Letter From A Concerned Reader

Dear Stupidocles,

I’ve always admired your integrity and insightful commentary, like
billions of other readers worldwide.  I consider myself a
fan.  So it is with heavy heart and shaky hands that I type you
this e-mail.  I’m sad to say your blog has degenerated into a
sloppy mess of random gibberish and falsehood.  Plus, it’s
redundant.

Did I tell you your blog was redundant?  Well, it is. 
Redundant.  You’ve had at least three entries in the past few
months about your dreams.  Yes, dreams are weird.  Big
deal.  Everyone has weird dreams.  So no more dream entries, please!

You seriously need an editor, too!  “Reddinsh?” 
What kind of word is that?  English isn’t even my first language,
and I can tell that’s spelled wrong.  By the way, a groundhog is NOT
a puma.  Either you are maliciously spreading lies or you
genuinely believe it to be true.  Either way you’re a complete
fool.  Or could you possibly think that such lies are actually funny?  Well, look at me, I
can tell lies too:  The American bullfrog, also known as the
komodo dragon, was introduced to the Asian continent to reduce our
out-of-control wild boar population, but has recently started to prey
on
unsuspecting humans.  Ha ha!  Wasn’t that funny?

Sorry to have to "call you out" on your deteriorating xanga, but I’m
asking you for the sake of all of your fans across the globe to make
sure that what you’re writing is true and reliable.  Give us more
thoughtful editorials, profound stories, and intelligent
interviews!  Lay off of the lies, the dreams, and the fake letters
from imaginary fans!  Your billions of readers will appreciate it.

Politely yours,

Pho Phan,
Shanghai, China.          

Your
concern has been duly noted, Mr. Phan.  Thank you for politely
calling me a complete fool.  Incidentally, are you in any way
related to a Ms. Sue Doe-Phan?  She sent me a very flattering poem
a while back.

It Didn't Make Perfect Sense at the Time, Either

Last night, I diagnosed a ratty old Nordic trac / sofa with congenital
glaucoma.   Despite concern about potentially toxic mold
spores, I performed surgery:  Unzipping a seat cushion caused two
orange-sized pink rubber balls to fall out.

I can only hope the surgery was done in time to save that inanimate object's vision.

Just Another Day

Or is it really?  On this
day in 1973 the world was honored with my presence.  Giving you
the information that I was 0 years old at the time, you can calculate
how old I am now.

I share my birthday with many less significant individuals:  Axl
Rose, Natalie Cole, Bob Marley, Fabian, Mike Farrell, Rip Torn, Zsa Zsa
Gabor, Babe Ruth, and Ronald Reagan.  I even left a couple out
since I didn't know who they were. 

You can find out who else was born on my birthday by going to http://www.famousbirthdays.com
.   While you are there, you might check out who was born on
your birthday as well, but that's not really important.  A more
productive use of your time would be memorizing the list from paragraph
two and thinking about how great I am. Not.

And here is an entirely unrelated but quite interesting story:http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11190559//

BIG PREDATOR IN SOUTHERN ILLINOIS

Wild America in our Back Yard

It was dusk.  The dying reddish-orange embers of the round orange
thingamajigger in the sky were streaming through the leafless tree
trucks, er, that's trunks.  Also, the dying reddinsh-orange embers were giving way to
the purplish blue color of the approaching night sky but no stars were
out yet--at least they couldn't be seen at this point.  I was
nearing the end of a vigorous run over undulating roads at Forbes State
Park, when suddenly a noisy burst from the underbrush and the
clattering sound of claws upon a tree trunk made me turn my head to the
left.   From the sound of it, I knew this was no
squirrel--clearly a much larger animal.   Peering into the
woods I saw clinging to the tree trunk some four feet off of the ground
the huge furry head of a beast.  Well, to be accurate its head
wasn't clinging to the trunk actually, but the beast itself (that is, it was clinging to the tree, not its
head, though it was certainly attached to its own head as well). 
But I particularly remember its fearsome head!  Paralyzed in fear,
I sprinted out of there as fast as I possibly could.  Not easy to
do when you're paralyzed, but somehow the adrenalin must have kicked
in.  I have no doubts about what I had just seen.  Skeptics
will be skeptical; that's their job.  Except for the amateur
ones.  Come to think of it, I've never heard of a professional
skeptic--but they must be out there somewhere.  Anyway, I am
unmistakeably unmistaken about what I saw that day a couple years
ago.  I have no doubt in my mind that this animal was in fact the
largest predator native to North America:  Yes, an American Cougar,
alternately known as the panther, mountain lion, woodchuck,  puma, and
catamount.  I've got to say I feel very fortunate to be one of the
few who has seen this noble animal in the wild and lived to tell about
it.

