Long Phone Call

Oodles of Doodles

When I bought my cordless phone last fall I changed my phone habits considerably. Where I used to draw unconsciously on scraps of paper at my desk while I talked, now I walk around, water plants, scrub the counter, put away dishes , whatever. Last night however I was at my desk and when the call was over I realized that there were some doodles on my paper. What intrests me is that they are very symmetrical. This is something new in my doodling world.

Silhouette

Last night I was walking Luna (how many of my posts start this way) when we passed one of the old manors that overlook Strathcona Park. I saw in the window, all outlined in a dim orange light, the silhoutte of a woman with large frizzy hair. She reminded me of Patti and Selma from the Simpsons, but spookier. She moved in this strange bobbing way.
As I got closer I realized that it wasn't human! How can I be sure? Well, I don't think giant poodles are human. Technically it might not have been a poodle, but it was a huge frizzy haired dog that looked like a poodle. Or maybe it was a woman who looked like a poodle after all and likes to press her face against the window.

Happy Birthday Jeanne!

Goodbye Ice, Hello Decomposing Organic Matter

The Rideau has thawed it's considerably smaller than the ottawa where the ice is on average 2½ feet thick. Last week they were dynamiting the ice to keep the river from backing up and flooding. This is a practice that goes back to the early years of Bytown as Ottawa was originally known.

They do the same on the much larger Ottawa river also using a machine called the Amphibex which can go on land and water as it's name suggests.One side effect of the warmer weather though is the smell of fertilizer that wafts down the canal. I don't know if it's the smell of rotting vegetation being exposed to the sun or if the wind is carrying the smell from the Experimental Farm. All those tulips and flowers have to feed off something after all.

Addendum: Somehow I shouldn't be surprised but the animal of the month at the Experimental Farm is a Border Leicester ewe.

Since Leslie liked the chocolate so much I found her these swiss 'chocolate' sheep.

Fly Guy

This is a very cool little flash world that you can explore. If you've ever had dreams that you could fly you will enjoy this.

This link is for Cacoa. Montezuma's Luxury Hand Made Organic Quality Chocolate from the Sussex Countryside.

Happy Easter

Out Like an Antelope

March did come in like a Lion with the nastiest snowstorm of the season and as it should it is going out like a Lamb¹.The world is coming alive again. You can smell the soil as it warms in the sun, the birds whistle, twitter and caw in the budding branches of the trees and the air is gentle, Someone is cooking up a big easter dinner next door. I could smell the potatoes and roast and buns flavouring the air. On my way out and again when I returned. I don't even like roast but the smell was delicious.There's usually an emotional component to odours and this one was filled with family gatherings of my past. I wish I was home today. Nonetheless it's a remarkable spring day and the sun is pouring in the window.

1 Well, another winter is almost over and March true to form has come in like a lion, and hopefully will go out like a lamb. At least that's how March works here in the United States.

But did you know that March behaves differently in other countries? In Norway, for example, March comes in like a polar bear and goes out like a walrus. Or, take the case of Honduras where March comes in like a lamb and goes out like a salt marsh harvest mouse.

Let's compare this to the Maldive Islands where March comes in like a wildebeest and goes out like an ant. A tiny, little ant about this big.

[holds thumb and index fingers a small distance apart]

Unlike the Malay Peninsula where March comes in like a worm-eating fernbird and goes out like a worm-eating fernbird. In fact, their whole year is like a worm-eating fernbird.

Or consider the Republic of South Africa where March comes in like a lion and goes out like a different lion. Like one has a mane, and one doesn't have a mane. Or in certain parts of South America where March swims in like a sea otter, and then it slithers out like a giant anaconda.

There you can buy land real cheap, you know? And there's a country where March hops in like a kangaroo, and stays a kangaroo for a while, and then it becomes a slightly smaller kangaroo. Then, then, then for a couple of days it's sort of a cross between a, a frilled lizard and a common house cat.(John Belushi: Saturday Night LIve

My Easter Pig

I'm thinking a lot about life and therefore death this weekend which also happens to be Easter weekend. Easter has never been a significant holiday to me, but is somehow deeply appropriate this time around. Of course there is the intense media attention around the Schiavo case. I rarely watch the American news channels but caught some bits of the insanity and egocentric pontification that is going on around this.
It seems to me that there is this bizarre attitude in our society that rejects death as a natural part of the universe. There is a certain kind of Christian based belief that resists nature and I am convinced it exists to fend off fear of our mortality.

