10:26am: A Conversation Between Continuity and Error

 By Way of Introduction,
A Conversation Between Continuity and Error

"I have detected an anomaly in which you may find interest."
"You have my attention."
"I know how you value your time, so I'll be brief."
Silence.  That meant the comment was unnecessary, a waste of the resource mentioned.  Continuity knew he would not be replaced, but had learned not to try the patience of his associate.  He did not acknowledge the notice of the slight.
"A ripple in the continuum, fabricated by Man."
"We can go back and eliminate the source of this discontinuity."  The word a curse in their current mode of speech.
"I don't think we'll want to do that..."

Discourse in Matters Best Left Unstated, pp iv-v,DeCosta, et al. , Jenrette, Bobbette, and Broum, Philadelphia, 1926

9:43pm: Human - Kzin relations

... Louis stood up. He was committing suicide; but he'd known tanj well what the custom was. "I challenge you," he said. "Tooth against tooth, claw against fingernail, since we cannot share a universe in peace."
(Another kzinti named Hroth defuses the situation, announcing his function is to apologize.)
... Speaker-To-Animals said one thing more before he turned back to his table. "Louis Wu, I found your challenge verbose. In challenging a kzin, a simple scream of rage is sufficient. You scream and you leap."
from Ringworld by Larry Niven

9:10pm: Starship Dimensions

 Starship Dimensions - A Museum of Speculative Fiction inspired Spaceships
Your favorites should be here - anything from science fiction.   Detailed Drawings in various scales, appropriate to size.  I mean it.  Anything.  Click and drag to compare sizes (Internet Explorer).  Bab5, Lexx, Ringworld, you know.  Anything.  Yes, the Death Star is there.  Vger.  Borg Cube.  Sulaco and Nostromo.  Have fun.

thanks to Bill W. for this link!

6:01pm: A sad note
 We'd noticed our big orange tabby cat, Louie, hadn't been eating for a few days.  We'd just changed his food, so we thought that might be the problem.  He'd look at it and yowl repeatedly.  We got him to eat a little by hand, but something was wrong.  We took him to the vet.
Diagnosis:  He is blind!  Apparently there is an illness of cats that renders them suddenly blind.  His crying was due to the disorientation and fear.  Sadly, there is no treatment for  the condition.  The only good news is that with a little care, blind cats can do just fine, thank you.  I googled up some helpful links.
 He's not an outdoor cat, so that big no-no is not a problem.  One rule is you don't pick him up and put him on something high, because he can fall off.  It's okay if he jumps up, because he knows about the edge.  Another rule is don't move furniture around and leave it - as long as things stay the same, he'll  learn his paths and get around just fine - he's shown us he knows where the food and the litter are. He finds his way to his favorite nap spots, too.  If there's a problem with repeated bumps into things, we might have to pad them.
So, a little special TLC is all we can do for him.  He's a sweetie, so that won't be hard at all.
Here's a link if you'd like to know a bit more - Pet People's Place on Caring for a blind cat.

6:57pm: Trilobites
 Various

12:51pm: Elizabeth Bishop

One Art

by Elizabeth Bishop

 

The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.
Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.
Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.
I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.
I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.
— Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

borrowed from "Prose, Poetry, and Letters"  NPR Fresh Air 4 29 2008

2:03pm: A quote from "The Prestige"

Nikola Tesla: 
You’re familiar with the phrase “Man’s reach exceeds his grasp”? It’s a lie. Man’s grasp exceeds his nerve. 
The only limits on scientific progress are those imposed by society. The first time I changed the world, I was hailed as a visionary. The second time I was asked politely to retire. The world only tolerates one change at a time. And so here I am. Enjoying my “retirement”. 
Nothing is impossible, Mr. Angier, what you want is simply expensive.

3:42pm: Second Day, Compline
"But why doesn't the Gospel ever say that Christ laughed?" I asked, for no good reason. "Is Jorge right?" 

 "Legions of scholars have wondered whether Christ laughed. The question doesn't interest me much. I believe he never laughed, because, omniscient as the son of God had to be, he knew how we Christians would behave. . . ." 

