No, I won't!

CAN Y0U R3AD 7H15?

Supposedly not everyone can read this. A hat tip to BosGuy. Whom I have added to my "People I Stalk" list for those of you who want to go there regularly.

I am not sure that the ability to read this fairly easily -- which I confess I was able to do -- is a sign of a strong brain, as BosGuy says.

It may just be an example of pareidolia: the imagined perception of a pattern or meaning where it does not actually exist, as in considering the moon to have human features 

So maybe if you can read this in a snap, you are the kind of person who sees divine faces in burnt toast, too.

Which brings to mind the immortal verse:

Last night I saw upon the stair

a little man who wasn't there.

He wasn't there again today.

I wish like hell he's go away! 

NB: There is a stray line about kazoos floating through this page and I cannot figure out how it got here or how to get rid of it. Ignore it if you can. Just wanted to make sure no one thought it was part of the reading test!

What You Want Is What You Get! (McDonald's Slogan in the 90s)

PITTSBURGH — An employee of a McDonald's restaurant in Pittsburgh was charged Wednesday with selling heroin in child-oriented Happy Meals to customers using the coded request "I'd like to order a toy."

Authorities made the arrest after an informant told them that an employee was selling the drug.

Customers looking for heroin were instructed to go through the drive-thru and say, "I'd like to order a toy," said Mike Manko, spokesman for District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr. The customer would then drive to the window, hand over the money and get a Happy Meal box containing heroin in exchange, Manko said.

Undercover agents set up a drug buy and arrested Shania Dennis, 26. Dennis denied wrongdoing to reporters as she was being led away in handcuffs.

Authorities said they found 10 bags of heroin in a Happy Meal box and recovered another 50 bags from the suspect.

About that book, Damien?

National Kazoo Day

Today, January 28, is National Kazoo Day. It marks 164 years of kazoo-playing in America, according to the National Kazoo Day website.

For what it is worth, it is also the Feast of St. Thomas Aquinas. Who, as far as I have been able to determine after exhaustive research, never played the kazoo.

Celebrating 164 years of kazoo playing in America, National Kazoo Day will be celebrated on January 28, 2014.

Of course, kazoo players are not known to be perfectly precise, so feel free to celebrate National Kazoo Day on January 23, if you so desire.

In fact, most people will agree that we should consider January 23-28, 2013, National Kazoo LONG WEEKEND! So celebrate all weekend long.
National Kazoo Day occurs annually (although in some regions, more often) on or about January 28 - or whenever it is convenient to the kazooist. As stated by founder Chaplin Willard Rahn of the Joyful Noise Kazoo Band at the Homewood Retirement Home in Williamsport, Maryland, "After all, we have to be flexible." Many kazooists choose the fourth Thursday in January because it's handy.
- See more at: http://nationalkazooday.com/#sthash.SoICSWqM.dpuf

Celebrating 164 years of kazoo playing in America, National Kazoo Day will be celebrated on January 28, 2014.

Of course, kazoo players are not known to be perfectly precise, so feel free to celebrate National Kazoo Day on January 23, if you so desire.

In fact, most people will agree that we should consider January 23-28, 2013, National Kazoo LONG WEEKEND! So celebrate all weekend long.
National Kazoo Day occurs annually (although in some regions, more often) on or about January 28 - or whenever it is convenient to the kazooist. As stated by founder Chaplin Willard Rahn of the Joyful Noise Kazoo Band at the Homewood Retirement Home in Williamsport, Maryland, "After all, we have to be flexible." Many kazooists choose the fourth Thursday in January because it's handy.
- See more at: http://nationalkazooday.com/#sthash.SoICSWqM.dpuf

Celebrating 164 years of kazoo playing in America, National Kazoo Day will be celebrated on January 28, 2014.

Of course, kazoo players are not known to be perfectly precise, so feel free to celebrate National Kazoo Day on January 23, if you so desire.

In fact, most people will agree that we should consider January 23-28, 2013, National Kazoo LONG WEEKEND! So celebrate all weekend long.
National Kazoo Day occurs annually (although in some regions, more often) on or about January 28 - or whenever it is convenient to the kazooist. As stated by founder Chaplin Willard Rahn of the Joyful Noise Kazoo Band at the Homewood Retirement Home in Williamsport, Maryland, "After all, we have to be flexible." Many kazooists choose the fourth Thursday in January because it's handy.
- See more at: http://nationalkazooday.com/#sthash.SoICSWqM.dpuf

Celebrating 164 years of kazoo playing in America, National Kazoo Day will be celebrated on January 28, 2014.

Of course, kazoo players are not known to be perfectly precise, so feel free to celebrate National Kazoo Day on January 23, if you so desire.

In fact, most people will agree that we should consider January 23-28, 2013, National Kazoo LONG WEEKEND! So celebrate all weekend long.
National Kazoo Day occurs annually (although in some regions, more often) on or about January 28 - or whenever it is convenient to the kazooist. As stated by founder Chaplin Willard Rahn of the Joyful Noise Kazoo Band at the Homewood Retirement Home in Williamsport, Maryland, "After all, we have to be flexible." Many kazooists choose the fourth Thursday in January because it's handy.
- See more at: http://nationalkazooday.com/#sthash.SoICSWqM.dpuf

Celebrating 164 years of kazoo playing in America, National Kazoo Day will be celebrated on January 28, 2014.

Of course, kazoo players are not known to be perfectly precise, so feel free to celebrate National Kazoo Day on January 23, if you so desire.

In fact, most people will agree that we should consider January 23-28, 2013, National Kazoo LONG WEEKEND! So celebrate all weekend long.
National Kazoo Day occurs annually (although in some regions, more often) on or about January 28 - or whenever it is convenient to the kazooist. As stated by founder Chaplin Willard Rahn of the Joyful Noise Kazoo Band at the Homewood Retirement Home in Williamsport, Maryland, "After all, we have to be flexible." Many kazooists choose the fourth Thursday in January because it's handy.
- See more at: http://nationalkazooday.com/#sthash.SoICSWqM.dpuf

Whose breath is this?