The idea of the immortal and eternal nature of the individual soul surely has something to do with this. Earth was created as is. No evolution. No change. Things are the way they appear. Good/Bad.The Bible is the literal word of God. That's all. They don't live in the world. Analysis is a dirty word. But nature will have it's way like it or not. It does at every moment.

People die all the time. There is a continuous flow of energy that recombines in a multitude of forms as a star, as a flower as you and me. But we arrive and we leave. It's not about right or wrong. It's not about how we would like it to be. It's not about justifying beliefs that comfort us. The universe goes on and on changing it's state. Stars burn out, petals wither, you and I vanish, just as the millions before us who had these same thoughts are gone. A molecule of water from uncle Joe flows through a tree that grows an apple that you ate. You get the picture.
But they frame it and hang it on the wall and call it eternity.

Bad Day. Blah.

I don't know what I was thinking. It's a four day weekend, my sister's birthday, my niece and father have birthdays coming up, it's Easter and I thought I should stay here to get work done. What I didn't factor into the equation is that no-one else is working or expects me to be working. Not only that but I finished what I had to do. Crap.

One Hour later...The news just got worse. It will take some time to process this. Shit.

Follow the Lederhosen

A couple of years ago I saw an interview/performance of this odd woman dressed up as a cartoon frauleine. She played keyboards and sang this spacy song. She's has a cult following and has retained her lederhosen appeal and spacy ways as you can see in this video:Lederhosen Lucil - Semi-sweet

Royal Summoning

It's funny how things sometimes unexpectedly come together. I am reading a book called the Catalpa Bow about pre-Buddhist Japanese religious tradition. The book introduced me to Queen Himiko (Pimiko). She is comprable to King Arthur in that she is a semi-mythical character, seen as the historical founder of what came to be Japan (an island too). In legends she is a warrior-priestess with relations to spirits, historically she was the ruler who united the first kingdom of Japan, the Yamatai. She initiated contact with Korea and China as well.

I was invited to dinner this evening with a family from Japan and the subject of Queen Himiko came up. It's not astounding that a Japanese man might speak of Queen Himiko but it was pretty odd that within 24 hours I was introduced to her and had her brought up in a conversation.

When I wrote about my dream word "tehf|nery" a few days ago there were no results for it on Google. Now there is one which refers to my post of the word. So with my post on the dream word I have created a recursive googlewhack monad fabrica. A true googlewhack consists of two actual words which if searched for returns a single result.

A monad whack has looser rules. It doesn't matter if it you use real words or a mispellings, the important criteria is that one result and one alone comes up. The fun thing is you can make up words that turn out to actually be words in other languages. For instance I tried 'spanunk' and got three pages of returns. On the other hand I tried blimter and found one entry, again these are not orthodox googlewhacks because I used one word, but it's just as interesting to see if made up words turn up.The fun you can have with search engines. Soon there will be two entries for 'blimter'.

Other imaginary words that turned out to exist in other languages:
hanatsim
ploost
gharg

Genetic Cache

An article in the Washington Post states that a recent discovery in studies overseen by by Robert E. Pruitt, a professor of botany and plant pathology at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, indicates that plants retain genetic templates of their ancestors which they can refer to in order to repair damaged genes. Gerald Fink, a professor of genetics at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research in Cambridge, Mass stated that the studies shows that "the central genetic code by itself is only part of the mystery of how inheritance works". It is suspected that the same gene repairing mechanism might exist in animals and humans. If so it could radically change present models of inheritance.

Mother 2B

Here are some pictures of Jeanne as a kid. Hard for me to believe she's all grown up and has her own baby on the way.Jeanne is always smiling. Except when she loses a game. Heh, it's true. Sorry, big brother habits die hard.


Posing as the new Morton Salt Girl


On one of the farms with a big dog. Taken in 1976 judging by Becky's Olympic t-shirt.


Posing as the new Heidi in her favourite lederhosen.


With her best real friend, Cheryl Tweedy (as opposed to imaginary friends like blue-haired suzi). And wow, I just noticed that pattern on that chair is absolutely identical to the couch I had for four years in Montreal. I loved that couch but it fell to pieces.The flowers were like velvet. I have no idea where this was taken.