William of Baskerville speaking to Adso of Melk - - -
The Name of the Rose, Umberto Eco

 Borrowed from Umberto Eco - Porto Ludovica

More on Professor Eco and on Jorge Louis Borges at The Modern Word

7:55am:

 ...The event took place some five years ago. Bioy Casares had had dinner with me that evening and we became lengthily engaged in a vast polemic concerning the composition of a novel in the first person, whose narrator would omit or disfigure the facts and indulge in various contradictions which would permit a few readers - very few readers - to perceive an atrocious or banal reality.
 
excerpt:  Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius by Jorge Luis Borges

"I am certain that the greatest difficulty of all will be to survive her first impression of me.  But surely she will not judge me by appearance alone."

The Invention of Morel (New York Review Books Classics)
Adolfo Bioy Casares, Suzanne Jill Levine, Jorge Luis Borges, Ruth L. C. Simms

Copyright 1964 Adolfo Bioy Casares
Introduction copyright 2003 Suzanne Jill Levine
Translation copyright 1964, 1992 Ruth L.C. Simms
First published 1940 Editorial Losada, Buenos Aires, Argentina

7:36pm: Return of the Bees
This weekend, a troubling reminder.  The bees came back!  We had 10 honeybees in the upstairs bathroom, and they were outside the window and around the chimney.  Then , the next day, they were mysteriously gone, again.  My wishful thought for the week:  They don't live in my house or I would see them all the time.  Why they check us out periodically remains one of life's little mysteries.

On a sad note, a little fox ran under my car yesterday morning.  It was still quite dark, about 5:45 am.  All I saw was a flash of grey, then I heard the thump.  The fox's color was much like this one- more grey rather than red:



Some other pictures of this one here, documenting a visit at a camp site in the Val d'Orco, Italy.  
The fox visit page is a part of Guillaume and Jennifer Dergaud's website - a most interesting travelogue of their travel and climbing adventures.  Highly recommended.



More apropos, perhaps, is this photo of a grey fox from the Little River Research Station in Adel, Georgia.
Urocyon cinereoagenteus


 

7:37am: ...contemplating one's existance*

"'When a great thinker despises men, it is their laziness that he despises: for it is on account of this that they have the appearance of factory products and seem indifferent and unworthy of companionship or instruction. The human being who does not wish to belong to the mass must merely cease being comfortable with himself; let him follow his conscience which shouts at him: 'Be yourself! What you are at present doing, opining, and desiring, that is not really you.'. . .'

(from) Nietzsche's Schopenhauer As Educator, published in 1874,...culled from Walter Kaufmann's anthology, Existentialism From Dostoevsky To Sartre'(World Publishing Co., 1956), pp.101-104."

Quoted in Nietzsche On The Need To Be Alone, an unattributed essay on philosophical society.com  

*or one way of thinking about what's at the bottom of the stairs in House of Leaves

9:03am: From the essay
 

The whole conviction of my life now rests upon the belief 
that loneliness, far from being a rare and curious phenomenon, 
peculiar to myself and to a few other solitary men, 
is the central and inevitable fact of human existence. 
When we examine the moments, acts, and statements of all kinds of people -- 
not only the grief and ecstasy of the greatest poets, 
but also the huge unhappiness of the average soul…
we find, I think, 
that they are all suffering from the same thing. 

The final cause of their complaint is loneliness.

God's Lonely Man
Thomas Wolfe

3:50pm: A thoughtful turn
Dignity is the struggle of one's attempt to exist with the consequences of one's choices.  
---On the Consideration of Existentialism, or, 200 years of Being , P. Jackson, unpublished

10:33pm: A Light in the Attic

by Shel Silverstein

8:29pm: My friend Bent sent this note.
He isn't very careful where he goes in SL, and is not judicious in his romantic encounters.

Notes on "Falling in Love with a Vampire" after one almost-date:

1. I want to ask her out to dinner. Is that...stupid?
2. If she promises just to kiss you, do you dare believe her?
We actually haven't touched, yet, I'm just thinking ahead.
3. Are vampires capable of the physical act of love? How would you find out, safely?
4a. If one achieves intimacy then finds some unforeseen side effect of one's partner's
unusual 'chemistry' repellent, how does one politely...withdraw?
4b. Same question, but if one's partner might react...violently...to rejection?

