Althouse: At the Koi Café...

June 23, 2013

At the Koi Café...

... dip in.

71 comments:

Icepick said...: Dip.; 6/23/13, 10:08 PM
edutcher said...: By all means, don't be koi.; 6/23/13, 10:09 PM
Icepick said...: Also? Boiled brains.; 6/23/13, 10:10 PM
Icepick said...: That Shakespeare fellow was quite the card....; 6/23/13, 10:11 PM
Chip S. said...: Are those tranny fish?; 6/23/13, 10:11 PM
rhhardin said...: Man is an oak. Nature contains nothing sturdier. ... The universe knows nothing: it is at best a thinking reed.

Lautreamont; 6/23/13, 10:11 PM
bagoh20 said...: I have a little pond around my patio with some small koi, goldfish and, minnows. The birds nest in boxes above the water. Sometimes, the little birds fall into the water. Sometimes I don't notice for a few days. When I do notice, it looks just like my pond is populated with piranha. Nothing but a skeleton left.

I used to have a big female bullfrog that I raised from a tadpole. The females don't make all that noise, thankfully. She would often climb out and sit on the edge, then jump in when approached by me or my dogs. One day I saw one of my pit bulls catch her in mid air as she leaped for the water. I yelled "drop it", and he immediately did, and the frog went back into the water and was fine. This cat-and-mouse game went on nightly for years, the dogs never got her again, until one night a few months ago, when I found her out in the dog run, deceased, not mauled, just dead. The cause of death was never identified, and nobody saw anything. No witnesses came forward.; 6/23/13, 10:22 PM
chickelit said...: Eutrophication is even uglier than the word.; 6/23/13, 10:23 PM
Peter Hoh said...: Are the koi waiting with baited breath?; 6/23/13, 10:31 PM
Anonymous said...: Since it is Sunday, I'll throw in a few unrelated quotes from Brigham Young for our evening reading:

"I love the Constitution and government of this land, but I hate the damned rascals that administer the government."

"If I had a choice of educating my daughters or my sons because of opportunity constraints, I would choose to educate my daughters."

"Remember, a chip on the shoulder is a sure sign of wood higher up."; 6/23/13, 10:33 PM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: The Red Sox made two, game costly, lackadaisical errors.; 6/23/13, 10:41 PM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: Or should that be lackadaisical play errors?; 6/23/13, 10:43 PM
Anonymous said...: Bridge Over the River Koi?; 6/23/13, 10:45 PM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: Or should "play" be subsumed and assumed to be part of a lackadaisical surviving sister who grew all her body parts correctly.; 6/23/13, 10:45 PM
Unknown said...: Brigham Young had some good ideas.; 6/23/13, 10:47 PM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: Yo no se koi; 6/23/13, 10:47 PM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: ... dip in.

That's a betamax koi if I ever heard one.; 6/23/13, 10:51 PM
Anonymous said...: Larry, Moe and Koily.; 6/23/13, 10:52 PM
Anonymous said...: I Am Going to Try an Experiment to Determine the Depths of My Althouse Comment Addiction: I Will Not Post a Comment for the Next Twenty-Four Hours.

God, Give Me Strength. And -- Please -- No Robot Posts.; 6/23/13, 10:53 PM
Ann Althouse said...: But I have a Google alert on "robot."; 6/23/13, 10:55 PM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: Why are Chevy Koivettes considered a middle age essential.

Life's imponderables quirk kois.; 6/23/13, 10:57 PM
Icepick said...: But I have a Google alert on "robot."

Aaaaannnnddddd betamax's head goes "POP!"; 6/23/13, 11:00 PM
Chip Ahoy said...: Did you know there is a beekeeping merit badge I like that bee. I bought one to sew onto a t-shirt for the heckofit.

To disarm it. The t-shirt is too severe. Clingy and oil-pan gray, now it's friendly.

Previous Althouse koi. This odd anim gets a low but steady stream of visitors for some reason from around the world.

My own fish inhabit a tank that forms a dividing wall to a room. On one side a table long enough to use for laundry so I fold my clothes there and I try to freak out the fish by popping fabrics in their faces but they're used to the clothes-popping freakouts and now they just hover there steady in aquarium-space facing me watching the odd clothes folding show and nothing I do freaks them out. Then today I showed them the picture on the fish food container and they both freaked the f out, I mean dove to the other side and dug into the plants then came back, like the picture of a fish was intolerable. So that's my new freakout thing. Those are the two large angelfish, the 40 or so smaller ones, whose collective mass does not come close to equaling the mass of the two large ones, take their cues from the two large fish. The two angels are the tetra's dither fish. Without the angels, the tetras would be scared as poopoogerts. ))crack(( scatter.