On Grandpa and Grandma Dawson's farm. I think that's Fritz.


Posing as the new uhm....some famous fortune teller no doubt.


The Saudi Arabia years. Jeanne clearly liked to dress up; a true chameleon. In many ways she was the David Bowie of her time. Although David Bowie was also the David Bowie of her time as well.

The Plotz Thickens

The other night on the Simpsons, Krusty the Clown told a joke in which someone said that he almost 'plotzed'. I hadn't heard the word before, but it in the context of the joke it seemed like the guy almost soiled himself. It actually means to burst or explode because of annoyance which is close in a way. Thanks to the 'great and powerful' internet I found this list of Yiddish phrases. It's remarkable how many of them have made their way into the english lexicon: Shnoz, nosh, spiel, shmooz, shlep, shtik, dreck, Chutzpah, klutz. Oh yeah English the ever absorbent sponge of languages, then again Yiddish has it's own syncretic origins, being characterized, and I quote, by "a largely Germanic grammar and vocabulary...mixed with Hebrew and Aramaic, and sprinkled with words from Slavic and ancient Romance languages."¹

1 George Johnson, Science writer

Kay Russell

My great aunt Kay Russell sadly passed away last month. These old photos are of her wedding day. I don't know the year but it obviously wasn't yesterday. Her and her husband Alf lived on their farm in Bristol Quebec. They used to come down to the cottage to play cards in the evenings when we were kids. Kay worked in the Woolworth's in Shawville and when I was five years old this made her a kind of celebrity. In Ottawa we weren't related to any of the public faces.

To get to the farm you had to drive past the house my grandmother was born in and take a turn off the main road down a rollercoaster worthy dip and back up again. I always liked playing on the farm especially running with the dogs.

Second Verse, Same as the First

The second day of spring repeats yesterdays glories. A fantastic blue sky and a somniferous sun. There's still snow on the ground but it's fading fast. In fact it's warm enough to sit outside on the patio.

First Day of Spring and the Dream Word

Ooh ooh ooh it's a wonderful grapefruit first day of spring. Fresh air and warm sun. Just had to share that. I had this word that drifted through my dreams last night. I 'googled' it to no avail this morning. The word was "tehfinery". In the future when I google it, I will find this post.

Uncle x 4

This Christmas we will have a new baby in the family. I'm going to be an uncle again come November. This time however it is my youngest sister who is having her first child. I just found out last night. It's a bit of a surprise since in my emotional mind she is still the 'baby' of the family. I'm very excited for her and her husband and wish them the best.

General Weirdness

The photo of the turtle below was taken by Eric Cheng. I went to his web site and saw that he visited Italy. My heart fell into my stomach when I saw this photo accompanying his visit to Milan.



For two seconds I thought it was Nicoletta (my ex). She could easily be her sister, almost a twin even down to the body language. How many times have I seen that expression and exact pose with the little gelato spoon in the gelateria. The cheekbones, the sunken eyes and arched eyebrows and the hair, even the jeans and jacket. However this woman is Marta, but I could half belive Nicoletta had changed her name. His shot's of Milan and his posts of walking around the city make me 'home-sick'/nostalgic today. Those were good times despite everything else that was wrong.

It's Friday!

Woman to Woman

I just came back from a walk with little Miss L. On the way in, I collected the mail. Someone name Trudy Dyer used to live here and we are still getting her subscription to Chatelaine, the Canadian monthly with the byline "Woman to Woman". I found the cover article taglines interesting. I learned so much*:

• "Oprah or Bridget: Who's Your Best Friend Like?" I deduce from this that there are only two kinds of women in this world. One type has her own daily talk-show, produces movies and has an influential Book Club, the other type is a fictional character. Now that I know that it makes life easier.


• "38 Fat-Busting Secrets" That's a lot of information to keep secret about a subject that so many people would be interested in getting their hands on. The best way to hide it would be to publish it all in a national magazine I suppose.


• "Why I'm Glad He Dumped Me." From this I learned that women are passive and men take action, but it's okay because everyone is happy with this in the end.


