Alcohol Fueled Automobiles
Sometimes not knowing what you are talking about can be fun. When you say what you would have done, you don’t have to face the consequences. When you speculate about the past, all you do is produce food for thought. This can be a tasty snack, or gluttonous indigestion.
There is a radio show/podcast called 99 percent invisible. It is facilitated by Roman Mars, who went to grad school in Athens GA. Last year, another podcaster interviewed him. In the resulting audio tract, the lady asked Mr. Mars if there was anything he would like to redesign. A light bulb went on in PG’s head.
When the motorcar was being developed, there was a question on how to fuel it. At the time, America was in the grip of a temperance movement. It was feared that if automobiles were fueled by alcohol, then there would be a still on every street corner. At some point, the decision was made to use gasoline. At the time, gasoline was the useless byproduct of refining crude oil into kerosene.
So it goes. The world went on the path of fossil fuel consumption. The cost to mankind, in terms of wars and environment damage, has been staggering. What if we could go back, and choose a different path for the motorized vehicle?
If laboratories were to research the uses of alcohol fuel, maybe they could find a way to make it more powerful. Even if they didn’t, and people were accustomed to cars that did not go as fast, maybe the roads would be safer. There are possible down sides, but you only learn about them as you go down the path. Often there is no going back.
Pictures are from The Library of Congress. This feature is written like Chuck Palahniuk.
Live Or Memorex
It started when PG got an email from a longtime friend. He has recently produced a book of photographs, something in my eye. On the last page is a statement: “All photographs in this photo journal are taken exactly as the Camera and I see them. Life is much more interesting without alteration.” The wheels of thought started to spin. If you saw a mushroom cloud rising over Peachtree Industrial Boulevard, that might have been it.
PG sent a reply, “I disagree with the concept that life is more interesting when it is not altered. The world is big enough to handle both points of view.” The next morning there was a reply. “your alteration is completely different and stands alone on its own excellent merit and as its own artform. I mean reversing pix, airbrushing etc. I would not even use the word altered on your artwork. Maybe surgically enhanced! but you know what I mean. Your stuff by altered becomes something that is creating something completely new and original.”
As the reader(s) of this blog know, PG likes to play with pictures. It is a good hobby. No talent or education is required. The software is a free download. Have fun, and don’t spill your beverage.
When the blogging thing started, PG had a dial up connection. When you upload 4kb a second, you like to keep the file size down. One way is to reduce the image to the size the blog has room for. The typical picture today starts at 2048×1536(pixels), with 666 kb of memory. If you reduce this to 720×540, the file size drops to 198kb.
The image size needs to be adjusted to go anywhere. Negatives have been replaced with code. If you are going to put out a dead tree book, you need to find a size for the image. The same goes for a blog.
You don’t have to use the entire image. Most raw images have parts that are not interesting. PG likes to use the golden rectangle (1612:1000) as a default when he crops images. This is usually more pleasing to the eye than the 4:3 ratio used by most cameras.
Most images can use some work in addition to cropping. Level adjustment and color balancing can add to almost every picture made. What the camera sees is often different from what the eye sees. The mechanical tool can use some help.
The camera has always been an adjustable tool. The settings, whether manual or automatic, play a role in how the device records the image. The way the image is rendered for viewing can change it’s content. Ansel Adams is as famous for his darkroom skills as he is for his photography.
Does anyone remember those memorex commercials? (The person who cleaned up the broken glass does.) The voice over says ” is it live, or is it memorex?.” When the commercial played on tv, it was a reel to reel tape, from an unknown manufacturer. The tape used was usually the one the producer got for the lowest price. The spell check suggestion for memorex is memorize.
The memorex ad is a bit quaint today. Cassettes have been replaced by compact discs, which were replaced by the MP3. A recording studio has all sorts of gizmos to corrupt correct the original. The recording studio has long been a creative instrument, rather than a facility for catching sound waves. The same is true of the camera.
There is nothing wrong with trying to get the reproduced image as close to natural as possible. The world is indeed an interesting place. It is just that the technology which is available to anyone with an internet connection, can change what the camera sees to more like what the human being saw. It can also create beautiful images that found their starting point in the original.