There was a song (by Bryan Adams, I think?) with the line: "Every breath you took was mine."[And, no, I am not thinking of the Police hit, "Every Breath You Take."] The idea was basically that he and the girl were lip-locked and when he breathed out, she breathed that breath in, and when she breathed out, he breathed that breath in. It struck me because at the time I was pondering what theologians call the double spiration of the Holy Spirit, but no need to go into that. Now. Ever.

This morning while I was doing my meditation, Daniel was cooking bacon. I could smell it all the way down in my office. (Okay, so it distracted me. The important thing is that it led to an insight.) How did the smell get from the kitchen to my office? Via the air flow, of course. And the air flow meant all sorts of things from the kitchen got to my office. And vice versa. And things from outside got inside. And I breathed some of those things in. And out.

The average respiratory rate reported in a healthy adult at rest is usually given as 12–18 breaths per minute, but estimates do vary between sources.  With such a slow rate, more accurate readings are obtained by counting the number of breaths over a full minute. Average resting respiratory rates by age are:
    birth to 6 weeks: 30–60 breaths per minute
    6 months: 25–40 breaths per minute
    3 years: 20–30 breaths per minute
    6 years: 18–25 breaths per minute
    10 years: 15–20 breaths per minute
    adults: 12–20 breaths per minute

So what, Damien, is your point? Among other things, I figure I have breathed something over 25 million breaths. Probably well over, since I have not spent all that time (despite what Daniel might claim) at rest.

I literally am breathing some of the same air that Daniel breathed just a while ago. And that Spot and Rover breathed. And the air that our neighbors breathed out a little while ago and that has made its way down the corridor or out the window and into our apartment.

And where did that air come from, and who had breathed it? The people in the office, on the bus, in the Co-Op? Before that?

I am saying that we all literally breathe the same air. You breathe it out, I breathe it in. At some point. Clearly I don't breathe in all the air in the world, but it is a big mishmash, carried about by winds and weather fronts and in the lungs of airline passengers and migrating birds. We know this or we wouldn't worry about spreading germs by coughing and sneezing and just breathing. So we are breathing in air that others have already breathed, not just now but over the millenia. Whose breath am I breathing?

So some of the air I breathe -- which has been swirling around the planet for who knows how long and through who knows how many lungs -- was probably breathed by a homophobe, by a saint, by a rapist, by a murder victim, by a baby, by a dying man, by a president, by a pope, by a Log Cabin Republican, by a Communist, by a black man, by a North Korean woman, by someone whose opinions I despise, by someone who hates me ...

It's all in my lungs.  Literally IN me.

Maybe that doesn't cause you to pause and reflect.

But it did me.

Partly because that whole double spiration thing I mentioned earlier is (for those who believe in a Trinity) part of the mystery of how the one god is three persons.

BTW, when I looked for a graphic to illustrate this post and searched images for "breathing in and breathing out," I was amazed at how many of those the search engine pulled up were of couples kissing. Every breath you take is mine ...

Holy Thief?

January 27, 2014
(Reuters) - Thieves broke into a small church in the mountains east of Rome over the weekend and stole a reliquary with the blood of the late Pope John Paul II, a custodian said on Monday.

Franca Corrieri said she had discovered a broken window early on Sunday morning and had called the police. When they entered the small stone church they found the gold reliquary and a crucifix missing.

John Paul, who died in 2005, loved the mountains in the Abruzzo region east of Rome. He would sometimes slip away from the Vatican secretly to hike or ski there and pray in the church.

Polish-born John Paul, who reigned for 27 years, is due to be made a saint of the Roman Catholic Church in May, meaning the relic will become more noteworthy and valuable.

In 2011, John Paul's former private secretary, Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz, gave the local Abruzzo community some of the late pontiff's blood as a token of the love he had felt for the mountainous area.

It was put in a gold and glass circular case and kept in a niche of the small mountain church of San Pietro della Ienca, near the city of L'Aquila.

Corrieri told Reuters the incident felt more like a "kidnapping" than a theft. "In a sense, a person has been stolen," she said by telephone.

She said she could not say if the intention of the thieves may have been to seek a ransom for the blood.

Apart from the reliquary and a crucifix, nothing else was stolen from the isolated church, even though Corrieri said the thieves would probably have had time to take other objects during the night-time theft.

Some of John Paul's blood was saved after an assassination attempt that nearly killed him in St. Peter's Square on May 13, 1981.
-------------
Okay, this is a queer story on at least three counts:
1) They kept some of his blood following the assassination attempt because ... well, you might want it later to give to churches.
2) They gave some of the blood to this church because ... well, someone had the foresight to have some blood on hand for such purposes. It is not stated but is implied that this is some of the assassination blood.
3) Someone stole the blood.

The canonization of JPII, according to other reports, is scheduled for April. There has been some opposition to the haste with which he was beatified and will be canonized, something made possible only because of his own  somewhat political manipulation of the rules governing the process for declaring saints during his pontificate. He declared 1,340 blesseds and 483 saints, more than all the popes in the last five centuries combined. I was, by the way, present for one of his canonization celebrations.

Catholics pray that the deceased rest in peace. The relic trade (and it was once actually big business, although it is forbidden to sell relics today) guarantees that the saints rest not in peace but in pieces.
--------------
The title to this post refers of one of the Brother Cadfael mysteries by Ellis Peters.It is about an attempt by visiting monks to steal the relics of St. Winifred from the Cadfael's home abbey of St. Peter in Shrewsbury. The relics make the abbey a major pilgrimage site, and thus a major source of revenue to the town and monastery. I will not spoil the story, but there is an irony to the plot that those who have read the earlier Cadfael tales will understand immediately.

Ghost ship? Cannibal rats?