In honor of this big cat sighting, I'd like to wish you all a

Happy PANTHER DAY!

The Samsons

The most popular show you’ve never heard of is taking Imaginary Cable
Vision by storm.  It’s not quite “Book of Daniel” but the buzz
around ICV network’s edgy new animated series “The Samsons” has folks
all over the country exchanging quotes by the water cooler and buying
popular action figures for their children.  The show’s delightful
theme music is composed by the award-winning Davey Dwarfman.  

Summarized briefly, “The Samsons” is the amusing tale of muscle-bound
Judge Samson and his trophy wife Delilah, two ex-hippies raising a
family in that quaint little everytown, Fallfield.  Their
skateboarding, wisecracking, underachieving, dopesmoking GEN-Xer son Dart is the
last of his generation attending the second grade at Fallfield
elementary school, and much of the humor revolves around his antics and
teasing of his brainy, chofar-playing little sister Elise.  

Judge Samson has turned from his long-haired hippy past to become a
musclebound, long-haired observant Orthodox Jew and gold-medal winning
Olympic power-lifter.  He’s constantly using his super strength
and speed to save Fallfield from one imminent disaster after another,
such as when he whips together an ark from recycled plastic jugs so the
townspeople can ride out a flash flood resulting from man-made deforestation. 
Shortly thereafter he confronts LumberJack Man, decimating his
bulldozer fleet and saving the local spotted owl population.  In
the next episode he destroys all the pollution-causing automobiles and
factories and forces people to ride bikes in order to save them from poor
air quality.  In the courtroom, he makes sure that evildoers can’t
do evil, including an episode where LoserMan attempts litigation to
prevent his wife from having an abortion.  Samson’s stern lecture
on the Constitution and creative sentencing puts LoserMan in his place,
barefoot and in the kitchen with a 40-lb weight tied around his gut to
carry for 9 months.  In another episode, Samson circumvents a
misguided optometrist and protects a patient’s
Constitutionally-guaranteed right to his preferred glaucoma medication, which
just happens to be cannabis.

Like a traditional father, Samson's iron hand rules the
family.  As he tells his wife, “Yes, Delilah, I’ve gone from being
a lazy,
good-for-nothing hippy to an important judge, but ONE thing I’ll NEVER
do is cut my hair.  Or drink.”  “That’s TWO things, dear!” she replies.  Samson's long hair irks
Delilah to no end, and a recurrent gag is her attempts to convince her
husband to get a
haircut.  Unbeknownst to Mr. Samson, she’s continually slinking
off to her relatives for advice
and plotting on how to get rid of his unruly mane.

I asked head writer and producer Justin A. Theest to explain the show’s appeal:

“Well, first of all, chicks dig it ‘cause Samson has whoppin’, poppin’
muscles.  Kids love the superhero stuff.  The cool kids relate to Dart and nerds relate to Elise.  Delilah’s not
bad-looking for a cartoon character.  Plus, we mix in some serious
social commentary with the humor.  So I think we have a little
something for everyone there.”

What about the people who say it’s just a “Simpsons” clone?

“That's flattering, but any resemblance to ‘The Simpsons’ is entirely coincidental.”

