The Living on the
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I am a confirmed airport security volunteer for life!!!!!!!!
When I was a kid, we used to experiment with improving those x-ray
glasses you could buy in any MAD magazine. All the prodigal brains of Redbrush,
Virginia could advance the existing technology only as far as seeing EVERYTHING
in triple-vision. But now........now, we have airport security positions,
giving us the ability to see through womens' clothing, sending them through
the conveyor, to become the victims of our fertile, if not exhausted,
imaginations. God bless technology!!
This was sent to me by a friend - Please read it all, and pass it on. I printed it out as it is quite long and might be easier read in hard copy...
Aloha, How are we doing in the war on terror, anyway? A tad better, I hope, than we're doing in the war on drugs, the war on poverty, and the war on teenage body piercings. "This war is being brought to you by..." Oxy-Magic Miracle Fabric Cleaner and Lawn Mowing Solution! Just one teaspoon of Oxy-Magic combined with the "Air You Breathe" and the "Water You Drink" makes enough Miracle Fabric Cleaner for 99 loads of laundry! Aaaaaand.... sprinkle it on your lawn for a fast, even cut that will have your neigbors oohing and ahhing with envy! Order now and we'll slash the price in half! Aaaaand... we'll throw in this handy plastic spray bottle and a second can on Oxy-Magic AT NO EXTRA COST! That's right, ALL THIS, for only three easy payments of $19.95! The problem with Cable News is they don't have the very classiest sponsors and there seem to be four times as many commercials. Notice how the anthrax reports are always sponsored by life insurance companies, and the battlefield updates by that herbal Viagra alternative "guaranteed to increase your sexual potency without side effects or your money back!" Is it just me, or has CNN become, well, more tinsel-ly, since its merger with America On-Line? Softer. Less newsy and more blabby. In the last war, we had guys in surplus-outlet shirts reporting on actual battles as they happened. In this one, we get a guy who looks and sounds like Dustin Hoffman doing "Peter Rabbit", tsk-tsking in a studio, and a bevy of model-like sweet young things reading from teleprompters. Well, to tell the truth, the sweet young things are a nice improvement, cosmetically (so to speak), but ever notice how they actually smile while updating the latest anthrax death count? Some director obviously told them to smile while they read, so they smile. No matter what they happen to be reading. "More bodies were pulled from the twisted ruins..."
In all fairness, since it's the most "managed" war in history, there's
not much to report. There's a good side to this. The Afghanis have TVs, too,
right? Well, OK, they don't have TVs but some of them have relatives in Pakistan
who go down to the neighborhood bar and watch news updates in between cricket
matches. Well, alright, Moslems don't go to bars, because partaking of alcoholic
beverages is against their religion. But wait -- the hijackers regularly
frequented bars in Florida and in fact got roaring drunk the day before the
attacks. Guess they didn't go to heaven after all. Oops.
