Floors, Ceilings, Atoms, and Jello

M.C. Escher was born on this day in 1898, about a month and a half after my great-great-grandmother Sallie Emma Palm.

"At moments of great enthusiasm it seems to me that no one in the world has ever made something this beautiful and important."

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From Skeptic Magazine

Top 10 myths of popular psychology

Myth #3: Low Self-Esteem is a Major Cause of Psychological Problems

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I think about this beer milkshake thing from Steinbeck's Cannery Row all the time:

In Monterey before he even started, he felt hungry and stopped at Herman’s for a hamburger and beer. While he ate his sandwich and sipped his beer, a bit of conversation came back to him. Blaisedell, the poet, had said to him, “You love beer so much. I’ll bet some day you’ll go in and order a beer milk shake.” It was a simple piece of foolery but it had bothered Doc ever since. He wondered what a beer milk shake would taste like. The idea gagged him a bit but he couldn’t let it alone. It cropped up every time he had a glass of beer. Would it curdle like milk? Would you add sugar? It was like a shrimp ice cream. Once the thing got into your head you couldn’t forget it. He finished his sandwich and paid Herman. He purposely didn’t look at the milk shake machines lined up so shiny against the back wall. If a man ordered a beer milk shake, he thought, he’d better do it in a town where he wasn’t known. But then, a man with a beard, ordering a beer milk shake in a town where he wasn’t known — they might call the police.

*** later in the chapter***

Doc walked angrily to the counter of the stand.

The waitress, a blond beauty with just the hint of a goiter, smiled at him. “What’ll it be?”

“Beer milk shake,” said Doc.

“What?”

Well here it was and what the hell. Might just as well get it over with now as some time later.

The blond asked, “Are you kidding?”

Doc knew wearily that he couldn’t explain, couldn’t tell the truth. “I’ve got a bladder complaint,” he said. “Bipalychaetorsonechtomy the doctors call it. I’m supposed to drink a beer milk shake. Doctor’s orders.”

The blonde smiled reassuringly. “Oh! I thought you were kidding,” she said archly. “You tell me how to make it. I didn’t know you was sick.”

“Very sick,” said Doc, “and due to be sicker. Put in some milk, and add half a bottle of beer. Give me the other half in a glass — no sugar in the milk shake.” When she served it, he tasted it wryly. And it wasn’t so bad — it just tasted like stale beer and milk.

“It sounds awful,” said the blonde.

“It’s not so bad when you get used to it,” said Doc. “I’ve been drinking it for seventeen years.”

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If I took a step back and discovered I supported a policy of separating mothers from children while their case is going through court (so before the legality of their status is determined) I'd have no other option but to ask myself- "Have I joined a cult???

June 17, 2018

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Last night Gretel kept pointing at us and saying over and over, "You're getting big, and you're getting big, and you're getting big, and I'm getting big. This is gonna be fun!"

June 17, 2016

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Yesterday Sloth calculated the number of truckloads it would take to do a certain job- 666. I calculated what we should charge for a different prospective job, based on mileage- $666. Then later today someone came in for an interview with me- their birthday was 11-6-66. Casey researched bags for tomatoes- .666 each. What does it mean? Nothing! Well it does mean one thing- confirmation bias is real.

June 17, 2015

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I'm never without a napkin, as long as I'm wearing socks.

June 17, 2015

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Kickball for lunch, racquetball for dinner, root beer float for dessert.

June 17, 2012

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Kickball today at noon at Buchanan Park. Stop by if you want to see me come apart at my rusty hinges. (And if you want to play!)

June 17, 2011

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If you're not making banana peanut butter ice cream, then you're not me.

June 17, 2011

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G.K. Chesterton- "This slow and awful self-hypnotism of error is a process that can occur not only with individuals, but also with whole societies."

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My clean laundry smelled like it sat damp in the washer for too long before I dried it... when I opened the washer lid to put it back in, there was a whole load of damp rotten clothes already in there.

June 17, 2011

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Ultimate Warrior

"THERE IS NO PLACE TO RUN! ALL THE FUSES IN THE EXIT SIGNS HAVE BEEN BURNT OUT!"

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This is Alice Huyler Ramsey- the first woman to drive across the US, in 1909.

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Joyce Carol Oates- "My belief is that art should not be comforting; for comfort, we have mass entertainment and one another. Art should provoke, disturb, arouse our emotions, expand our sympathies in directions we may not anticipate and may not even wish.”

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On this day in 1631, Mumtaz Mahal died during childbirth. Her husband, Mughal emperor Shah Jahan I, spent the next 17 years building her mausoleum- the Taj Mahal.

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The Battle of the Rosebud took place on this day in 1876. Crazyhorse led 1500 Sioux and Cheyenne led against General George Crook's forces at Rosebud Creek in Montana Territory, beating them back.

A year later the Nez Perce defeat the U.S. Cavalry at White Bird Canyon in the Idaho Territory.

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On this day in 1939 the murderer Eugen Weidmann, was executed in Versailles- the last public guillotining.

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The United States Supreme Court ruled 8–1 in Abington School District v. Schempp against requiring the reciting of Bible verses and the Lord's Prayer in public schools. That raises a question. Which idiot voted against it?