The plight of the Lyubov Orlova has grabbed the imagination of the media with its tale of cannibal rats" aboard an abandoned vessel drifting in the north Atlantic -- possibly toward the U.K. On Thursday, reports surfaced that high winds could be pushing the vessel and its rats toward the shore of western Ireland, Scotland or the southern tip of England.

If it weren't for the starving rodents believed to be feeding on one another on the craft, the story of this cruise vessel turned ghost ship could have an aura of romance.

What is the Lyubov Orlova? A Yugoslavian-built cruise ship named for a 1930s star of Russian cinema, Lyubov Petrovna Orlova. The Orlova was built in 1976 for pleasure cruises to the Antarctic and Arctic Circle. Passengers were world-travelers, well-to-do or would-be academics.

In 2010, the ship was impounded in Newfoundland because of a dispute over debts. The crew was unpaid and deserted their ship, which moldered in port for two years before it was decided it should be towed to the Dominican Republic and turned into scrap metal.

But on the way to the scrap heap, the tow-line to the tug broke and the ship was lost at sea. Canadian authorities reportedly captured it later, dragged it out to international waters and let it loose. Since then the empty husk of the cruise liner has been adrift, its cozy interior now believed to be inhabited by hordes of rats feeding off one another.

There's been no sign of the vessel since March of last year. Automatic beacons are triggered when lifeboats on the ship hit the water, the Independent reports. Two beacons were triggered in March 2013. But not all the lifeboats have signaled, a sign the ship could still be afloat and, possibly, headed toward land.

The head of the Irish coast guard told U.K. media: "We must stay vigilant."

Source: Chicago Tribune
--------------------------------
So if I understand this, the ship has been unseen and unreported for almost a year, may or may not still be afloat in the North Atlantic, may have rats on board who may or may not be eating other rats and may or may not be drifting to Ireland or Scotland or England ... Did the Mayans predict this?

Don't mess with the elves!

Over the past few months, dozens of environmentalists in Iceland have staged a high-profile protest against a road scheduled to cut through an area of volcanic rock on the Álftanes peninsula, not far from the capital of Reykjavik. It is only one of countless eco-protests in the world, but the campaign has made international news, because some of the protesters claim the proposed road would disturb the habitat of elves who live among the rocks.

Elves and fairies are closely related in folklore, and though elves specifically seem to have sprung from early Norse mythology, by the 1800s fairies and elves were widely considered to be simply different names for the same magical creatures.  

Polls find that over half of Iceland's population believes in elves, or at least doesn't rule out the possibility of their existence.

But why do so many Icelanders believe? The passed-down tales are just part of the picture. Iceland's concept of the natural world takes on a mystical tone; pair that with environmentalism, the want to preserve this mystical world, and magical creatures almost make sense.

Source: LiveScience

Damien's Note: Emphasis added.

On behalf of educators everywhere

Curling with a zig and a zag

If the Sochi Olympics were a competition in conspicuous outfits, the Norwegian curling team would win a gold medal. Tuesday, they showed off their rather unconventional Olympic outfits.
Some remember the team from the 2010 Vancouver Olympics because of their loss against host nation Canada in the curling final. Most people, on the other hand, remember their pants.
Plain black pants had been an omnipresent part of curlers’ equipment for ages, and drawing as little attention as possible seemed to be the norm. The Norwegians wanted to change that.

In Vancouver, the team’s bright red, white, and blue checkered pants – motivated by the colors of the Norwegian flag – gave curling, a sport that was first accepted as an official Olympic sport in 2006, more off-ice attention than the team ever had expected.

Tuesday, only weeks ahead of the Sochi Olympics, the Norwegian team showed off their new Olympic uniforms in New York City: tailor-made suits in a red, white, and blue zig-zag pattern – another graphic homage to the Norwegian flag, and a guaranteed attention-drawer.

The team’s outfits have a solid group of fans, in particular in social media. A Facebook page entitled ‘The Norwegian Olympic Curling Team’s Pants’ has collected 530,000 likes – more than a tenth of Norway’s population.

Seventy-three

According to Sheldon Cooper (AKA Jim Parsons) of The Big Bang Theory, 73 is the best number. The reason is because it's the 21st prime number, and its mirror 37 is the 12th prime number, whose mirror 21 is the product of 7 times 3.

Also in binary 73 is 1001001 which is a palindrome.

As a counterpoint, I note that Rajesh Koothrapalli (AKA Kunal Nayar) of the same show, contends that the best number is 5,218,008. His reason is that if you enter that number into a digital calculator and turn it upside down, it appears to spell BOOBIES.

Any other suggestions?

And yes, all us nerds know that Douglas Adams said 42 was the answer to life, the universe and everything. But he also said he just came up with that number while staring out the window at his garden. " It was a joke. It had to be a number, an ordinary, smallish number, and I chose that one. Binary representations, base thirteen, Tibetan monks [all suggested explanations of why it is 42] are all complete nonsense. I sat at my desk, stared into the garden and thought '42 will do'. I typed it out. End of story."

But if you subtract 42 from 73, you get 31 and according to Christian tradition, there are 3 persons in the 1 God. And  3 is the 2nd prime number and 3 minus 2 is one. And Jesus, as the second person of the Trinity incarnate is said to have 2 natures in 1 person, which adds up to 3. There were twelve tribes of Israel (1+2=3) and twelve apostles (again, 1=2=3) and ... no, I'm pretty sure this way lies madness. Madness, I tell you!

Just be satisfied with 73 ... but if you divide 7 by 3, you have 1 left over -- 3 and 1 again! Aiiiieeee!

What are the odds?

From Huffington Post.