I met her in a crowded bar. We talked a bit. She declined to dance.
I drank Jack Daniels, she drank something green with red veins in.
Red veins are definitely different, but different is all over, right?
I invited her to my place, but she said she preferred if I just went home with her.
Neither romantic or coy, just "Let's go to my place".
She fixed some coffee while I sat on the sofa. I hadn't even made a pass when she said, "There's something I need to tell you."
I've heard that before, so I was looking for the most direct path to the door.
You know, "My boyfriend just got out of prison, etc, etc."
She said, "Don't be scared - just watch."
She showed me how her teeth...grew. She growled - I guess that was involuntary. Hope so.
Hey, I've seen the movies - I pulled out a cross to protect myself.
She laughed and said, "I'm a Christian, too." WTF?
She said, "Don't be afraid, I like you, you're interesting."
She said she's four hundred years old, but she was my age when she...became what she is.
I asked her some history questions, but she said she doesn't remember.
She was a little pissed off and asked me some stuff from 10 years ago.
I didn't remember, either. I must have looked sad, because she smiled and laughed.
I laughed, too. Any idiot would have kissed her, then , but see #2, above.

5. How do you impress a girl you're afraid of? Well, now that I think about it,
I've been afraid of every girl I've met, anyway. (Thanks, Mom.)
6. However, since men fall in love with their eyes, I am in love. She's beautiful.
And she finds me interesting. Four hundred years old, and I'm interesting.
7. Do vampires play with their food?
8. Has anyone some examples of successful relationships with the undead?
If I need to define 'successful' please leave a comment.
9. If you can't find eternal love, can you make do with 'eternal'?

7:05pm: Somebody had to do it

A copy of House of Leaves

sits by my bed, despite the fact I won't read it while I'm in the house alone.

The novel starts with a description of a short film, "The five and a half minute hallway."

It's been several years since I first read HOL. I cannot explain why it took so long
for me to check Youtube. It was inevitable. Someone made the film described in the book.

We're spoiled with high quality entertainment, so the first reaction to this is "blah - home movie."
However, HOL, the novel, is a study in subtle, insidious horror. Other intriguing features of the book
maintain your attention until, too late, you realize the horror is... inside...you.   The subtle nature of 
this film fits right in.  I appreciated that the film carefully follows details of the description in the book.

I ask you to think of this film as a starting point.   You may or may not choose to read the book.
I leave it up to you.  Read a few reviews.  Decide for yourself. 

Here is the film on youtube.

 

7:02pm: Since it is springtime

Read The Blossom, by John Donne.  Courtesy Bartleby.com

10:04am: Avant Game, game design for the real world, game theory for real life
including
Why I Love Bees: A Case Study in Collective Intelligence Gaming

11:54am: Something Different, or Due Consideration
3QuarksDaily

10:22am: Ironic Juxtaposition and
What do China, fertilizer, weed killer, and electricity have in common?
What do the three numbers on fertilizer mean?
Why should you care?
Do you eat?

Andrew Leonard, in Salon, gives us one more thing to think about.

Thank youto txtriffidranch

4:11pm: Graffit Research Labs GRL

Thanks to Hackaday for this link.  A very large laser writing on a building.

 

2:53pm: English 102

In English 101, we've learned to sharpen our pens and how to scrape the vellum to a fine, smooth surface.  Now, to Write A Vignette.

8:46pm: We have visitor(s)
 
I don't know her name, but she and several of her sisters came calling in my upstairs bathroom.  Curious, I found a (large) number of their friends outside playing around the roofline.  It may be a friendly swarm, or we may need a REMOVAL if they've set up housekeeping.


Here's a video on one removal from the Owens Apiaries website, which is an excellent resource on honeybees.  Check out the video, or just think, cutting off the root, etc...This costs $$$.  One gentleman tells me I can keep the honey, but he gets the bees.
No bees were harmed in creating this post.  At great personal risk, I've captured 3 and returned them to the wild.  They fly in a circle for a bit, then return to the SOFFIT!
Another resource is the Wikipedia article on the Western Honeybee. 

2:53pm: Careful Researchers, Research!
Channeling HPL Some useful information.  Adepts only, please.

Please read these notes on the Sigsand manuscript before referring therein.  Every Time!  This Means You!

And lastly, no matter how many A's one spells it with, there is only one Saamaa Ritual.  

Sheesh!

7:55am: From the Cover of the Current Issue of Clarkesworld


See Matts Minnhagen's work at http://www.minnhagen.com

Clarkesworld