The pictures for this post are by chamblee54, and were taken March 18, 2011. The first four were taken on a walk through Chamblee GA. The second one illustrates where manipulation tools can give the illusion of reality. It is almost impossible to photograph a rectangular object and have all the lines come out evenly. This picture was cropped with the no smoking sign in the middle. GIMP has a tool which allows you to pull out the sides. This enables you to have the borders appear to be portrayed as flat lines with ninety degree angles.
These pictures are presented today in the order in which they are shot. This is another option the presenter has. That evening, PG went to a discussion group. The best comments were by a dog. After that, the group went to a bar. The facility next door had a drag show, with the performers waiting on the sidewalk before they went in. This adds a new dimension to the concept of real versus altered.
Cluster Bombs
During the 2008 campaign, there was a little bit of discussion of cluster bombs. Supposedly, BHO wants to ban the use of such weapons.
WHAT ARE CLUSTER BOMBS? Cluster bombs or cluster munitions are large weapons which are deployed from the air and from the ground and release dozens or hundreds of smaller submunitions. Submunitions released by air-dropped cluster bombs are most often called “bomblets,” while those delivered from the ground by artillery or rockets are usually referred to as “grenades.”
Evidence that BHO is opposed to the use of these weapons is here: “In the autumn of 2006, Diane Feinstein (D-CA) submitted an amendment (No. 4882) to a Pentagon appropriations bill to the Senate. It banned neither the manufacturing, stockpiling nor the use of cluster bombs. It merely forbade their use in “any concentrated population of civilians, whether permanent or temporary, including inhabited parts of cities or villages, camps or columns of refugees or evacuees, or camps or groups of nomads.” Senator Feinstein couldn’t have made voting for the bill more pain-free. Senator Obama voted yea, McCain, predictably, nay.
These reports are five years old. Is the United States still using cluster bombs? That is a silly question. “Cluster munitions have demonstrated military utility. Their elimination from U.S. stockpiles would put the lives of its soldiers and those of its coalition partners at risk. Moreover, cluster munitions can often result in much less collateral damage than unitary weapons, such as a larger bomb or larger artillery shell would cause, if used for the same mission.”
Pictures are from ” The Special Collections and Archives,Georgia State University Library”.
The Nine Horse
The storm was moving in, so there would be no bicycle riding today. There was a Charles Bukowski file to listen to. A collection called “70 minutes in hell” played, and a few pictures from The Library of Congress were converted. This is not going to be an afternoon to make sense. Making sense is overrated.
The pictures were Union soldiers from the War Between the States. The idea was to kill Confederates, or die trying. That is another thing which makes no sense at all. We don’t know what it was about 150 years ago. It might have made sense then.
When the decision to write this feature was made, the first thought was to find a link to Mr. Bukowski. (Spell check suggestion: Buckskin) The thing would be easy enough to find, but a certain attitude crept into the picture. If a person wants to find the file, then Mr. Google can work for them just as easily as it can work for this slack blogger.
Poetry comes into the room like water, pouring though the mouth of a river flows into the Gulf of Mexico. When a cup of water moves from fresh water into salt, no one cares where it comes from. All that a body of water knows is that it is one cup larger.
These files are fun to listen to, without the cigarettes and beer spills. When you are tired of listening, you click on the spot and the noise goes away. Mr. Bukowski was talented, and prolific. If you keep the quantity up, the quality takes care of itself. The problem is, for every Charles Bukowski, there are a million useless urinal feeders.
Mr. Bukowski was at the racetrack, and took an emergency bowel movement. Before it was too late, he saw his wallet in the bowl, floating on top of the waste product. The billfold was extracted from the zip file. Mr. Bukowski took a ten dollar bill out, and bet it on the nine horse.
Horses On Drugs
This episode started out as a repost. Google and reality got in the way, and there is no telling where we will wind up. Pictures (except for the divas) are from The Library of Congress. Ansel Adams took these pictures at the Japanese Internment Camp, in Manzanar CA, in 1943.
Awful library books is one of the actors in this drama. It is a good waste of your time. (The link in the repost does not work, because Awful library books has a new web address.) On top of the shelf today is Lee the Rabbit with Epilepsy. Other uplifting volumes on the front page include Isn’t One Wife Enough?: the Story of Mormon Polygamy and When Cavemen Go Bowling.
The book that Awful Library Books chose to “weed” was Latawnya, the Naughty Horse, Learns to Say “No” to Drugs. The links in the original post no longer work, so google was enlisted to find a replacement. Believe it or not, this galloping tale has a wikipedia page.