According to a study by the University of Scranton, the top 10 New Year's resolutions for 2014 are:
1. Lose Weight
2. Getting Organized
3. Spend Less, Save More
4. Enjoy Life to the Fullest
5. Staying Fit and Healthy
6. Learn Something Exciting
7. Quit Smoking
8. Help Others in Achieving Their Dreams
9. Fall in Love
10. Spend More Time with Family

1. Lose Weight
Since 1 in 2.8 (35.6%) of adults in the US is obese and 1 in 2.6 (38.5%) of adults believe he/she is overweight, it's not surprising that losing weight is the top resolution for 2014. Barbie and Ken haven't gained a pound since 1959, but alas most of us have.

2. Getting Organized
The average office employee spends 1.5 hours a day (6 weeks per year) looking for things. Americans spend 9 million hours looking for things. The top five items men look for in their homes were clean socks, remote control, wedding album, car keys and their driver's license. For women, the top five items were a favorite pair of shoes, child's toy, wallet, lipstick and the remote control.

[Damien's note: Wedding album? Really? And the people at Scranton believed that?]

3. Save More
During 2013, the personal savings rate or savings as a percent of disposable personal income, was about 4.5%. Thus the odds a dollar of personal income was saved in 2013 was 1 in 22.2. Current levels of saving are an improvement over the 2007 rate of 2.6% (1 in 38.7) but still a far cry from the 1971 height of 13.3% (1 in 7.5). What are the odds an adult has no savings at all? 1 in 3.2 or 31% of American adults.

4. Enjoy Life to the Fullest
We work way too hard. The odds an American doesn't plan on taking all his or her vacation are 1 in 4, and half of those who vacation work or think about it during their time off. Play is as important to us as it is to cats. The odds an hour of a man's day will be spent at leisure or play are 1 in 4.1. The odds an hour of a woman's day will be spent at leisure or play are 1 in 4.8

5. Staying Fit and Healthy
Staying fit and healthy is an aspiration but less than half of us are willing to do much to achieve it, especially as they get older. In the US, 1 in 1.7 adults 18-24 get the recommended amount of exercise a week and the odds drop as people get older, to 1 in 1.9 of those 25 to 34, 1 in 2 for those 35 to 64 and 1 in 2.5 for those 65 and older. If only paying for a gym membership did the trick by itself!

6. Learn something exciting
The Department of Labor estimates that the average worker will switch careers 3 to 5 times during their working life. Continuing education can help a person pick a career that matches their abilities and interests. Not everyone attends continuing education classes for professional reasons. In fact, hundreds of thousands of people enroll in personal enrichment classes every year to learn new things and meet new people.
The odds an employed person is engaged in:
• In career- or job-related courses: 1 in 2.6
• In apprenticeship programs: 1 in 71.4
• In personal interest courses: 1 in 4.6
• In informal learning activities for personal interest: 1 in 1.4

7. Quit Smoking
In 2011, 19% of people 18 and over (1 in 5.3) smoke. In 2013, most people who smoked wanted to quit smoking all together (1 in 1.4 or 70%) but 1 in 2.5 (40%) will try to quit this year. However, a small minority, 1 in 14 or 7%, will succeed in quitting on their first attempt.

[Damien's note: Happy to say I am one of those happy few who was able to quit the first time around, many years ago. Daniel, on the other hand, quit for many years, picked it up again and for the past few years has quit "mostly" ... or something.]

8. Help Others in Achieving Their Dreams
Americans are remarkably generous with their time. Over 64 million people volunteered in the last year, which is more than the population of the U.K. That's a lot of dream help!
The odds a man volunteered in 2012 were 1 in 4.3, and the odds a woman volunteered in 2013 were 1 in 3.4.

[Damien's note:  Volunteering can help you reach some of the other resolution-goals: enjoy life to the fullest; learn something exciting (best way to  learn is to teach!); maybe even fall in love (meeting more people increases your odds: other volunteers, etc. And guys, really, get out there!]

9. Fall in love
The odds an adult believes in love at first sight are 1 in 1.9, over half of us! The odds an adult believes there is any number of people with whom she or he could fall in love are 1 in 4.2.

[Damien's note:  I am a firm believer in infatuation at first sight. Love is a bit more complicated. Many of the folks I have fallen in love with over the years have been people who did not interest me at all until I got to know them. I assume, however, that they fell in love with me at first sight.]

10. Spend more time with family
About 23% (1 in 4.4) of adults spend time helping household members, while about 20% (1 in 5) spend time helping their children. The average time spent per week on each of these activities is two hours. One of our favorite family activities is reading to kids at bedtime. The odds? A wonderful 1 in 1.2 parents read to their 3- to 5-year-olds weekly.

[Damien's note: There is a great national reading program that I heard about at the Barona Public Library called "1000 Books before Kindergarten" that encourages parents and other caregivers to read 1000 books to their kids before they start kindergarten. (I know, you figured that out from the name of the program, right?) To find  out more, click on the provided link. As a university instructor, I assure you it is important!]

The Bottom Line
Of the 317 million adults in the US only 1 in 2.2 make a New Year's resolution. Of these 1 in 8 or 17.8 million will keep it for a year. Don't lose hope though. It turns out people who make a New Year's resolution are 10 times more likely to change their lives than those who don't.

Is it just me, or ...?

Vegetarian Chicken Ham

Lamyong Vegetarian Ham is a tasty and convenient vegetarian food ingredient loved by all in the family! Comes in 3 different flavours, Original, “Chicken” and “Bacon”.

Available Sizes: 1kg

Ingredients: Water, vegetable oil, textured Soy Protein (27%), whey protein, wheat flour, salt, soy sauce, vegetarian seasonings

Contains soybeans, gluten and dairy. May contain traces of nuts and seeds.

My first question is, what is the original flavor? Ham? Or ...

Because it's Saturday night and ... well, it's Saturday night.

Think Geek Eviltron

As any fan of Phineas and Ferb would know, Dr. Doofenschmirtz would call this an evilinator. And just knowing that people out there are buying this thing and may be hiding it under my desk or under the bedframe ... well, it doesn't help my paranoid tendencies any, I can tell you that.