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Five White House operatives were arrested on this day in 1972, for burgling the offices of the Democratic National Committee during an attempt by members of the administration of President Richard M. Nixon to illegally wiretap the political opposition as part of a broader campaign to subvert the democratic process. And people wonder how he won in a landslide.

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John Hersey, author of Hiroshima, was born on this day in 1914.

"...their faces were wholly burned, their eyesockets were hollow, the fluid from their melted eyes had run down their cheeks."

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Newt Gingrich and Barry Manilow were both born on the day in 1943. 

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Jello Biafra was born on this day in 1958 when The Purple People Eater by Sheb Woodley was at the top of the charts. Reminds me of something I wrote back in 2007.

The Most Unbelievable Question I've Ever Been Asked

I saw Jello Biafra speak last night. For the uninitiated, he was the singer of the Dead Kennedys- my favorite band of my high school years, and still right up there. He is responsible for making me realize very generally that #1 politics are important, #2 the leaders are not to be trusted and #3 Noam chomsky must be a good guy. Where else would have I learned these things? Would have I? Perhaps I would have become like that dead comanche in The Searchers, the one John Wayne shot the eyes out of- dooming him to wander the land, lost, forever.

I remembered his spoken word stuff as inflammatory (which is good) and unsubstantiated (which is bad.) Well it's still inflammatory, but I was surprised that it was completely substantiated. (That a word?) Our political beliefs seemed identical. Several times I saw where his arguments were going, and was so pleased when they ended up at some vague statistic that I already knew. And I was even more pleased when they led somewhere that I didn't know but should have. Oh, and humor all along the way.

Minor complaints- he spends a lot of time on how ugly some politicians are. And since when does an anarchist make a rule that people must turn off their cell phones? But these are minor complaints. I rediscovered that we are kindred spirits.

There were questions I wanted to ask him:

Where did he hear that of the 550,000 soldiers that fought in Desert Storm, 300,000 are on some sort of disability?

Where did he hear that Bush admitted to 50,000 Iraqi civilian deaths? I thought he only admitted 30,000?

The Military Commissions Act? The Cope Act? What were they again?

Did he find it strange that Johnny Ramone had a caveman haircut and politics to match?

Later at home I was enjoying a glass of wine and watching the Colbert Report when the phone rang. This is what the caller said:

"Hey Ben, this is T. Would you like to drive Jello Biafra to the airport."

I'm going to repeat that.

"Hey Ben, this is T. Would you like to drive Jello Biafra to the airport."

Yeah! Wow! Usually I'd be nervous being around any sort of celebrity but I wasn't nervous for it at all. There was a bunch of stuff I really wanted to talk to him about. And I'd have an hour and a half with him on the drive to Philly.

As a sidenote, I ran into Crispin Glover at a bookstore in Hollywood and had nothing to say. I spent my time trying to decide if I should say anything to him even if I'd happen to think of something to say. He did help with the commentary on a bunch of Herzog films... so there was that. Unfortunately, there's also this:

Maybe he'd respond if I asked him a question about Herzog, or maybe he'd yank out a hank of hair and stare. I didn't ask him anything, choosing instead to begin thinking about how to incorporate the experience into a blog several years later.

Back to Jello. I put down my wine (happy I only took a sip), changed out of my pajamas, and headed for the door. Too bad that the phone rang as I was running out. It was T. Unbeknownst to him, someone had already agreed to it.

I thanked him for thinking of me, and for asking me- the most unbelievable question that I've ever been asked.

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Other notable birthdays- Red Foley (1910), Venus Williams (1980)

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Newspaper headlines:

Farmer Bill Does in House

Two Convicts Evade Noose; Jury Hung

Hospitals Are Sued By 7 Foot Doctors

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Albert Einstein- Pure mathematics is in its way the poetry of logical ideas.

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Dylan- “She knows there’s no success like failure and that failure’s no success at all.”

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Jung- "Every form of addiction is bad, no matter whether the narcotic be alcohol, morphine or idealism."

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John Hersey, again- 

"Green pine trees, cranes and

turtles ...

You must tell a story of your

hard times

And laugh twice."

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Eleanor Roosevelt- "A mature person is one who does not think only in absolutes, who is able to be objective even when deeply stirred emotionally, who has learned that there is both good and bad in all people and in all things, and who walks humbly and deals charitably with the circumstances of life, knowing that in this world no one is all knowing and therefore all of us need both love and charity."

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M.C. Escher, again- "Are you really sure that a floor can't also be a ceiling?"

Addendum:

On the way home from racquetball tonight, I listened to Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything. He was talking about atoms. Everything seems to have extra meaning when you are totally physically exhausted. From the book:

Welcome.

And congratulations.

I am delighted that you could make it.

Getting here wasn´t easy, I know.

In fact, I suspect it was a little tougher than you realize. 

To begin with, for you to be here now trillions of drifting atoms had somehow to assemble in an intricate and curiously obliging manner to create you. It´s an arrangement so specialized and particular that it has never been tried before and will only exist this once. For the next many years these tiny particles will uncomplainingly engage in all the billions of deft, co-operative efforts necessary to keep you intact and let you experience the supremely agreeable but generally und appreciated stat known as existence. 