On the short side, the jut-into-the-room side, I have positioned one of those coffeehouse type stools, a tall chair for a tall table, and sit there and the fish come straight over like two little puppies, and the 2 schools of tetras follow them, while I hand feed the little dummkopfs who just float there gobbling flakes that I drop in front of their two gaping mouths like they can't even see the flakes, they go all blind gobblegobblegobble.

Then they get full, their stomachs bulge out and stop eating but stay there as long as I do. Today I was eating chips and they just hovered there watching me.; 6/23/13, 11:04 PM
effinayright said...: "That Shakespeare fellow was quite the card...."

Yes, and according to Christopher Wren, he should have been dealt with.; 6/23/13, 11:09 PM
effinayright said...: Ann, do you use filters for your blues and greens?

If so what?; 6/23/13, 11:11 PM
Unknown said...: Poor Betamax. Now we're just toying with him.; 6/23/13, 11:28 PM
bagoh20 said...: I have noticed that the greens in most of the cafe photos recently look oversaturated to my eye, but it could just be the acid.; 6/23/13, 11:30 PM
Titus said...: Just returned from Ptown to hear what is hot for this summer. My contact is like the mayor and she knows the rules gave me the lowdown. Next weekend is Berkshires and rest, relaxation, yoga, rejuvy, finding our third eyes and Jacob's Pillow and Tanglewood...but I digress.

This is what is hot and will arrive in Jesusland, in approximately 9 months, even if you don't like it, because we make the list and even Walmart reluctantly responds with cheap knockoffs.

The list has been made, now abide pubes:

Kale
No coffee because of cals but just pop a Vivarin.
Going to 5 star restaurants and paying a boat load but only having 2 bites.
Puking.
Enema packs for 2.
Social responsibility-give or volunteer for a cause that you are passionate about.
Testim/Androgel and vicodin
Lena Dunham
Hillary!
Bristol/Joan in Wife Swap.
Rolling your pant legs up while wearing Pradas with LACES but no sock. All pant legs should actually be rolled up, it's the law.
Dining shirtless with flat front Tom Ford chinos.
Large breed rare dog and or a rescue, from the South, that everyone can automatically say, where did you get it? Reply? Hickory, NC, snicker snicker, natch.
Eastern European captial and northeast of U.S.
Romania.
Poland.
Michael Bastian.
John varvatos
Lobster Roll minus celery, bread and mayo.
Pecs, abs, glutes, bis and tris-which seem to never go out of style. Fur or no fur is ok this season.
Daft Punk's album Random Access featuring Pharell and Gioriga Moroder.
Drake.
Power lesbians who are hot and now actually have white children.
New York City.
Wealth, power and influence.
Organic and ecosmart slimfit white t's.
Fresh organic and local strawberries.
Kansas.
Children of all ethnicities.
Expensive baby carriages.
31 inch waist.
Gay friendly straights with children, as well as Grandparents taking their grand fag to Miss Richie 1981 performances at the Crown and Anchor.
Aaron Hernandez.
Money.
Being thin at any age.
No bras.
Brown University.
Exotic, expensive, unusual bottles to carry your water.
Monogamy.

Now get to work bitches.; 6/23/13, 11:40 PM
Anonymous said...: I got the no bra and kale thing, woo hoo! I'm ahead of the game!; 6/23/13, 11:57 PM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: Aaron Hernandez is under suspicion of murder...

?!?; 6/23/13, 11:59 PM
Chip S. said...: Kansas, sure. That makes perfect sense.

But Brown? NFW will that ever be hot.; 6/24/13, 12:09 AM
Chip Ahoy said...: The giraffe has the longest neck in the animule kingdom which makes them particularly difficult to lasso, and with their extraordinarily long legs they are proper bastards to saddle up and mount so you scarcely ever see them being ridden. But, Thally here ith not particularly clever with acathia thornth

Also, my thithter, I mean my sister did not believe when I was talking about yeast, CO2 and alcohol production and such so I made this to show her. It's yeast starter that fills a condom with air. But I should make a new one since now I have a real camera.

I had that experiment running when Dr. Fred dropped by, it was between us on the table as we conversed, a jar active with yeast filling a condom with air, it goes pulse pulse pulse pulse pulse ))) boing ((( and Fred cracked up laughing. I deflated it. We continued conversing, it refilled, Fred cracked up again at the boing part, deflated, refilled, cracked up at the boing part over an dover Fred cracked up every 7 minutes at the boing like a little kid because the jar was really active, then he took the jar home.