A tip of the hat to Michael for pointing me to the geniuses at Think Geek.

A truly diabolical device

Easy-to-hide with six creepy sound choices
There are a lot of scary things out there. But here at ThinkGeek Mindlabs(TM) we think there are certainly few things scarier than one's own imagination. The human mind can play devious tricks on itself, especially when given a small amount of outside stimuli to work with. Your thoughts can easily lead you into a maze of paranoia and put you into a very uncomfortable state of heightened awareness. That odd noise that just came from the attic or the "face" you just saw hovering for a split second outside your window - these things can really stir your thoughts. So, we used this simple principle to create our newest mind toy, the ThinkGeek EvilTron.
This fiendishly small device features six creepy sound choices perfect for frightening your "friends" and co-workers. Simply choose your favorite sound (or use the random mode), place it in a dark hiding spot and watch the madness begin. Perfectly suitable for dorm, office and home use. Or try putting it in someone's car - that gets them every time.
The ThinkGeek EvilTron Features:

• Fiendishly small

• Six scary sound choices (5 sounds plus a random option):

Your Highly Tested EvilTron Sounds Are:
• Something unsettling creaking
• Unidentifiable scratching sounds
• Gasping last breath
• Sinister child laughing
• Eerie whispering of 'hey, can you hear me?'
• Random/Alternating Mode

• Battery included (lasts 1 month+ of continuous use)

• Embedded Rare-earth Magnet for easy hiding

• Single push button to change sounds

• Please note: after removing battery tab you may need to push down slightly on the magnet to re-seat the battery correctly (you may even hear a small click)

• Battery: CR2032

Nothing?

National Nothing Day is an "un-event" proposed in 1972 by columnist Harold Pullman Coffin and observed annually on January 16 since 1973, when it was added to Chase's Calendar of Events. Its purpose is:

to provide Americans with one National day when they can just sit without celebrating, observing or honoring anything.

It is sponsored by Coffin's National Nothing Foundation, registered in Capitola, California.

The Realist Society of Canada (RSC) has a religious holiday called THABS ( "There has always been something" Day, pronounced \ˈtabs\) dedicated to the Celebration of the realization that "if there was ever nothing, there would be nothing now". It is celebrated July 8th of each year.

Research, research, research

A book I have been waiting for arrived in the mail today. I realized that my own book -- the one I keep promising to get to my publisher -- has a huge lacuna insofar as modern druidism is concerned. Most of the new-pagan religions/philosophies are very fluid and non-dogmatic. This makes getting a handle on them in just a few pages fairly slippery. Anyway, I am reading what I can in various traditions-within-traditions to see what I can learn.

From what I have read, Isaac Bonewits was pretty fluid himself, but this book looked worth the time.

And who knows? I may find some suitable cross word material ...

Is it, or isn't it?

Or as a friend said, "It's not who you know, it's what you wear!"

The Honorian Patriarch

I decided to post this story because it is about something that happened to a graduate of Philip Peabody Horton University and a former student of mine. I have tried to reproduce his account of the queer events of July last as he told it one Sunday morning to a group of us gathered over coffee and bagels at the Café du Canard Bizarre across from campus.

George King woke with a hangover and the phone buzzing in his ear like an angry rattlesnake. He kicked at Jackson to get the phone, which was on that side of the bed, but Jackson was not there.  He was out jogging as usual in the early morning.  George belched, tasted sour mango and grimaced. 

“Okay, George. No more fruity drinks, no matter how cute the fruit mixing them.” 

By the time he groped his way through tangled sheets to the phone, it had stopped buzzing and the flashing blue light alerted him to a message. “1 missed call 9:03 AM”  He pushed the call-back button. 

“Who the hell is calling at 9:03 AM on Sunday, for God’s sake?”

“Mr. George Basilarion?” a hesitant voice asked. 

It had been five years since anyone had called him that. George’s mumble was apparently affirmative enough.

The voice continued, “Your Holiness, it is with profound sorrow that I tell you that His Holiness, Patriarch Honorius, Twenty-third of that blessed name, Episkopos Apostolicos of the One Church of the One God, One Son and One Will, has passed into the glory of the One Kingdom he has so long desired, ahead of all human expectation, but in accord with the One All-Knowing and All-Merciful Will of God.  The Patriarch is dead.  Long live the Patriarch, Your Holiness.” 

Silence.

George’s mind blurred even more.

“No,” he thought, “ that can’t be right.”   

Images flashed through his vodka-fogged mind: plumes of incense, dots of candlelight reflecting off black satin robes, tall veiled hats, chains dangling jeweled crosses and enameled images of the Virgin, gold staff. 

“Now that’s drag!” he had once announced to his aunt.  The Patriarcha was famously not amused. 

George King, 23 and gay, was called Peach by his friends because he had been born in Buford, Georgia, when his mother unexpectedly went into labor while on the way to Florida to visit Epcot Center. He competed in drag contests as Miss Peachy Keene, twirling the fire baton, which he considered a lost art.  In the real world he was a clerk at a vintage/used clothing store called “Been There, Worn That” on Clark Street on the border of Boystown and Girlstown.  The store had originally been called “OUT-Worn”, but that soon described how people felt about the place, so the owners, vegetarian Orthodox  lesbians, changed it.

George’s real family name was Basilarion, but he anglicized it when he hit 18. His slender build, olive skin, hazel eyes, full lips, lean face and scruffy beard got him attention in the bars.  He had a nervous tic of running his fingers through his short, thick, curls.  He smoked constantly, his fingers stained from the tobacco.

He was also the unlikely nephew of the Honorian Patriarch, an anomaly he either hid or used as a pickup line.  No one even knew what he meant, most of the time – “Hi, I’m George.  My uncle is the Honorian Patriarch.”   It didn’t matter that they didn’t understand. For a couple of years before he met Jackson, it usually got him at least a second look, sometimes a drink and a chance to hook up.