Frontline:
The Fixers What is the environmentally responsible solution to the incredible increase of shark attacks in the big blue? I read this morning that Australia shark attacks are up times 10. I don't know the stats for Florida but it appears to be up, at least coverage is more sensational. My feelings on the issue are unresolved but I'm leaning toward my approach to a mosquito or a spider; if they're desirable of my blood I prefer to neutralize them first. Yes, they were there first and it is their natural habitat but we are not their natural food. When a dog goes bad (biting people, eating chickens) we put them down. I am not fully informed on the issue, that's why I ask the question. Has the great white population increased? Do they have a natural predator that has diminished? Has human intervention been curtailed in any way? I've seen a few species up close while diving but never the aggressive ones. Even a sleeping nurse is intimidating but only by association. I've been in the midst of huge schools of dogfish (mud sharks) in Puget sound and although small, in large numbers they can be quite disconcerting. I don't want my fear of those big leathernecks to determine a course of action but at the same time I would not want to see fear of tampering with nature exaggerating the problem either. What say you? Sharks, Caves and Spiders Richard Although shark diving and cave diving (as well as deep wreck diving) are equally exciting, diving with sharks in caves is a double thrill. On Maui there is a shore dive called "five graves" (close to a small graveyard) that has a cave housing a couple of medium-sized white tips. It is only about 40 inches top to bottom and a ways in. The heart-pumping action is in watcing them dart too and fro, creeping up to get a better photograph, never knowing when they may want to pass you on the way out. Oceanic white tip diving is fun too in boat dives a ways from the reefs. They are often in the company of Beluga whales and tend be anywhere between curuous to aggressive and often need to be kicked or pushed away with the camera or strobe. Having 2 in the water at the same time is usually reason to leave the ocean to them, since they grow in aggressiveness with numbers. As to black widows, I had a client in Texas that had engaged me to develop and conduct an inventory management program as well as set up inventory control measures. They constantly had a record accuracy problem with this one warehouse....turns out that it was a very old wooden building that had hundreds (yes, that many) black widows in it. This is a compeling reason to abandon cycle counting in that area. I finally showed them that solving the warehouse problem was less costly in the long run than the cumulative impact of their inventory inaccuracies. Going into that warehouse to validate the problem and gather enough data to support inventory control conclusions was more scary to me than any shark I've had the pleasure to meet. By the way, I'm not as reclusive as I may have sounded in previous notes...after all, I made my living in self-employed consulting, seminar speaking, and developing/conducting train-the-trainer and presentation style workshops. I've always been better at objective, rather clinical study of people and business processes, and speaking "to" rather than "with" people. I can, however, affect a flawless immitation of real, personal interest when required. Maintaining social distance was always a requirement since often I would be interviewing/studying a person, department or plant for the purpose of increased business process efficiency...which ocassionally meant "downsizing" it...often to the point of total extinction. These forums are fun primarily cause they are easy....read and post any time, day or night...no messy logistsics of get-togethers. I'd just rather be golfing, hiking, diving, traveling or on photo shoots with my wife than going to various social functions. Prejudices Diana
...and brown recluses, and cockroaches,and alot of snakes, and skinheads
from whereever,and thankyou for correcting my messages! Diana
I admit it: I have numerous, deeply felt prejudices which I attempt to conceal with white-out. Younger generations, of course, have no idea what I'm talking about. White-out, or "liquid paper," was used back in ancient times before the invention of the self-correcting Selectric typewriter. Don't stare at me blankly like that. A "typewriter" was a mechanical device with a keyboard somewhat similar to the one you're using now that enabled the user to generate hard-copy print-outs simply by pounding on the keys. Its hallmark was the ability to yank a ruined page out of the machine, crumple it (the page) into a ball, and hurl it in the general direction of the round file bin in one violent motion. A Selectric was an electric-powered version of this device which made it even easier to ruin page after typewritten page by lightly brushing the wrong key or pressing the right one too forcefully, though the page-yanking action tended to wear out the little internal gears and eventually make it impossible to create evenly spaced lines of text. Of course, in those days we didn't call it text, we called it type. I don't know when exactly type became text... somewhere between the TRS 80 and the Commodore PET, I think. But all that's irrelevant. No amount of white-out will ever obfuscate my prejudice against mongooses. Most visitors who see one think it's a cute little ferret dashing innocently across the resort lawn. In reality, it's the leading pest on the island, the most prolific threat to the ecosystem. How can it be, you ask, how such a cute, innocent looking, fuzzy ferret be such a serious threat to such a big old island? Eggs, I answer. They eat them. Bird eggs. Endangered species eggs are their favorite. They also eat the birds that lay the eggs. Ah, but you're no bird lover, you say, you don't care if a few dozen or so avian species disappear forever. So I'm prejudiced. A tank truck full of white-out can't obscure my prejudice against poison dart frogs. I just plain don't like 'em. Never mind the toxic exudate on their mottled warty little epidermises. They behave badly. Instead of bouncing away when they see you, like a good little toady amphibian, they leap at you and hiss. A giant iguana did that to me once in Curacao, also. But I'm not prejudiced against giant iguanas, only poison dart frogs. An ocean of white-out wouldn't hide my prejudice against black widow spiders. I can't explain it, they just give me the georgies (that's like the willies, only worse). Don't get me wrong, not all eight-legged arthropods make my scalp do the flamenco. Lobsters, even though they're just big spiders with tails, don't. Not even crabs. I just hate black widow spiders, that's all.