I’m not sure how to bring this up, but the immense popularity of your
show
has given rise to a small contingent of very vocal opposition.  In
the words of extreme bumpkin Dexter Pinion, conservative Christian
spokesman for the Family Values Conglomeration,
“Besides being sacrilegious and inane, 'The Samsons' is no more than a
Trojan
horse for Hollywood’s anti-family, pro-abortion, pro-homosexual
agenda.  Mr. Samson is supposedly ‘based’ on a Biblical
personality but is
in
reality just another in a long line of un-elected liberal activist
judges usurping the role of the legislature.”  What do you say to
that?

“Well, frankly, I’m not sure what he’s getting at.  I think our
Nielsen ratings indicate that we have widespread appeal among
those Bible Belt rabble that he’s trying to rouse.  The religious
aspect is something that we chose intentionally to appeal to the
demographic that made ‘The Passion’, ‘Lord of the Rings’, and ‘Narnia’
all such a huge success.  We’re certainly tapping into the market for
religiously-themed material, but what’s ironic about comments like Mr.
Pinion’s is that we’ve done our research. 
Yes, we’re edgy, but we work very hard to be respectful of Biblical
themes and down-home values.  Samson and his family are
teetotalers and devout
Jews--and like any good Jewish family we show them attending mosque
every Sunday.  We’ve even been accused of being a little preachy
sometimes:  Our “Two Moms Are Better Than One” episode took some
heat for being critical of single parenthood, a la Dan Quayle. 
Honestly, I think we’re already doing all we can to make the normal
Christians happy--every episode ends with Judge Samson saying
‘Thanks to the big, cool presence in the sky that makes us all warm and
fuzzy inside!’  Dexter Pinion’s a loony who only represents a
very
small percentage of our population, thank Ground-of-Our-Being. 
It’s a cartoon,
Dexter!  A cartoon, for sky’s sakes!”

Tune in to ICV network Thursday nights at 7:00 CST for “The Samsons”  

A New Classic?

Somehow after about 45 minutes I was just rolling along when I managed
to hit a keyboard combination which instantly closed the browser and
wiped out my entry.  Here's my
second attempt:

Not much to brag about lately.  2006 has arrived.  
We've all seen the Christmas classics:  Rudolph the Red-Nosed
Reindeer, The Charlie Brown Christmas Special,  Frosty the
Snowman.  The latter of these spawned a number of sequels over the years: 
the delightful Frosty's Winter Wonderland, the intriguing Rudolph and
Frosty's Christmas in July, the miserable Frosty Returns, and the recent Legend of Frosty the Snowman. 
After all that, you'd think the depths of  "Frosty"-ness had been plumbed, but you'd be wrong.  Dead
wrong.  Now comes a fresh, new reinterpretation of the classic tale
featuring a darker, grittier "Frosty" that stands firmly on its own large
snowball base.

Belonging as I do to NASA (North American Snowperson Appreciators), at our
last chapter meeting I had the great privilege of previewing an
astonishing film by Gnulime Cinemas, brainchild of Aussie filmmaker
Jack Peterson who brought us the five-hour epics Leprechaun 4.4: 
Lucky Clovers, Ex-Wife of the Grasshopper King, and Genghis Kong. 
I can't say much about it other than it's destined to become a classic,
and at 4.5 hours it feels much "tighter" and "streamlined" than Peterson's other works
(although the deeply touching melting scene was drawn out several
extra minutes--oops, did I say "melting
scene"?  Er, that may or may not happen...I'm not at liberty to
say).  However, I can give you a summary of the trailer:

Camera pans over a quaint, little village surrounded by wintery, snow-covered hills.
Voiceover (ominous, deep voice):  You think you know him...

(Two thumps of tympani)
Children's choir (eerily, faintly in the background):  Thumpity-thump-thump, thumpity thump thump.
Voiceover:  But...do you really?

(Two thumps of tympani)

Shot of children happily playing in snow, making snow angels and pegging each other with snowballs.
Children's choir:  Frosty the snowman...

