi designed buildings in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. At left is the La Pedrera apartment house, built in the first decade of the 1900s. He also renovated the Casa Batllo on the Mançana de la Discòrdia (Block of Discord) in Barcelona.

Whiny Goth Kids
'Nuff said. (Thanks to Swift!)

Seasons Come and Seasons Go
Even though fall officially started a couple of weeks ago or so, summer weather has lingered. Today it's sunny, about 85F (30C), with little or no humidity and a nice breeze. Ahhhhhh. It won't last, though. There's a cold front coming through tonight, and temperatures over the weekend are supposed to dip below freezing. Time to pick the last of the tomatos and hot peppers from the weedy remains of the garden. Meanwhile, hawks soar lazily on high blue updrafts, and groundhogs raise their heads by the roadside. In the woods, the leaves are still green, but the acorns have been falling for awhile. Mushrooms poke their red caps through last year's brown leaves. Deer are everywhere. Tomorrow it will be fall.

Thought for the Day
"I should never have bitten the head off that bat. I knew people would take it the wrong way."
--Ozzy Osbourne

October Surprise
Republican Presidential candidate George W. Bush has been endorsed by shock-rocker Marilyn Manson. Go figure.

Shrubya and Marilyn: Together at Last!

Personal Observation
Isn't it odd how most of the people who insist that sex should be "natural" are the same people who demand that teenagers remain celebate?

Thought for the Day
"People demand freedom of speech to make up for the freedom of thought which they avoid."
--Kierkegaard

Button Addendum
Added holographic version of Aleister Crowley's interpretation of the Masonic "Eye in the Pyramid" symbol to the Button Selection in the Scrapbook.

Conservative Character
According to an article in today's New York Times, outspoken Clinton critic Matthew J. Glavin, president and chief executive of the Atlanta-based Southeastern Legal Foundation, was caught fondling himself on May 17 on a trail in the Chattahoochee National River Park just east of Atlanta. The undercover federal officer who caught him at it said Glavin also fondled him after the two started talking. Glavin is known for his efforts to end Affirmative Action in Atlanta and for his strident calls to disbar President Clinton for lying under oath in regard to the Paula Jones scandal. You can read the full NYT article here (assuming the page stays up) -- you'll need to do the free registration to access it, because no one else seems to have picked up the story yet. Just goes to show you can still get in trouble even if you keep your hands to yourself.

I Hate Politics
I started watching the first Bush/Gore debate last night and realized just how much I dislike both of these men. Ask them a question, and they'll give you an answer -- to a completely different question. I could tell that they were both in favor of the economy, but that's about all. I heard the word "lockbox" so often, I decided that's where both of these guys belong. I realized that I was watching this irritating debate just so I'd be able to spot the blatantly biased news coverage the next day and get irritated about that, too. So I wandered outside and looked up at the stars and got a sense of perspective and scale, and when I came back in all I saw on TV were two carbon-based bipedal life-forms arguing abstracts that don't even apply to most of the inhabitants of this planet, and the universe couldn't care less. I went to bed and slept soundly.

Thought for the Day
"All of us who are concerned for peace and the triumph of reason and justice must be keenly aware how small an influence reason and honest good will have upon events in the political field."
--Albert Einstein

Long Joke
It was getting a little crowded in heaven, so God decided to change the admittance policy. The new law was that, in order to get into Heaven, you had to have a really bad day the day you died. The policy would go into effect at noon the following day. So the next day at 12:01 the first person came to the gates of Heaven. The angel at the gate, remembering about new law, promptly asked the man, "Before I can let you in, I need you to tell me about the day you died."

"No problem," said the man. "Well, for some time now, I've thought my wife was having an affair. I believed that each day on her lunch hour, she'd bring her lover home to our 25th floor apartment and have sex with him. So today I was going to come home too, and catch them. Well, I got there and busted in and immediately began searching for this guy. My wife was half naked and yelling at me as I searched the entire apartment. But, damn it, I couldn't find him! Just when I was about to give up, I happened to glance out onto the balcony and noticed that there was a man hanging off the edge by his fingertips! The nerve of that guy to think he could hide from me! Well I ran out there and promptly stomped on his fingers until he fell to the ground. But, wouldn't you know it, he landed in some bushes that broke his fall, and he didn't die. This pissed me off even more, so in a rage went back inside to get the first thing I could get my hands on to throw at him. And oddly enough, the first thing I could grab was the refrigerator. I unplugged it, pushed it out onto the balcony and heaved it over the side. It plummeted 25 stories and crushed him! The excitement of the moment was so great that right after that, I had a heart attack and died almost instantly." The angel sat back and thought for a moment. Technically, the guy did have a bad day and it was a crime of passion. So he announced, "Ok, sir, welcome to the Kingdom of Heaven," and let him in.

A few seconds later the next guy came up. "Ok, here's the rule. Before I can let you in, I need to hear about the day you died." "Sure thing," the man replied. "But you're not gonna believe this. I was out on the balcony of my 26th floor apartment doing my daily exercises when I got a little carried away and accidentally fell over the side! Luckily however, I was able to catch myself by my fingertips on the balcony directly beneath mine. When all of a sudden this crazy man comes running out of his apartment and starts cussing and stomping on my fingers! Well of course I fall. I hit some trees and bushes on the way down which broke my fall. So I didn't die right away. As I'm laying there face up on the ground, unable to move, and in excruciating pain, I see the man push his refrigerator, of all things, over the ledge and it falls directly on top of me and kills me!" The angel is quietly laughing to himself as the man finishes his story. "I could get used to this new policy," he thinks to himself. "Very well," the angel announces. "Welcome to the Kingdom of Heaven," and lets the man enter.

A few seconds later a third man comes up to gate. "Tell me about the day you died," said the angel. "Ok. Picture this," says the man. "I'm naked inside a refrigerator...."

Black Walnuts
In the unseasonably warm October afternoon, our neighbor Buddy was kneeling on the ground in front of a large wooden tray-like thing. The wood was gray from age. It was about three or four feet long and half as wide, divided into three equal sections. Two of the sections were flat, and one at the end was tilted slightly. Only the middle section had anything in it -- a lot of round green things that looked like squashed apples.

"Black walnuts," said Buddy. Sure enough, inside the soft green layer outside was a small black nut, the shape of Christmas walnuts, but not the dark brown color -- solid black, covered for the moment with a gooey dark residue.

I noticed that Buddy was wearing industrial-grade rubber gloves while pulling the walnuts out of their coverings, and I asked him if the juice was corrosive (actually, I asked him if it would burn ya). He said no, but it would dye your skin a ginger brown color. Wouldn't wash off, it had to wear off. Indians used to use it some way or other, he said. As warpaint, or for ceremonies? He didn't know. Maybe they used it instead of tanning booths. The end of my finger where I touched the walnut juice is still brown.

Thought for the Day
"I have made mistakes but I have never made the mistake of claiming that I have never made one."
--James Gordon Bennett

Update
Added a selection of buttons to the Scrapbook.

Bumper Sticker
On the way to work today, I saw a car with this bumper sticker on it:
"What God Call Right Is Right
What God Call Wrong Is Wrong".
Of course, this is not correct grammar. The "Is" should be replaced with "Be".

Thought for the Day
"When they call the roll in the Senate, the Senators do not know whether to answer 'Present' or 'Not Guilty.'"
--Theodore Roosevelt