The last time George had attended the Sacred Liturgy was at Easter, and he did so only because he chanced to stagger by the tiny Cathedral on his way home from a champagne brunch in Boystown.  Brunch was perhaps the wrong word – it was actually an exceptionally late Saturday supper.  His uncle-the-Honorian-Patriarch, surrounded by lesser luminaries adorned as seraphim or cherubim, had calmly ignored him, although the Patriarcha had glared.  She had been saddled with the disturbing name of Livia by her own bishop-father, and she cultivated that deadly empress’s least charming characteristics.  Jackson adored and fawned over her because he knew it drove both George and Livia mad.

After another moment of silence, the voice on the phone explained what had happened, but George couldn’t make sense of it.  Patiently the messenger repeated the story.  His version sounded like a press release. 

What had actually happened, as George was to learn later, was this: The Patriarch (Honorius  XXIII) and his son, Athanasius, who should have succeeded him, had died in an automobile explosion.  At first it was reported as an assassination, and this was the version that George received on the initial call.  Careful police investigation,  however, indicated that Athanasius had flipped a lit Havana cigar – a gift from the mayor –  out of the window,  and it rolled into a drain filled with sewer gas, setting off the blast.  This was at the corner of Michigan and Van Buren.  The Patriarch’s gold chain flew through the air and landed on the outstretched arm of one of the horse-mounted-Indian statues that  faced one another across the street.  The sirens were whining before the chain stopped spinning. 

Two blocks away, crowds of children playing in the fountain at Millennium Park looked up to see the fire reflected in the giant jellybean sculpture (which the creator insisted  on calling “Cloud Gate,” a name no one else used), bursting into cheers and applause at the spectacle, thinking it was a movie or a fireworks exhibition.  Parents scurried into the fountain, ignoring for once their fine shoes and slacks, scooping up their babies and heading for shelter under the aluminum waves of the Frank Gehry-designed performance space.  The car had passed the Park moments before, the stout chauffeur hidden behind his sunglasses, the enormous Patriarch munching on a square of pastry layers filled with honey, nuts and soaked in orange liqueur.  It was the Patriarch’s  complaints that his son’s cigar smoke was spoiling the taste of the sweet that led to the disaster.

“Oh. Thank you, ” George said, reflexively polite and completely inappropriate. He hung up and fell back onto the pillows. 

“What a weird dream!” 

The phone rang again in two minutes, but this time he buried his head under the covers and ignored it.  He wasn’t falling for that again.

It was 10:40 when George finally came into the kitchen. Jackson was sitting on the chair in his blue blazer, grey (not gray-with-an-a, but grey-with-an-e) slacks, $70 haircut, perfect nails.  Hidden were the tribal tattoo on his left arm and the gold ring that pierced his left nipple. He had a text from Augustine propped up in front of him, but he was reading Friday’s Red Eye, the Chicago Tribune’s tabloid aimed at college students and twenty-somethings. 

“J. Lo’s engaged again”

Jackson Taylor, George’s live-in boyfriend, was stunningly blond and blue-eyed.  He taught Latin at an Anglican boys’ school, Pendragon Prep.  Originally from Gay Hill, Texas, Jackson was very straight-looking except for lavender toenail polish under his silk stockings and shoes, and the aforementioned tattoo and nipple ring.  He was a graduate of St. John’s College in Annapolis, where he spent most of his spare time picking up sailors and learning enough naval jargon and gossip to drop hints that he himself had been a midshipman. This fantasy went over well at his school. Even the Headmaster who had reviewed Mr. Taylor’s academic records was confused by the vaguely nautical air Jackson cultivated.  The Headmaster and some board members occasionally boasted that their Latin Master was a graduate of the United States Naval Academy, believing this reflected a masculine glory badly needed at a rich Christian boys school.

The smell of hazelnut coffee filled the room.  George jerked open the refrigerator and took out a bottle of nearly flat club soda.  As he swallowed half of it, he wondered if it was just “club”, the soda having pretty much disappeared.  He must ask someone.  But who would know something like that? He fell back onto the yellow plastic cover of a retro aluminum dinette chair.

“The Patriarcha called,” Taylor said, cutting a piece of perfectly toasted English muffin.  He applied a dollop of clotted cream, eyed it from under an arched brow and popped it into his mouth. It was really Breyer’s Sour Cream Lite, but he put it in a small crockery pot with a lid so no one would know,

“The Patriarcha?” George wrinkled his own unarched brow.

“Mm.” Taylor patted his lips with an incongruous white bar towel.  “She seemed more outraged than usual.  I suspect the incense had too much myrrh and not enough cardamom.”

 George ran his hands through his hair.  Why would the Patriarcha call?  She never called.  Something nagged at his memory, submerged under the fumes.  Like an annoying bee, it buzzed around, and he half-swatted his head before he realized that the noise was the doorbell.  He glared at Jackson who calmly turned the page of his paper and took another sip of coffee.

            “I’ll get it,” George growled, lifting himself up and stumbling toward the door in his leather flip flops. “Who the hell could be visiting at this hour?  And didn’t the phone ring earlier? That must have been the Patriarcha.  Christ almighty! Didn’t people realize it was Sunday.  Why weren’t they in Church?  No wonder the Patriarcha was outraged.”

He swung the door open and peered out into the light.  The sun in his face made him sneeze, and he cupped one hand over his mouth and nose while the other scratched his butt through his orange and green boxers.  There appeared to be a small crowd outside.

            Someone snickered and pushed a microphone in his face. 

“Are you George Basilarion?” the waxy-faced young man asked.

Things began to register.  Peering at ID badges and reading little signs on microphones and video cams, George realized there were reporters from PBS, NPR, FOX and a couple of local affiliates. 

            “My name is George … King,” he said.

            The reporters looked at one another. 

            “Did he say George King?”  someone whispered.