The original book was targeted at African American youth. The author has daughters named Latawnya and Chrystal. The author has sued amazon, wikipedia, and urban dictionary.
A possibly illegal reproduction is found using the link. One of the comments tells a cautionary tale: ” It seems that many of these comments are viciously lampooning the work of a genius. I, however, see the visionary work of Mrs. Gibson. This insightful masterpiece presents the very real dangers of horse peer pressure. Just last week my daughter, Amber, was walking to school on a normal, idyllic day in suburbia. Then out of nowhere a Clydesdale galloped brazenly over to my precious princess and offered her a 40 oz bottle of Olde English 800 and a marijuana cigarette.”
Clydesdales have long been used to promote the products of the Anheuser-Busch company. When PG was younger, he worked on the mall maintenance crew at Northlake Mall. One day, the Budweiser Clydesdales made a visit. PG was given a shovel and bucket, and told to walk behind the horses.
One of the reasons for the drug problem is drug education. Many of these programs, while well intentioned, make the problem worse.
Courtesy of Awfullibrarybooks, we can see today “LATAWNYA, the Naughty Horse, Learns to say “No” to Drugs“. This uplifting story is about the afternoon when Latawnya goes out to play with her sisters Daisy and LaToya. Suddenly they meet four strange horses, Connie, Chrystal, Jackie, and Angie. They like to drink and smoke drugs.
The author of this tale was born in Mississippi, and lives in California. She says “Thank you, G-d”.
In 1986, there was an oversupply of cocaine coming into America, and new ways of using the product were needed. Someone had the idea of making crack. The media did its part, by running scare stories about the new drug sensation. “One puff makes your head feel like it is exploding”. The stories had the combined effect of scaring parents, and making crack cocaine irresistible to certain people. Crack became a part of the life.
The first time PG heard about oxycontin was a drug education flyer at work. It promised an overwhelming rush to the user who injected the substance. PG imagined the reaction of some of the druggies he had known to this promise…where can I get some?
PG is in the detoxed, old fogey stage of his life. Millions of others are not. When they read stories about horses who drink and smoke drugs, they learn to believe the opposite of what the drug educators tell them. Many will not live to be detoxed old fogeys.
S. Bear Bergman
PG was tired of staying at home, and accepting almost any invitation that came his way. On the Sunday before the Stupor Bowl, there was an event on Covington Highway. (Spell check suggestion: Convincing) This meant getting on I285 , and dodging people in a hurry to get somewhere. After finding the site, and having the parking spot approved by the host, PG stepped onto the front porch. Sitting there, smoking a cigarette, was the entertainer of the night.
S. Bear Bergman told stories this evening. A person, wearing a shirt that said “No one knows I am transexual”, took money. PG was not into making conversation with people he did not know, and found a seat near the front. It wasn’t until the show started that he realized that a lamp on the table next to him was shining under the shade into his eyes. This was an issue throughout the evening.
The talent stood in front of the front door to the small house. This illustrated the first story. It was about airplanes, and a well dressed woman who thought sitting next to the talent created a risk of infection. The punch line of the story also serves as a book title, “The Nearest Exit May Be Behind You”. The book was available for sale, on the table with the oppressive lamp.
At some point in the presentation, it became known that S. Bear Bergman is a transperson. Wikipedia fills in a few blanks. “S. Bear Bergman (born September 22, 1974 as Sharon Jill Bergman) is a transgender author, poet, playwright, and theater artist. Bergman identifies as neither male nor female and prefers pronouns “ze” and “hir”.
The talent is sporting a luxurious goatee. Bear did not make PG wonder about gender. (This is one matter where PG is often not paying attention.) This video features a more ambiguous appearance.
Bear used the phrase Ze in his presentation, without explanation. Does Ze mean Bear, the husband, the son, or all three? Another mystery involves the son. The spouse is another transperson. Did spouse produce the baby? Did spouse have transitional surgery? It is not just nosy housewives at Starbucks who want to know.
Another story involved the wedding planning. Bear lives in Canada, with husband and son. One partner was Jewish. The family of the non Jewish partner had a lot of questions. It all turned out ok, except for someone’s Uncle setting a tablecloth on fire. By this time, anything that could not be explained was said to be “traditional”, including a tablecloth fire.
