Sharks are scary but o! so very lovely

A vid of skindivers off the coast of North Carolina killing a large tiger shark: 

Things to consider:

• Is it moral to use death to promote a product?

• What if the death is of an animal feared in the deep wet bloody guts of all humans?

• What if the animal doesn't have an agent?

• What if the narrator of the story is unreliable?

• "Read" his narrative as if you were him: 
• What is he trying to defend? 
• What is he trying to explain? 
• What is he trying to rationalize?
• What does he want you to believe about him?

My reading of it is that he is so totally wrapped up in the tale that he is trying to spin about himself that he can't see that the story isn't about him...

The Fat Fact of Forty

Youth has nothing on wisdom?

Here I am, having survived the turning of the arbitrary clock into what was my 40th year. Becoming 40 was traumatic but being 40 is freedom, if freedom is an excuse. Why did I have to wait so long to let myself be me? 40 was permission, 40 was validation, 40 was a soft comfy chair at the end of a long day. So here I sit in my 40 and there are wrinkles around my eyes and mouth when I smile at the satisfaction of coming to rest.

Joozkilla Hamish Gigglebag, Jr.

Anyone else notice that certain skinheads dress like Amish Rodeo Clowns?

How to get to the end of the End of it...

New Scientist has an article called "Winning the ultimate battle: how humans can end war" in which an academic presumptuously updates the Myth of the Noble Savage by pointing out the lovey-dovey behavior of a few isolated groups of people. I have a better idea...

Ridiculous monkeys

We are just ridiculous monkeys, the lot of us.

We mourn someone we don't know, who did very little in the world except entertain us - but of course that is so important - we celebrate dominance based on nothingness: "King" of "Pop"? He was such a leader . . . in dancing? In singing? In dressing? In what, exactly? And what if he has escaped justice? What if he did molest those children? Weep because he brought so much to better humanity, right? You stupid, stupid monkeys.