Saturday, October 31, 2009

Thursday, October 15, 2009

This Water is Different


Evan doesn't like to waste anything.  Anything.  Tonight we stopped at the Varsity for a couple of hotdogs.  And water.  As we finished, Evan was reluctant about throwing his water away.  So he sat there and drank big gulps, then got up and drank more big gulps.  "Evan," I said.  "You don't have to drink it all.  It's just water."  That didn't work, so I had to get to the heart of the matter:  "Evan, if you drink all that water you might pee in your bed tonight."  "I'll pee before I go to bed," he said.  Finally, I coaxed him into ditching the cup, but after he did it, he started crying.  Then I tried to soothe him.  "It's okay," I said, "if you're thirsty when we get home, you can have more water.  We have more water at home.  We have lots of water."  "But this water is different," he said.  I tried to convince him that, no, the water is the same, and we have lots of it.  I can fill a bathtub with water if I want to, I told him.  "But this water is different," he said.  No, it's the same.  Just ask your Mom.

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Ted Williams' frozen head used for batting practice at cryogenics lab

(from the nydailynews.com)


Workers at an Arizona cryonics facility mutilated the frozen head of baseball legend Ted Williams - even using it for a bizarre batting practice, a new tell-all book claims.

In "Frozen," Larry Johnson, a former exec at the Alcor Life Extension Foundation in Scottsdale, Ariz., graphically describes how "The Splendid Splinter" was beheaded, his head frozen and repeatedly abused.

The book, out Tuesday from Vanguard Press, tells how Williams' corpse became "Alcorian A-1949" at the facility, where bodies are kept suspended in liquid nitrogen in case future generations learn how to revive them.

Johnson writes that in July 2002, shortly after the Red Sox slugger died at age 83, technicians with no medical certification gleefully photographed and used crude equipment to decapitate the majors' last .400 hitter.

Williams' severed head was then frozen, and even used for batting practice by a technician trying to dislodge it from a tuna fish can.

The chief operating officer of Alcor for eight months before becoming a whistleblower in 2003, Johnson wrote his book while in hiding, fearful for his life.




Friday, October 9, 2009

Forsaken

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
       Why are you so far from saving me,
       so far from the words of my groaning?
O my God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer,
       by night, and am not silent.
Psalm 22:1-2

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Iron Maiden

(from Wikipedia) An iron maiden (German Eiserne Jungfrau) is a torture device, consisting of an iron cabinet, with a hinged front, sufficiently tall to enclose a human being. It usually has a small closeable opening so that the torturer can interrogate the victim and torture or kill a person by piercing the body with sharp objects (such as knivesspikes or nails), while he or she is forced to remain standing.


Friday, October 2, 2009

My Fescue Crop

It's odd how much effort I put into growing fescue, as if I were a farmer and a full dinner table depended on my success.  Comparatively speaking, compared to neighbors and to those living in the more pristine neighborhoods, I don't really put that much effort into growing fescue, but even so, to me, it seems like a lot.  I aerate (rather I pay a man with a large tractor to aerate), I plant seed, I fertilize, I hope for rain.  I wait and watch and keep hoping for rain.