(Two tympani thumps)

Snowball-throwing children chase each other around rock formation, come
face to face with a covered wagon ornately decorated in magical symbols
bordering on the occult.

Children's choir:  Was a fairy tale they say...
(Tympani
thumps increase in frequency as tall, dark-suited, mustachioed magician
with stovepipe hat steps around wagon and smiles creepily at
kids.  More
percussion joins in with escalating intensity as a number of images are
flashed in
rapid sequence, including the shadow profile of a stove-pipe hat being
placed upon an enormous snowman, lab-coated Santa's elves injecting
needles into a pile of snow, a talking rabbit slugged by a huge snow
fist, cars tossed through the air landing on tanks, a
policeman swallowing a whistle, an exploding helicopter, kids running
fearfully
through a dark forest which transforms to the
inside of a snowglobe viewed by the scowling magician, an overhead
view of a fast-moving train, the North pole, and sudden silence as the
hatless
magician sweats in a greenhouse, looking around anxiously).

Children's choir:  He was made of snow, but the children know...

Magician:  I know you're here somewhere, you brats!  I want my hat!
(Huge shadow appears over the shuddering magician's suddenly terror-struck face).
Magician (whispers melodramatically):  It can't be...I killed you! 
(Screen goes dark).
Voiceover:  He'll be back again...some day.
(Deep growl, followed immediately by)
Magician:  Ahhhhhhhhhhh! (with loud tympani thumpity-thump)

Merry Christmas!

(Apologies to Rodgers and Hammerstein and anyone who reads this):

My day at the stores has come to an end I know.

A manager has come out to tell me it's time to go.

But deep in the dark green shadows are voices that urge me to stay.

So I pause and I wait and I listen for one more sound,

For one more lovely thing that the stores might say.

The malls are alive with the sound of MUZAK!

With songs we have heard 'bout a million ti-imes.

The malls fill my heart with the sound of MUZAK!

My heart wants to block out every wrong perpetrated upon my ears.


I go to the malls for my Christmas shopping.

I know I will (sing very quickly now:)  impulsively buy a bunch of slickly packaged stuff I saw in a fancy display on sale.

My cash will be drained to the sound of MUZAK!

And I'll sing once more! 

(REPEAT)

I have avoided the malls and muzak thus far this year by doing my
Christmas shopping online, but a brief trip to the mall may yet be
necessary.  I only hope that (1.) they don't mangle the classic
Christmas carols as badly as usual (not likely) and (2.) I am not
persuaded by shiny, sparkly Christmas displays and advertisements to
spend wildly (it's never happened before).

Alas, my digital camera seems to be broken.  I brought it to the
Salem theater to take pictures of the set of the Christmas play and
accidentally knocked the camera onto a hard floor when I swept up my
coat from a table.
  
Aided by my card reader I was able to upload possibly the last photos
ever taken with my camera.  Here is the set of "The Night Before
Christmas" by Lowell Swortzell, based on the classic poem  A Visit from St. Nicholas attributed to Clement Clarke Moore (though there is apparently some controversy about his authorship):

Doesn't that fire look cozy?

The play itself was a lot of fun, with a few exuberant children
involved.  I played the part of the stern but loving father, Mr.
Moore, who initially refuses to let the poem be published on the fear
that it will ruin his reputation as a serious academic.

The set is sparse, but worked for the show.  Most of the
play took place centrally.  Lighting was used to direct the
audience's area of attention and to differentiate the supposedly
upstairs bedrooms from the living room.  We could have created
levels but it wasn't necessary.

May you and your loved ones have a blessed and wonderful Christmas!

A deep discussion of gastronomy

I've always had an interest in gastronomy.  It really gets one
thinking about the immensity of the universe and the omnipotence of God:

Gazing into the stars can truly make one ponder, like the psalmist David:  "What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?" (Psalm 8:4)     Gastronomy:  "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands." (Psalm 19:1)


The staggering splendor and magnificence of the heavens makes one
wonder how any gastronomer could fail to acknowledge the existence of
God. Yet amazingly, we find in the Bible that this omnipotent and
majestic God cares deeply about even such small, lowly individuals as
you and I.  Gastronomy.

