Etc

It’s Not About The Barbecue

UNTIL THEIR SACRIFICE IS OBVIATED by a calmer world, we remember them.

In Flanders Fields
By: Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Etc

Silicon Intermission

WE AT FRANCE STREET TOOL and Blog (i.e., Ann & moi — G is only exploring keyboards) will be offline for the next 12 to 18 hours, G?d willing, as a new computer (thanks again, Dad) replaces the old (thanks again, Don). Try to be good to each other in the meanwhile?

Living

Pithyism #6,001

IN THE 10,000-YEAR-WIDE BUBBLE that is civilized collective consciousness, every death is the end of an era.

Etc

So Much For Earth

What happens when the opposable thumb outweighs the brain? Fun fun fun! Unless, of course, you live here.

Fig. 1

WORST-CASE SCENARIO: THE BP SPILL will kill everything in the Gulf of Mexico. This will be the tipping point for all of Earth’s oceans to die. In 50 years we’ll be wishing for one more breath, if we even live that long.

So much for immortality, rice pudding and Beethoven, not to mention the Cubs’ pennant chances. (Apparently we’ll all die before hell freezes over[1].) And all because we weren’t smart enough to count our blessings before turning them into curses. It’s not like we didn’t see it coming … but it’s hard to really see through a primate program that says Someone Bigger Will Fix This and It’ll All Be Okay, Somehow.

Well, right now, for this, there isn’t anyone or anything bigger than what the hands of man can build. Right now we’re at the mercy of our own inventiveness.

To whomever-from-Elsewhere may find this note: My apologies on behalf of (at least the wiser members of) my species and the others we silenced. We really thought we’d hold it all together long enough to find you, or for you to find us, or at least to become smart enough to solve all of our problems, or at least the pressing ones, or even decide what they were, so you see our difficulty, but that’s all moot now. Enjoy the fruits of what we were and could have been.

And please, despite my own anger, don’t judge us all too harshly. We were only self-domesticated apes after all, choosing expediency over longevity. Let this be a lesson to yours and other species: Always look for the catch — and if you don’t see one, look harder.

PS: And if this sounds defeatist and crabby and depressing to you, why are you just sitting there? Go ahead. Make me a liar.

Please.

__________________________________
– [1] To Bill, Stanley, Jay and my other Chicagoan friends– my condolences.
– Graphic courtesy of http://www.warninglabelgenerator.com/.

Crit

Pithyism #2.35

THE FIRST TIME, YOU SEE/READ/HEAR IT for the story; the second time for nuance; third (and thereafter) is sheer love of craft.

Writing

Jon Stewart Slams Glenn Beck Idol

THE DEMISE OF THE HEADLINE-WRITER’S art (according to a recent article fed through both Slashdot and The Daily Beast) dictates an appeal to search engine optimization (SEO) instead of readers — something that snags on Google instead of anticipatory imagination. Thus, the perfect SEO headline for anything would be the above, as it’s (quoting from memory since I can’t find the original article, alas) “guaranteed to bring in thousands of page hits.” (I added “Idol” just to tweak the numbers, in my own special pundit Beltway Comedy Central Lady Gaga Obama porn Mafia Wars Stephen Colbert Go USA way.)

So there we go. I’ll post an update in 24 hours (hmm… better make it 36) and see how many Fabulous Prizes and Destination Sunsets we’ve won. (So to speak. Heh heh heh.)

UPDATE: JSSGBI+10 minutes: THIS is CREEPY. As in OMG!!! creepy. I no sooner post this when, touched by curiosity, I Google “Jon Stewart Slams Glenn Beck.” And:

The mind-blowing evidence of Google's unholy grasp on the world's electronic tentacles.

Fig. 1.

NUMBER FIVE??? IN N*I*N*E M*I*N*U*T*E*S?!?!?!?!? That’s actually pretty cool…

Torah

Song of the Universe

TONIGHT IS SHAVUOT, WHICH CELEBRATES the gift of Torah at Mt. Sinai some 3,322 years ago. Whether one believes the Torah’s own account is inconsequential; what we celebrate is the living text (rather, Living Text) itself and its indivisibility from the Jewish soul. (It’s not just about Mel Brooks and rye bread, folks.) Jews the world over will be cracking the books for an allnighter of mind-stretching scope, G?d willing. For the hardcore, that means a survey of the Hebrew Bible (Torah, Prophets, Writings), Talmud (Mishna and Gemara), Law Codes (Mishneh Torah, Shulchan Aruch), Commentaries (Midrash) and a smidgen of qabala (Zohar), learning in pairs until dawn (or if unable, in bed until sleep).

Locally, that means a study party at our rabbi’s house tonight between 9 and midnight (if you don’t know where that is, shoot one to scoopatsonicdotnet and I’ll tell you). Everyone is invited to bring a personal piece of Torah to share; I’ll attempt to convey the thousand-year grandeur of the Talmudic intellectual tradition in fifteen minutes, and also acquaint everyone with a little-known text (at least until recently, at least to me) called Perek Shirah.

Perek Shirah (“Verses of Song”) is Torah writ large — 84 verses worth of Universe As Teacher. The text is at least 2,000 years old, according to its Jewish Encyclopedia article, and of uncertain authorship. Each verse (Psalms or Prophets, but mostly Psalms) illustrates how Torah is transmitted through a particular element, plant or animal. Its preface quotes the Talmud (Eruvin 100b), and fairly summarizes the work’s intent: “R. Yochanan said: ‘If these things were not prescribed in the Torah, we could learn decency from the cat; the ant would preach against robbery, and the dove against incest.’

By my own level of scholarship, Perek Shirah is somewhat over my head — which only interests me further. A free copy may be downloaded from three different websites (it’s the same 208k PDF):

http://www.archive.org/details/AkivaPerekShirahperekshirahebengslifkinpdf
http://lazerbrody.typepad.com/lazer_beams/files/perek20shirah20booklet.pdf
http://www.zootorah.com/books/Perek%20Shirah%20booklet.pdf

Chag sameach (happy holiday)!