        With a sense of noblesse oblige, the PBS representative stepped into the breach. “Look, buddy, the Honorian Chancery said this is the residence of the new Patriarch, George Basilarion.  If you aren’t that George, could we see the one who is?”

            The phone call dream came rushing back. 

         George tried to back away and push the door closed, but a skinny religious reporter from FOX News pushed forward and asked him his position on pressing moral issues, such as abortion and gay marriage. 

Bleary eyes stared back at the woman and George blurted, with a hint of southern drawl, “You’re kiddin’, right?”  

This time he got the door shut.

            The night before George and Jackson had been dancing late at Roscoe’s.  It had been a typical Saturday night. The usual skinny boys who thought they were auditioning for a remake of Queer as Folk were dancing shirtless at one end of the room.  The fat old Asian was shining his laser pointer around on a self-appointed mission to provide a light show.  Yet another obscure fruit-flavored vodka drink had been pressed on them.  Too many fruit-flavored fruits pickled in cheap vodka!   What was it this time? 

“Go-Man Mango.  Christ!” 

George went back to the kitchen, ignoring the renewed buzzing of the bell.

            Jackson looked up.  “And who is that violating the peace of the Lord’s Day, pray tell?”

            “You don’t want to know,” George answered. He picked at the bar towel and grabbed at the Red Eye, which Jackson deftly pulled out of reach.

             “Did the Patriarcha say why she was calling?” 

            George tried to sound casual, but his voice rose two notes higher than usual at the end of the question.  Fortunately Jackson was back to reading two-day-old celebrity gossip and didn’t notice.

            “She just said it was important.  I didn’t really hear the words, you know. I hardly ever pay attention to what she actually says.  I just enjoy the tone and drama. “ 

             He finally looked up.  “Why?”

            “Hi, I’m George.  My uncle is the Honorian Patriarch,” George intoned.

            Jackson rolled his eyes.  “Okayyyy…”

“You probably weren’t actually listening when I explained this either, but…”

Jackson leaned back, but he held onto the paper in case this story wasn’t that interesting.  George launched into an ecclesiastical history lesson.  As he talked, Jackson forgot about the newspaper.  

The Honorian heresy, George explained, was also known as Monothelitism.  It consisted of a small group of Christians who followed the teaching of Archbishop Paphnutius, (+676 in eastern Turkey), that Jesus had no human will.  Denounced in 681 by the Sixth Ecumenical Council, Constantinople III, they went into schism.  They took the name Honorian after Pope Honorius, the only Bishop of Rome anathematized by a recognized Ecumenical Council, who had written an indiscreet letter in which he apparently supported the Archbishop’s position. Historians generally agreed that the pontiff simply did not understand Greek and failed to grasp the nuances of the esoteric debate.

Despite taking the name of a Western Latin bishop, the Honorians maintained many of the most ancient Eastern Christian traditions and had a married clergy.  Over the years, the positions of the handful of bishops, even of the Patriarch since 915, had become hereditary or dynastic, partly because there were so few adherents.  The small remnant was driven from Turkey in the late nineteenth century, eventually moving to Chicago.  Church business took little time and produced little income. Being a prudent steward, the Patriarch also headed a construction firm, PP Enterprises, Inc., which shared office space with the Honorian Chancery at 681 North Michigan Avenue, Suite 787a.  It was the construction company’s political connections combined with the Patriarch’s ability to deliver a small but important number of votes in a swing precinct that made this Sunday morning tragedy more than a blip on obscure religious radars.  That was also why the police investigation to come would be prompt and efficient.

“Well, your family is so much more interesting than I realized,” yawned Jackson, picking up his paper again.

            “Listen, asshole,” George shouted, “can’t you add?  Uncle Honorius is dead, Cousin Athanasius is dead.  There are no other sons.  I am the nearest male relative.  I think I’m the new Honorian Patriarch.”

            That got Jackson’s attention.  Down went the paper, up went the eyebrows, and a slow smile split his face.

            “Darling, all that gold!  All the smells and bells!  It’ll be fabulous!” 

             He smirked for a moment and then his mouth fell open.

            “OH MY GOD!  Does this mean I’m the Patriarcha?”

            “Shit!” George jumped up and ran for the phone and started punching numbers penciled on the wall next to it.  “This can’t be happening, this can’t be happening, this can’t be… Hello?”

            “Thank you for calling.  Your call is important to us, so please listen to this entire message before making your selection. To reach PP Enterprises, please press 1 now… To reach the Honorian Patriarch’s office, please press 2 now…  Our offices are open Monday through Saturday from 8:00 AM until 5:00 PM.  To leave a message….” George slammed the phone and screamed, heading for the bedroom.

            “Why do they tell you to listen to the entire message and then say ‘Press 1 now’?”

            Jackson strolled to the bedroom.

            “Something wrong, Your Holiness?”

            George glared from the unmade bed, clutching a rainbow-hued stuffed dragon Jackson had given him for Christmas. 

“I don’t frigging need this.  I don’t frigging need this.” 

The fingers of his left hand ran through his hair while those of his right compulsively squeezed the dragon, which squeaked in commiseration. 

            Jackson smiled. “You know, Holiness sweetie, you’re going to have to stop that whole hair routine.  It’s very cute and all, but I don’t think it will work too well with that tall hat you’re going to be wearing.”

            He reached over and plucked the dragon from George’s grasp. 

            “And stuffed toys reminiscent of the Ancient Enemy will never do.”

            George fell back on the bed and put both hands over his mouth.  The doorbell was buzzing again and the telephone chimed in.  He looked out the window and a white pigeon landed on the windowsill and stared into his eyes.  At least, he thought it was a pigeon.

            It was going to be a long day.  And how was he ever going to explain to the vegetarian Orthodox lesbians?

As for that final question, none of us had a clue.

Will that be the extra-large with fifty toppings?

