“It sounds like something out of a darkly satirical science-fiction dystopia. But it’s absolutely real —”

Source: Tim Carmody, The Damning Backstory Behing ‘Homeless Hotspots’ at SXSW

My senior year in college,
In my all-windows room,
I woke up to Peter, Paul and Mary.

It wrenches my heart a bit now.

Ain’t no rule says a dog can’t get an Oscar.

Julie Miller (Vanity Fair) on “Do Animals Deserve Academy Awards?”

[Image: Everell Collection (Rin Tin Tin), by Jamie McCarthy/WireImage]

Today is Christmas.

In the news …
Americans’ belief in Santa Claus is up, up, up and 40,000 pounds of ice cream spilled onto the Indiana highway.

[Image: Lancaster, Pennsylvania’s Quilt and Textile Museum, 1940s Christmas Room, via “Good Twin, Bad Twin.”]

I think I had an inexplicable crush on … no, not Macaulay Culkin … Daniel Stern as a child.

(Campbell, Scott. “You guys give up yet? Or are you thirsty for more?” Online. Available: http://greatshowdowns.com/)

Today, for the second or third time in the past few months, I was berated for environmental stewardship in the workplace. The berating came from a co-worker – someone I usually consider a close friend – who proudly regales the times she has taken deliberately unsound environmental actions.

Today, I wrote an e-mail to her because I was tired of it. This may make me a jerk, but I don’t much care because I was quite angry.

The following may be preachy, it may be self-indulgent, it may contain outlandish rhetoric, it may brandish two-too-many logical fallacies, but I think it’s somewhat commanding and telling enough.

Mind you, a section from the letter has been removed … the one where I refute the argument that my commenting on someone’s daily use of approximately eight paper cups is akin to evangelism.

So, “Dear [co-worker],” my here-truncated letter began …

I can’t justify actions that are deliberately taken in the spirit of being anti-environmental nor actions taken that are consciously anti-environmental. The only two conceivable reasons that one is anti-environmental are because of 1) laziness and/or 2) ignorance.

(…)

There is nothing admirable about laziness. There is nothing stopping anyone from being un-lazy. Laziness is slovenly, unproductive, and unhealthy.

As for #2, you don’t need a college degree to be educated let alone un-ignorant about how important the environment is to our general health, happiness, and well-being. There is nothing elitist, snooty, nor pretentious about being environmentally conscious.

(…)

Rachel Carson (…) said it best:
“The human race is challenged more than ever before to demonstrate our mastery not over nature but of ourselves.”

You and [name withheld] and anyone else who laughs at being proactive are better than that, and that’s why it riles me up. Because I believe you know better. I believe you can do better. You possess the knowledge necessary to the belief and practice of environmental stewardship. That’s how I see it. I’m not trying to be mean or make anyone feel bad, I just wish people didn’t succumb to laziness or apathy so much where the environment is concerned – and honestly, I think if someone feels bad about anything I’ve said, they are probably guilty of not treating their surroundings as they should. If they don’t, that’s fine. They don’t care and I honestly think less of them for it.

Maybe you don’t care, maybe you don’t think the environment is something worth protecting, but I do.

So that’s why I get “sorta ‘mad’.”

I am writing a letter about automata and other such handsome mechanical things.

Six months before she called it quits Grams, Because “Grandma sounds too old,” asked me If he was a “squish-bug.”

I’ve never had quite any idea what she meant, And no research attests to the term as a colloquial one. She came from Dexter, Georgia, 1926, a town whose Population is something near five-hundred-and-nine.

But no, Grams, I don’t believe he is.

I unintentionally saw Martha Marcy May Marlene on the [33rd] anniversary of the Jonestown incident.

I refrained from making the picture for this post a Flavor-Aid packet … because that would be in poor taste.

(Also: The lead actress is the kid-sister of Mary-Kate and Ashley.)