• "'I Love It!' Best Chicken Recipes Ever." Women get excited about food and are eager to share recipes to such a degree that they will employ all known anthropological and historical methods to uncover the quantifiably best ones.

* DISCLAIMER FOR THOSE WHO TAKE EVERYTHING THEY READ LITERALLY: I'm being facetious here i.e. waggish.

Fresh Baked

It's a crystal clear sky tonight, but cold. The fingernail clipping of a moon is bright and the stars shimmer. Every once in a while I get a craving for a certain kind of food, last time it was blueberry pie. Tonight walking the dog I had a craving for fresh baked raisin bread. I can't say why. I haven't had any for years and I never buy it, not with raisins anyway. In Montreal there were three bakeries near my house. I loved the smell of the fresh baked bread. There was one in particular that I would sometimes pass on the way home at night. What ever else had happened during the day when I walked into that cloud of fresh bread everything was right in the world.

eSt week 08

To the Beginning >

The World According to CSIS

OH NO!>

BRRRRRAkk kk k k k kes s . . . . .

I finally saturated my Blog spirit. Slumbers await..

Mathturbating

Is string theory the ultimate numerical whack-off? Just asking.

India and Wales

The mysterious semblance of Welsh and Hindi.

Lester Bangs, The Blog Father?

I read this Old Lester Bangs article on Van Morrison's Astral Weeks, and the tone was reminiscient of a contemorary blog.

Tulips are Better than No lips

Having said that you can eat the bulbs, I should add that I don't know if they are nutritious or taste any good. I only know that during WWII the Dutch ate them when otherwised faced with starvation.

Here's some interesting background on tulips, perhaps the most dramatic flower in history.

Historical Highlights

• Tulips are not native to Europe. They were introduced in the 1500's from Turkey.


• The hyprid Semper Augustus was so expensive only aristocrats and wealthy merchants could afford it.


• In the 1600's tulip futures speculation tulpenwindhandel resulted in people losing fortunes. Tulips it turned out were just not such rare a commodity and the market collapsed.


• The most valuable tulips at the height of "Tulipmania" in the 1600's could cost as much as a house.


• The first highly valued mottled and multi-coloured tulips appearence were a result of infection of mosaic virus which came from a louse that infested potatoes and peaches. Modern varieties are genetically stable hybrids.

This is a picture of my sister my mother and me in Ottawa in the 70's. Mom is dressed up for the Tulip Festival where I think she was volunteering, at least that was her story. I told you it was a big deal here. That is my 'Drum Book' around my neck. I don't think a book that a kid can hang by a cord around his neck would make it to the market these days. Then again maybe it was custom made for me. The shovels were what I used to pound out my beats. Always had to be avant-garde.

New Day

I caught up on some sleep going to bed early last night. It's sunny and warm. A day that belongs to liquid: Little streamlets of melting snow, tree sap running, soil moistening, scents released from winter prisons. Montreal never had much of a spring, pulling back and forth between stubborn winter's hold and the ever rising strength of the sun, finally snapping into the heat of summer.

I do recall wonderful springs in Ottawa. The tulips and lilys and crocuses shooting up in flower missles while the ground is still cool. The apple blossom snow storms.

There's actually a Tulip Festival here in May. It has its origins in WWII when Queen Juliana of the Netherlands came to Canada to escape the invasion of her country by Germany. In gratitude the Netherlands gave Canada a commerative tulip garden of more than 300,000 tulips. This was something we all learned as kids at school in Ottawa. The festival is now characterized as a "Celebration of Peace and Friendship".

Seeing the tulips come up often when there is still snow on the ground makes it a powerful symbol of life and awakening. And you can eat the bulbs too.

Morris Island

It turned out that it is still very much winter in the woods. In fact the river was frozen solid about a foot thick. No muck or mess. Lot's of deep snow. Although I didn't see much wildlife, the signs were everywhere, from deer tracks, to beaver gnawed tree stumps. We even saw blood in the snow amidst scattered pine needles and broken branches. Someone was in a struggle for his/her life. The brewery was a mystery. We stopped in Fitzroy Harbour and I asked the man in the pizza parlour/corner store/LCBO/Beer Store."There is no brewery" he said giving me a look I'd expect if I asked him where the Sasquatch lived. 'He' lives here. But there is no brewery. It was strange. 'He' I guess being the owner of the micro-brewey that doesn't exist. So what am I buying in the store? Phantom brew? That's all he would tell me.