Anthony Padilla apparently thinks the elusive Bigfoot has been wandering around his property and eating pizza. I'm not sure what it says for the pizza, but apparently after Bigfoot eats it, he poops. Padilla, who is determined to make his point at any inconvenience to himself, claims to have samples of the poop. So far the police have turned down his request that they test it for DNA. Padilla wants to claim the $10 million prize being offered by Spike TV for "irrefutable proof" of the existence of the Big Guy.The prize, of course, is a come-on to get viewers for some reality program on Spike TV about people looking for Sasquatch.
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In other weird news, I did some work on my book this morning. See, it's not all fun and games here in Damien's Queer World.

Damien's dirty little secret

Okay, confession time. I am supposed to be writing a book. I have been doing all sorts of research on non-mainstream religious/irreligious belief systems for a class, and I had promised my publisher that I could easily turn the lectures into a book. And I had a draft of it done and thought things were rolling merrily along. What with the holidays and the weather -- have you seen the Illinnoying weather reports lately? -- I have lost momentum. The body-in-motion-remains-in-motion and body-at-rest-remains-at-rest thing is working against me. And when I get my body in motion, I would rather play with things like blogging instead of the slogging demanded to get a book polished up and in shape for publication. So I have been having fun here instead of doing the work I am supposed to be doing.

I know, as dirty little secrets go, it's not very exciting. But it is mine own, my precious.

Anyway, I should be writing on the book instead of sharing this with you.

Don't you feel guilty for distracting me? As I frequently point out, it's not my fault I'm not accountable.

Or did Chris Christie say that?

It's time to begin planning the Crossword Caper!

When he is in a snarky mood, Daniel always calls me the Horseless Headman. That’s because, although I am officially the Head of the Queer Studies Department at Philip Peabody Horton University, there are no other staff members. Hence, there is no horse. I don’t even have my own secretary but share a marginally competent work-study student with the Dean of Anti-Social Studies. Who, by the way, actually has a small group of faculty to dean it over.

One would think, well, I would, that given the sparse personnel resources of the Queer Studies Department, we (that is to say, technically, I) would be exempt from various extracurricular responsibilities, but for some reason Dean Withers, my own revered Dean in the School of Special Fields, thinks otherwise. He seems to reason that since I have no one to administer, I must have bountiful leisure hours to devote to the sorts of creative things that university students do in order to avoid actually improving themselves.

Among these many things is Freshman Orientation Week, inevitably called Weak Freshman Disorientation by the more experienced WHOvians. This takes place the last week in August, just prior to registration and the beginning of the academic year. About four hundred and fifty carefully screened social misfits – all duly certified by the AntiSocial Certification Process overseen by the afore-mentioned Dean of AntiSocial Studies – descend upon our leafy campus and are herded into dorm rooms that vary from hideous lime-sherbet green to a pale Pepto-Dismal pink, colors that pseudo-social scientists, or social pseudo-scientists, have determined will calm the raging hormones and ire of eighteen-year-olds. I believe the original research was actually done on prisoners and the patients at mental institutions, but it was a small step to see that it would apply equally well to several hundred late-adolescents crowded together for a prolonged period of time.

PPHU students who are about to enter their final year of studies work as mentors, leading small clusters of incoming freshmen. “Incoming!” some wag always shouts when they are crossing the Quad, gawking at the crenellated tops of the faux medieval cloisters. The seniors-to-be haughtily ignore the shouts and, walking backwards in the time-honored gait of campus orientators, keep up a bright chatter about the history of this, that and the other, pointing randomly at whatever building they happen to be tripping past at the moment. Any accurate information gleaned by the newcomers is largely a matter of luck or coincidence.

In olden days of yore, when I attended freshman orientation at Midwestern State Megaversity and dodged the dinosaurs that still roamed the earth, we took placement tests, wandered around the campus and went to “mixers”, sad little dances where people who already knew one another from high school crowded together in a largely successful effort not to meet anyone new. Since those innocent days, the social scientists and university marketing people have resorted to icebreakers and games to knock down barriers and build bridges. Or something.

The idea makes some sense, I suppose, at a normal university. PPHU, however, is a special case, given its preference for students who don’t fit in anywhere. Getting these folks to break down barriers and build bridges is no easy task. That has not prevented Herkimer “Give Me a P!” Jones, the head of recruiting (the department’s real task is unabashed marketing), from trying. And one of his brainstorms is the Crossword Caper.

For the purpose of the Caper, the incoming are broken up into aggregates – I hesitate to call them teams – of thirteen. Apparently group dynamics research shows that thirteen is the maximum size of a group in which each member will know every other member on a personal basis. That this is the same number of people that centuries of tradition told us should never sit down to table together seems not to have dawned on the group dynamics people. I guess they never wondered why the first person to get up from one of these sessions always seemed to be the first to quit. (You thought I was going to say the first to die, didn’t you? Just how superstitious do you think I am?)

If everyone who is invited shows up, there are 35 aggregates of thirteen incoming. Each aggregate, or congeries* for the over-educated, is encouraged to give itself a name, in itself a pointless and usually futile exercise in team-building, and is handed an official Crossword Puzzle on Monday evening of the Disorientation. The completed Puzzles are due back no later than Thursday midnight at the Recruiting Office. The time the Puzzle is returned is recorded so that, in case of a tie, the first aggregate to have submitted the correctly completed Puzzle will be declared the winner. Much honor and glory is supposed to accrue to this aggregate when their victory is announced on Friday at the concluding ceremonies. To the best of my knowledge, no winning aggregate has ever gone on to do anything together again once all this is over.

At any rate, as one of the faculty overlords of the Disorientation, I help construct the Crossword. Why this task cannot be relegated to some piece of shareware designed for such a purposeless purpose, I know not.

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* Congeries [from the Latin congerere,  to heap up] means a bunch of things piled together. Although it appears to be plural, it can take a singular verb. Which makes it of interest to me as a queer thing, singular, even. (Sorry!) I first ran across it in some story by H.P. Lovecraft, and the word itself did lend a note of horror to the writing.