I’m sure you, like all of us, assumed the unfortunate stingray stabbing death of conservationist and TV star, Steve Irwin was just a freak accident.
Well, maybe we shouldn’t be so sure.
An 81-year-old boater was in critical condition Thursday after a stingray flopped onto his boat and stung him, leaving a foot-long barb in his chest, authorities said.
Whoa… Hold on a sec… The stingray jumped into the boat and stabbed the dude in the chest? And we’re calling this a freak accident, too?
I just don’t know about that, my friend…
It must have been sometime in college that I read Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Suskind. It easily became one of my all-time favorite novels. (It also makes an interesting gift for a new girlfriend, FYI. There are two copies in my house… I’m just sayin’…)
Now I see that they’re releasing a movie based on the novel, and the trailer doesn’t look half bad.
I make no claims for the film, but the book is highly recommended.
First, we’ll compare and contrast the human/primate relations in India as depicted by two stories:
- Monkey throws brick, woman killed — On the campus of a hospital, no less!
- Villagers pray for recovery of monkey — Little guy fried himself on an electric transformer.
The monkey news in the US is much less… Um… Am I a bad person if I say “entertaining”? Anyway…
Former employee blames UC Davis officials in monkey deaths
Several weeks later, the heater at the Animal Resources Service building blew hot air into the animals’ room, raising the temperature to about 115 degrees.
Yeah, that’s just gross.
And all-time favorite track of mine, “Ship Of Fool (Save Me From Tomorrow)” by World Party, came on the iPod today, and the lyrics just kind of hit me:
Avarice and greed are gonna drive you over the endless sea
They will leave you drifting in the shallows
Drowning in the oceans of history
Traveling the world, you’re in search of no good
But I’m sure you’ll build your Sodom like you knew you would
Using all the good people for your galley slaves
As your little boat struggles through the warning waves
But you don’t, pay
You will pay tomorrow
You’re gonna pay tomorrow
You’re gonna pay tomorrow
Oh, save me, save me from tomorrow
I don’t want to sail with this Ship of Fools, no, no
Oh, save me, save me from tomorrow
I don’t want to sail with this Ship of Fools, no, no
I’m guessing Brozo might get the connection.
The Handwriting Is on the Wall
When handwritten essays were introduced on the SAT exams for the class of 2006, just 15 percent of the almost 1.5 million students wrote their answers in cursive. The rest? They printed. Block letters.
And those college hopefuls are just the first edge of a wave of U.S. students who no longer get much handwriting instruction in the primary grades, frequently 10 minutes a day or less. As a result, more and more students struggle to read and write cursive.
I haven’t written in cursive since early high school, I think, at which point a drafting class had me convinced that printing was not only more legible, but at least as easy to perform.
Nowadays, my most frequent use of a pen is to sign my name on credit card slips.
One of my proudest achievements in life has been finding a girl as wonderful as Heather to sign on for the role of The Wife.
Two years ago, after a nine year “test drive” that had us crossing such milestones as moving across the country, putting her through grad school, and buying a house together, we finally made things official.
I’m not really sure what we were waiting for, but hey, it’s not the destination but rather the journey, right?
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