...Uh, wait...I think I meant astronomy. 
Amazing what a difference one little "g" makes!  So what is
gastronomy, then?  Let's see...my Webster's dictionary defines it
as "the art or science of good eating"...so under that definition my
opening statement still stands:  I've always had an interest in
gastronomy.

Gooseberry Monster, circa 1974.

And while food may not be majestic, the variety of delicious foods
found in nature are a testament to God's great creativity. 
The
art of preparing meals from these many foods can be in some very small
way an echo of that creativity.  We're clearly meant to enjoy
food, and there's nothing wrong with taking pleasure in it as long as
we realize its proper place and don't make it an idol.  The
apostle Paul reminds us "'Food for the stomach and the stomach for
food'-but God will destroy them both" and cautions the Phillipians
against being like those whose "god is their stomach", obsessed with
earthly pleasures (see Phillipians 3).

There is also the struggle to keep a balance between tasty foods and
nutritious foods, fast foods and healthy meals that usually take longer
to prepare.  As a compromise, I recently bought a couple packets
of Adiposely-Challenged Viands (chicken primavera), which heat up
quickly in a skillet.  Interestingly, step number 3 on the
instructions reads:  "Use your imagination by adding 1 clove minced garlic or 2 Tbsp. chopped fresh basil or 1 to 2 Tbsp. white wine."  Use your imagination by doing exactly what they suggest?  How imaginative is that?

I've been on the verge of coming down with a cold for the past few
days, so I'm hoping to avoid it happening just in time for the play I'm in this weekend based on the famous
Christmas poem "A Visit from St. Nicholas":

            'Twas the Night before Christmas and all through the house, not a    
            creature was stirring, except me coughing a lot.'

...Probably wouldn't work very well, so I've been trying to get plenty of
rest, desperately and neurotically ingesting all sorts of foods and beverages
recommended to stave off illness:  Total cereal, a daily
multivitamin, green and black tea, blueberries, broccoli, zinc &
vitamin C lozenges, tangerines, pomegranite juice (chock full of
anti-oxidants)...and...(a paramount example of humankind's tendency to warp good things like proper nutrition and healthy eating)...GREEN JUICE!

GREEN JUICE* contains many different fruit juices and ingredients which in themselves may be quite tasty, but when put together form
perhaps the most repulsive beverage known to man!  However, since
it
is high in zinc and many other vitamins I have forced myself to guzzle it and the
slightly less disgusting pomegranite juice down as well.  So far
it seems to have worked.  I just hope my health holds through the
weekend or all this unpleasant beverage-drinking will have been for
naught!

* Actual product name withheld to avoid litigation
               
              
              
              
              
       
               
         
Slain fly (windowsill) discovers too late the power of green juice.

And now I'm off to bed.  I'll ponder the stars another night.

(Likely Result If You Try to Read This Whole Entry)

Last night I went to Salem’s “Mega-Night” of basketball–four games,
girls and boys JV and varsity.  Returning to a school building
apparently got my subconscious mind spinning.  Interpret this dream, if you
dare:

I found myself back at the Illinois State University Library, reading
an enthralling book by my church’s current youth minister (not his real
job title) on how to stand up for yourself and your opinions on a
university campus whose values and beliefs may be extremely hostile to
Christianity.  That was the first chapter.  The second
chapter started to inform me about what a great, full-of-camels,
democratic paradise Argentina used to be until a communist dictator
took it over and ruined the country.  Suddenly I realized I was
late for my class on the other side of campus.  Or rather, I had a
vague notion that I was in danger of being late, since I didn’t know
what time it was or when the class was supposed to start.  Oh
well, big deal.