At one time in his dumpster diving past, PG found some 3d pictures of a Jewish wedding. To a recovering baptist, this was rather exotic. The process of 3d pictures never did catch on. PG was trying to remember the last time he saw those pictures, and what box they are in today.
After the intermission, Bear told a story about karma. Part of this tale is in this video. The two dogs, of the host, barked every time the house applauded. Fortunately, the karma did not run over the dogma.
The rest of the night went smoothly, and everyone found the nearest exit with no problem. PG took the surface roads home. There is an eatery in downtown Dickhater called “Pita Pit“. Pictures are from “The Special Collections and Archives,Georgia State University Library”.
Sliced Bread
The best thing since sliced bread
Is the bag containing the loaf.
This plastic package keeps crumbs in,
And moisture out.
A bread sack can be used for many things
After the last slice is consumed.
It is not a toy for small children.
Choice
WT is very sick. He has cancer. After a round or two of chemotherapy, and the devastating side effects, the cancer is back. More chemo is being applied, and dialysis is being done to his kidneys. It may work, and it may not.
This feature is not about this particular struggle. It is about the refusal of our culture to accept the concept of scarcity. If a person, whose bills are covered, wants to spare no expense to live one more day, then that wish is granted. Is this really the best use of our resources?
A few more things about WT. He is a wonderful man, with a loving family and lots of friends. It is a quality life we are extending. WT is also sixty-ish, and has already lived more than many. At what point do we say, enough is enough?
With the discovery of deficit spending, our government does not choose between guns or butter. It orders both, in heaping quantities, and puts the bill on the tab. As long as the interest is paid on the money borrowed, the machine keeps churning. One of the biggest sources of government spending is health care. We spend money like there is no tomorrow, without asking if it is really a good investment.
Pictures are from “The Special Collections and Archives,Georgia State University Library”.
Coffee Of The Day
Coffee of the Day is House, M.D.
“Bold, slightly bitter, ironic.”
South of Ponce de Leon,
It is hot, black, and strong.
Personification of Joe,
Leads to bad jokes,
Roasting the elderly comedian.
Global Belly Laugh Day
The previous post is about the morbid custom of putting death notices in newspapers. Part of the festivities was noting famous fatalities that occurred on January 24. It is a diverse crew. “Grim reaper recruits on January 24 include Caligula (41). Ira Hayes (1955), Winston Churchill (1965), William Griffith “Bill” Wilson (1971), L. Ron Hubbard (1986), Ted Bundy (1989), Chris Penn (2006).”
Ira Hayes was born into an Arizona tribe, Akimel O’odham. In World War II, he joined the Marines, and was included in the famous picture taken on Iwo Jima. After the war, Ira Hayes became a drunk.
Winston Churchill was the British Prime Minister during that same conflict. He is considered a hero, even if his most famous speech was made by an actor. Mr. Churchill was also fond of alcohol. “Madam, you are ugly” “Sir, you are drunk” “Yes, but in the morning I will be sober.”
Bill Wilson was the original of Anonymous Alcoholic. He has a lot of friends.
The synchronicity between Caligula, L. Ron Hubbard, and Ted Bundy is a bit more subtle. Caligula was a historic figure, and anything said about him is subject to dispute. He might have really been a warm, fuzzy kind of guy. L. Ron Hubbard was the founder of Scientology, and Ted Bundy was a serial killer. Chris Penn is the brother of Sean, and his character in Reservoir Dogs fired a lot of shots.
January 24 is a lot of things. It is the birthday of Oral Roberts (1919) and Neil Diamond (1941). January 24 is also Global Belly Laugh Day. On January 24 at 1:24 p.m. (local time) smile, throw your arms in the air and laugh out loud.
Obituary Mambo
Andrew Sullivan had an uplifting feature, the other day, about obituaries. As is his custom, he found an article at another site, threw out a juicy quote, and moved on. It is up to Chamblee54 to provide more detail, and put up pictures for the text averse. These pictures today are from the Pleasant Hill Baptist Church cemetery. This is a repost.
It is a common practice to look at the obituaries (aka “Irish sports page”) first thing in the morning. If the reader is not included, then the day can proceed as normal. This custom does not take into account the possibility that you have died, and your family it too cheap to purchase a notice.