intolerance Diana I agree that this forum is intimidating in it's scope. I would also fight to the death for our freedom to be able to state our beliefs; thank you, Dennis ,for this opportunity. I'm now going to try to say something that is kind of fuzzy in my own mind. I'm always instantly offended whenever anyone uses broad issues to camoflage their own deeply held prejudices. We are all part of the human race and must accept that our ancesters commited some atrocities out of context with our present lives. We personally did not have anything to do with that, or,at least I most sincerely hope not. We all need to help each other, by our acknowledment of this as a fact that has hugely impacted thousands of people's lives, because no healing can occur when wrongs are never acknowleged. This is true on a personal level as well as well as on a national and world society level. Hence, you find President Clinton appologising for what President Cleveland and wealthy americans in Hawaii did to the Hawaiian people. We as individuals have to learn we are all in this together, and that our individual contributions are most important (on a one to one basis) for promoting understanding. When we admit we are human, and may have made mistakes, as did our ancestors, we open the door to amazingly rich friendships with people who have wonderful things to contribute to our lives. I think I should quit now. Beautiful language Michaelp
My brother, a burly mainland haiole, married a Hawaiian girl 10 years
ago on Oahu. That was my first non-tourist introduction to the island culture.
We spent days in various homes, mostly simple poor folk. Family life amongst
the Hawaiians is so interwoven, so special. Being included in that family
was/is a precious priviledge. The wedding was traditional Hawaiian, outdoors,
and a special treat was enjoyed by all at the party that followed. Piles
and piles of home prepared food, great story, lovely song and the crowning
glory, hula. The best friend of my sister-in-law, a hula instructor, graced
the crowd with dance. With an interpreter in the background, the most beautiful
language I've ever "seen" was spoken. For over an hour the crowd, mostly
Hawaiian, and my family (the ones with the bright white legs), were
mesmerized. If I were a white man Ahmad If I were a white man I would never dream of leaving the mainland U.S. forever. It's just as I have told Japanese people here. If I were a Japanese man I would never leave Japan. Why not? Because it's set up for you. When you speak of your forefathers you can be sure that they looked like you and had your interests at heart. Different worlds...It reminds me of something the principal of this mildly prestigious Quaker school I went to once said to me. " It must be very difficult for you here Ahmad. I appreciate that you have to live in two worlds". To the point, what does this have to do with living in or wanting to live in Hawaii? The answer is everything. People move to Hawaii to escape something and find something, they certainly don't want what they are trying to escape to find them. I have looked at U.S. territories like Guam but it's so much like the Philippines I think I would prefer the real thing. I picked up a property in the Philippines a few years ago but I am after all American and need a slice of apple pie now and then. Dennis once referred to the Big Island as "Third World". I am Third World. I've often tried to run from this fact but I cannot escape it. I realized it for the first time in the Philippines several years ago. Walking through Cebu City I felt as if I were in my grandmother's backyard in East Baltimore. Playing basketball with the neighborhood kids took me back to our milk crate on the side of someone's garage. Going on and on and o... Peggie First let me say that I am somewhat intimidated by the literary prowess of the postings. I've never given in to intimidation so I'll jump in. The back and forth of race issues, religeous and civil rights all have many excellent points to be pondered. As I'm reading my brain is going ya - but. I wish I could get the thoughts from my brain to my fingers! I agree with Michaelp when he touched on respect and forgiveness. I would like to add tolerance.
The world is so small now, we are all touched by the same issues of
survival, global warming, species extinction that it is simplistic to put
the blame on one group or another. Unless we work together and realize that
we are all a family - with the problems that arise from time to time; it
won't matter what our opinions are.
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