Here's a panorama view (192k) that won't fit in this blog--->

Spring Thaw and Brew

I'm off to the Morris Island Conservation Area this morning to see...what? It's an awkward time of year to hike. Everything is in a primordial transition state of melting and muck. It's too late to enjoy the crisp purity of winter and too soon to take in the bursting of buds and blooms. Still, it will be nice to be in the countryside. It's an area that is known for it's rich natural habitats. Hawks, owls, beaver, fox, deer, painted turtles... and over 100 species, yes species, of my favourite insect, the dragonfly.
The Scotch-Irish Brewing Co. is also located nearby in Fitzroy Harbour. They make one of the best Indian Pale Ales I've ever had, if not the best. Sadly their products are for the most part only available on tap. They just began introducing Sgt. Major's IPA in the LCBO though so maybe more to follow.

Encyclopedia Extravaganza Bonanza

After a long brain-pushing day I hit the encyclopedia jack-pot. I was walking Luna and saw that the city recyclers rejected the encyclopedia (maybe because of the hardcovers) so I snatched up the remaining volumes. I'm missing vol.7 and vol.12 out of a 16 book set. Not bad. It's amazing how the covers that I haven't seen since I was 11 years old have such a powerful impact upon me. Especially this one from Daguerreotype to Epiphyte



That bug-eyed clown doll hanging from the wall, the mysterious disembodied stone ear, the formula pinned to the photo of the diver and squid in the eerie depths. And what of that drum and the gem and the painted egg. To my young eyes there was a story here that connected all these things, but what could it be. Anyone who wants to write one I would gladly read.

Even as a child in the 1970's I was aware that the illustrations were from an earlier time. The had "that look". The edition looks identical to the ones we had and are copyrighted 1941 through 1959. So the content all presents a pre social revolution perspective (one that I suspect a lot of conservative people are trying to reclaim).

Today some features from Erosion to Geysers


This is from the entry on Etiquette. Despite acknowledging diverse ways of greeting each other in various cultures, it's notable that the custom that Europeans still use was first and oldest!! Well these are white cavemen. But where did the "savages" come from?



I wonder if cavemen invented hat-tipping too?



Certainly they invented the modern nuclear family. What a paradox! Why it almost seems like those old caveman would be more at home in the Western World than they would be in Africa or Asia.
Isn't it refreshing to see that even in the 1950's Finland accepted same-sex marriage. While in the good ol' U.S. of A. the girls sure to seem to admire dear old Dad and his weenie!

Golden Book Encyclopedia

When we were kids my mother shopped at IGA. Each month she would get one volume of the Golden Book Encyclopedia. I devoured these books and their colourful illustrations. They really did stimulate my interest in everything. Tonight coming home from the dog park. I found the entire set in a recycling bin. Unfortunately I couldn't take them all and randomly grabbed a few volumes.
Here we have some scans from the classic, Chalk to Czechoslovakia (soon to be a major motion picture)


I learned how Chewing gum is manufactured outdoors, by a guy with two spatulas, for U.S. Soldiers to sell and raise money to buy flak jackets.



Perhaps my passion for all things Citrus was encouraged by this entry. Although personally grapefruit is the best-liked citrus fruit around this household.



From the article on Colorado we have an illustration of Leslie riding a horse. Look out for that crazy daredevil skier behind you!



These surprisingly healthy young Communists are spending a cheery Sunday afternoon spreading some propaganda for everyone to enjoy.

Surprise>

Suspicious Mind

Now tell me, doesn't this "Frazz" character look an awful lot like a grown-up Calvin?





So what happened to Hobbes?

Hundertwasser

Looking at Hundertwasser's work I was reminded of this PIL cover. I don't think he did it though but it sure was influenced by his work. I really like it. I think he would not be considered an "outsider artist" simply by the fact he was schooled in his craft and was involved with other established artists. However he is a very interesting character. The idea of "outsider art" is of course somewhat arbitrary and lumps many diverse people under one label, but what else is new. I found an interesting site about him here>



His buildings are really fun. Did you see them L? They seem to have a kinship to Gaudi's buildings>.

Here's the link that John posted to the Ned Khan article on NPR>

Winter's Last Stand