The article in question is THE DEAD BEAT CLUB Ten things you don’t know about the obit biz. It starts off by saying that the family members are usually happy to help the obit scribe. They have stories about the recently deceased, like ” Eddie “Bozo” Miller boasted of regularly drinking a dozen martinis before lunch, yet he lived to age eighty-nine.”
Newspapers take different approaches to obituaries. Some assign rookies, or use the death beat as punishment for troublemakers. Others give the job to their best writer. The paid notices are usually written by family members, with the help of the undertaker.
Of course, there is the occasional oddball. Alana Baranick, obituary writer for Cleveland’s The Plain Dealer and lead author of Life on the Death Beat: A Handbook for Obituary Writers , likes to visit every municipality in the United States named Cleveland.
One oft repeated saying is that obituaries are about life, not death. As the source puts it: “The British “quality” newspapers — The Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian, and The Independent, substantiate the old chestnut about obituaries being about life, not death. These papers rarely mention the cause of death, focusing instead on presenting a vivid account of a lived life. American papers have an unhealthy fixation on death. It’s common for “complications of chronic pulmonary disease” or “bile duct cancer” to show up in the story’s lede, never to resurface.”
Only one obituary has won a Pulitzer prize. ” Leonard Warren, a Metropolitan Opera baritone, dropped dead mid-performance in 1960. Sanche de Gramont (who changed his name to Ted Morgan), a young rewrite man at the New York Herald Tribune, banged out the obit in under an hour and won a 1961 Pulitzer in the Local Reporting, Edition Time, category.”
There is an The International Association of Obituarists. The headquarters is in Dallas TX, presumably near a grassy knoll. They have an annual convention, which is said to be a lively affair. The 2005 conference was in Bath, England. The 2007 conference was in Alfred NY. There is also the Society of Professional Obituary Writers.
IAO was founded by Carolyn Gilbert, the lady who puts the bitch in obituary. Ms. Gilbert collaborates on a page, Remembering The Passed. RTP has a series of podcasts. They require an apple app to listen, which is too much work for PG.
Death is a part of life. Every language has a word for it, and English has a number of slang expressions. An incomplete list would include : ““passed on”, “are no more”, “have ceased to be”, “expired and gone to meet their Maker”, “are bereft of life”, “have ceased to be”, “rest in peace”, “push up daisies”, “whose metabolic processes are now history”, “are off the twig”, “have kicked the bucket”, “shuffled off their mortal coil”, “run down the curtain” or “joined the Choir Invisible”
Columbia Journalism Review (Motto: Strong Press, Strong Democracy) has a feature about Obit. “Krishna Andavolu is the managing editor of Obit an online magazine intended for those interested in obituaries, epitaphs, elegies, postludes, retrospectives, grave rubbings, widow’s weeds, and other such memorabilia of expiration. Part eulogistic clearinghouse, part cultural review, Obit purports to examine life through the prism of death. Founded in 2007 by a wealthy New Jersey architect who sensed an exploitable niche after seeing a middle-aged woman distraught over the death of Captain Kangaroo, the site is a locus for enlightened morbidity.”
OM is worth a visit. The top story features a picture of Betty Ford, who survived Breast Cancer, Alcoholism, and The White House, to die at 93. The site has an ad from Newlymaid.com, with the creative suggestion to Trade In Your Old Bridesmaid Dress & Get a New Little Black Dress.
OM has a popular feature called Died on the same day. Grim reaper recruits on January 24 include Caligula (41). Ira Hayes (1955), Winston Churchill (1965), William Griffith “Bill” Wilson (1971), L. Ron Hubbard (1986), Ted Bundy (1989), Chris Penn (2006).
No google search is complete without someone trying to make money. Obituaries Professionally Written says ” … we believe in honoring a life with respect, dignity and integrity. When needed, euphemism is used liberally. “
OPW content provider Larken Bradley says “”Obituary writing is an honor, a privilege, and great fun … I can’t think of anything I’d rather be doing.”… After she dies she expects her obit headline will read, “Obituary Writer, Six Feet Under.”
The Book
Irving Stone was promoting Depths of Glory,
a book about Camille Pissarro.
Mr. Stone said:
“The book is the great creation of man. It is greater than cement, the wheel, or running water.”
He died four years later.
Pictures: “The Georgia State University Library”.
Chamblee54 
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