The campus was bustling with students walking to and fro as I strolled
down the quad on a bright sunshiny day.  Some kind of synchronized
campus protest shouting was heard and grew louder as a mob of angry
students marched by, carrying a huge cylinder with the word “UNITY”
painted on the side.  “Hmm...Rather ironic, rallying for
unity when they’re apparently so angry and divisive,” I thought. 
“Hypocrites.”  As I got closer to the building where my class was
to be held, some guy whizzed by on roller blades and ran over my
foot.  It surprised me but didn’t hurt enough to warrant crying
out in pain or yelling at the guy.  

I arrived at the building and realized I couldn’t go in because I had
no idea which room my class was in.  Then I saw a former HS
classmate’s brother, and the HS classmate himself was not far behind in
arriving.  “Ah, good,” I said and explained I’d forgotten where
our class was and asked if I could just follow him there.  But
first I had to leave my coat and shoes at the check-in and put on some
roller-skates to enter the building.  Once inside, the
roller-skates were immediately nonexistent as I followed my classmate,
but then I had to go back out and move the pile of clothes I had left
in everybody’s way at the check-in.  Unfortunately, that made me
even later and I lost track of my classmate amongst the other students
that were streaming into the building and making their way down the
halls.  Fortunately, I found some other late students to join up
with, including a guy who I recalled upon waking as a former optometry
school classmate.  As we hastily made our way through the halls,
he said encouragingly, “We can still make it!”  At one point, an
exit-type sign read “Silence” so our conversation ceased.  We
wound through hallways and stepped into a lecture hall in a round
section of the building (a series of lecture halls split by dividers
into pie-shaped rooms–if one left the dividers open, it would be
theoretically possible to run laps through all the rooms–but you
wouldn’t want to do that when classes were in session).  Students
were already seated and a prof was up lecturing.  “Uh oh, that
means we’re late after all,” I thought, but it was obvious this was the
wrong classroom so we moved on.  After one or two more wrong
classrooms, my classmate said, “It’s downstairs on the lower level!”
and the late crowd hurried into the hallway, down some stairs, and
finally arrived at our “music/art appreciation” class–a darkened
lecture hall with the professor speaking below from a lighted stage.
 

We latecomers were each on our own now as we attempted to approach our
seats most stealthily so the prof wouldn’t notice and penalize us for
coming in late.  I just hoped there wouldn’t be a pop quiz like
one of the other profs had mentioned as we’d zipped through his
classroom.  Some weird music played.  I spotted apparently
empty chairs, but closer inspection revealed jackets upon them.  I
crept to another one and sat down.  Instantly, the lights went up
and the professor turned sharply, fixed a burning gaze upon the class,
and tapped his head to trigger the final strains of the “Twilight Zone”
theme to resonate throughout the classroom.  He grinned.  I
was alarmed to be pointed out by the girl sitting next to me and
noticed that several other tattletales pointed to my tardy-in-arms
comrades as well.  We were busted.  

We each in turn had to state our names and reason for being late as the
prof gleefully scrawled the information down.  I was the second
person to be called on.  A few scattered voices from around the
room said “Dr. Dan!” in a tone of recognition and mild surprise. 
“Oh, yeah,” I thought.  “I already have a degree and a job. 
What do I care about being a little late for some silly class?” 
Anyway, all eyes were on me so I began to explain that I had lost track
of the time, and I wasn’t certain when the class started anyway. 
I thought it was eleven.  But just that moment my eye spotted
11:15 on the clock and I had to backtrack and say, “Uh...let’s just go
with ‘I lost track of time,’ then.”  Chuckles came from the
class.  I was going to explain some more, but then an exquisitely
cute young blond woman basically told me to shut up and started talking
with her face hovering about two feet away from me.  I’m not sure
what she was saying because I kept getting distracted by a giant fuzzy
bunny hopping and frolicking around in the distance behind her. 
Suddenly, it vanished.  The young woman fixed me with piercing
blue eyes, seeming to look right through me and read my thoughts. 
“I control the bunny,” she said.  It appeared again.  “Hmm...I
guess she’s right," I thought,  "How is she doing that?"  All
in all, a real “Galadriel” moment.

And then I woke up.