Why atoms take this trouble is a bit of a puzzle. Being you is not a gratifying experience at the atomic level. For all their devoted attention, your atoms don´t actually care about you – indeed, don´t even know that you are there. They don't even know that they are there. They are mindless particles, after all, and not even themselves alive. (It is a slightly arresting notion that if you were to pick yourself apart with tweezers, one atom at a time, you would produce a mound of fine atomic dust, none of which had ever been alive but all of which had once been you.) Yet somehow for the period of your existence they will answer to a single rigid impulse: to keep you you. 

The bad news is that atoms are fickle and their time of devotion is fleeting – fleeting indeed. Even a long human life adds up to only about 650,000 hours. And when that oddest milestone flashes into view, or at some other point thereabouts, for reasons unknown your atoms will close you down, then silently disassemble and go off to be other things. And that's it for you. 

Still, you may rejoice that it happens at all. Generally speaking in the universe it doesn’t, so far as we can tell. This is decidedly odd because the atoms that so liberally and congenially flock together to form living things on Earth are exactly the same atoms that decline to do it elsewhere. Whatever else it may be, at the level of chemistry life is fantastically mundane: carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen, a little calcium, a dash of sulphur, a light dusting of other very ordinary elements – nothing you wouldn´t find in any ordinary pharmacy – and that's all you need. The only thing special about the atoms that make you is that they make you. That is, of course, the miracle of life. 

Whether or not atoms make life in other corners of the universe, they make plenty else; indeed, they make everything else. Without them there would be no water or air or rocks, no stars and planets, no distant gassy clouds or swirling nebulae or any of the other things that make the universe so agreeably material. Atoms are so numerous and necessary that we easily overlook that they needn't actually exist at all. There is no law that requires the universe to fill itself with small particles of matter or to produce light and gravity and the other properties on which our existence hinges. There needn't actually be a universe at all. For a very long time there wasn't. There were no atoms and no universe for them to float about in. There was nothing – nothing at all anywhere. 

So thank goodness for atoms. But the fact you have atoms and that they assemble in such a willing manner is only part if what got you here. 

To be here now, alive in the twenty-first century and smart enough to know it, you also had to be the beneficiary of an extraordinary string if biological good fortune. Survival on Earth is a surprisingly tricky business. Of the billions and billions of species of living things that have existed since the dawn of time, mist – 99.99 per cent, it has been suggested – are no longer around. Life on Earth, you see, is not only brief but dismayingly tenuous. It is a curious feature if our existence that we come from a planet that is very good at promoting life but even better at extinguishing it. 

The average species on Earth lasts for only about four million years, so if you wish to be around for billions of years, you must be as fickle as the atoms that made you. You must be prepared to change everything about yourself – shape, size, colour, species affiliation, everything – and to do so repeatedly. 

That's much easier said than done, because the process of change is random. To get from protoplasmal primordial atomic globule (as Gilbert and Sullivan put it) to sentient upright modern human has required you to mutate new traits over and over in a precisely timely manner for an exceedingly long while. So at various periods over the last 3.8 billion years you have abhorred oxygen and then doted on it, grown fins and limbs and jaunty sails, laid eggs, flicked the air with a forked tongue, been sleek, been furry, lived underground, lived in trees, been as big as a deer and as small as mouse, and a million things more. The tiniest deviation from any of these evolutionary imperatives and you might now be licking algae from cave walls or lolling walrus-like on some stony shore or disgorging air through a blowhole in the top of your head before diving sixty feet for a mouthful of delicious sandworms. 

Not only have you been lucky enough to be attached since time immemorial to a favoured evolutionary line, but you have also been extremely – make that miraculously – fortunate in your personal ancestry. Consider the fact that for 3.8 billion years, a period of time older than the Earth´s mountains and rivers and oceans, every one of your forebears on both sides has been attractive enough to find a mate, healthy enough to reproduce, and sufficiently blessed by fate and circumstances to live long enough to do so. 

Not one of your pertinent ancestors was squashed, devoured, drowned, starved, stuck fast, untimely wounded or otherwise deflected from its life’s quest of delivering a tiny charge of genetic material to the right partner at the right moment to perpetuate the only possible sequence of hereditary combinations that could result – eventually, astoundingly, and all too briefly – in you. 

Because they are so long-lived, atoms really get around. Every atom you possess has almost certainly passed through several stars and been part of millions of organisms on its way to becoming you. We are each so atomically numerous and so vigorously recycled at death that a significant number of our atoms—up to a billion for each of us, it has been suggested—probably once belonged to Shakespeare. A billion more each came from Buddha and Genghis Khan and Beethoven, and any other historical figure you care to name. (The personages have to be historical, apparently, as it takes the atoms some decades to become thoroughly redistributed; however much you may wish it, you are not yet one with Elvis Presley.) So we are all reincarnations—though short-lived ones. When we die our atoms will disassemble and move off to find new uses elsewhere—as part of a leaf or other human being or drop of dew. Atoms, however, go on practically forever.

June 17, 2021