That meant certain death to the yeast. There was no way he would keep a thing like that active. You have to feed it and drain it off and use if for bread, no way would he do any of that but he took the jar anyway.; 6/24/13, 12:23 AM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: Aaron Hernandez is under suspicion of murder...

Of course...
He share things with the Tsarnaevs.; 6/24/13, 12:30 AM
Anonymous said...: My house is one street away from the rim of a deep canyon that forms an odd bit of wilderness in the heart of the city. If you go to the entrance to the canyon there's a baseball diamond, some tennis courts and a rec center, all landscaped but past that it turns into a red dirt road running alongside a creek sheltered by tall eucalyptus trees. A couple hundred yards in, you barely know you are in a city.

Sometime in the past five years a coyote family -- mother and two offspring -- moved into the canyon. I would occasionally see them in the deeper part of the canyon. The city put out signs warning of their presence, but otherwise left the coyotes alone. Which struck me as a questionable decision since small children play in the canyon and walkers take their pets along its trails for exercise. The web tells me coyote can sprint over 40 mph and scale fences over twelve feet high.

Occasionally late at night, in response to a police or ambulance siren, the coyotes would start howling back and I could hear them from my house. But I haven't heard them in over a year and I wonder if they are still there, whether they finally ran afoul of humans somehow or decided to move on.; 6/24/13, 12:35 AM
chickelit said...: But Brown? NFW will that ever be hot.

Chip, you're forgetting the P-town anthem, Brown Reason To Live.; 6/24/13, 12:36 AM
Chip S. said...: OK, warm maybe. But not hot.; 6/24/13, 12:44 AM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: I've been meaning to comment on the so called Chinese curse "May you live in interesting times"... what I found for it on the Wikipedia as it relates to what is not strange and unfamiliar anymore.

A traditional Chinese idiom which seems to be similar is translated from ("寧為太平犬，不做亂世人") as:
--- "It's better to be a dog in a peaceful time than be a man in a chaotic period."
It is reported that it was the first of three curses of increasing severity, the other two being:
--- "May you come to the attention of those in authority" (sometimes rendered "May the government be aware of you"). This is sometimes quoted as "May you come to the attention of powerful people." (Alternately, "important people".)

--- "May you find what you are looking for." This is sometimes quoted as "May your wishes be granted."

I think the transgender first grader pretty much synched it for me.; 6/24/13, 1:05 AM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: Not that there is anything wrong with that, I said.

Not at all, they said.; 6/24/13, 1:16 AM
Palladian said...: Kale? Varvatos? LOL. Poor Titus, about 2 years behind the trends. What a drag it is getting old.; 6/24/13, 2:17 AM
Palladian said...: Coffee has 1 calorie per 250 ml.

Oh wait, are we talking about pussies who put milk and sugar in coffee?; 6/24/13, 2:19 AM
Palladian said...: Poverty, obesity and genius is what's in, cunt.; 6/24/13, 2:19 AM
David said...: Bubbles? Is that you? A miracle! You survived the Great Flush.; 6/24/13, 2:51 AM
Chip Ahoy said...: The reason for being is for paying your debts in raisins.

No srsly, earlier I was learning words by the dozens, and I mean dozens, signs wot there aint no wurdz 4 so now kids are making them up, like for STEM in ASL, and I was taken aback right off because I was thinking, "damn, man, why are you doing all the sourpuss faces? What's with all the duck lips faces? Can't you try to be neutral for the video like a normal person? But some of them are neutral so I got over myself. Words like Jupiter, light year, photosynthesis, concatenation, boolean, encapsulation,

but then words like kilobytes, clients, complexity, classes, geometry, chemical engineering, and events are already broadly known but those are entries for STEM, go figure.

So, anyhoo, what they're doing over there on STEM is spelling the word, then "sign" then their proposed sign.

But the way they're saying "sign" is backwards. They're actually saying "roll." Most of them are.

"Sign", index fingers upright both make a bicycle wheel rolling backwards, in place in front of signer. I've been doing this since I was knee-high to a grasshopper -- giant Madagascar grasshopper, buggers are 14 feet tall, but still, a long time.

They're all going the opposite way and also sloppily, the fingers are not upright, and they're not pointing at each other either as in the word "roll."

"roll" index fingers pointing at each other, bicycle wheel moving away from signer.

Everybody presently agrees the sign for "roll." It used to be the sign for "go." So if you encounter an elderly person who is resistant to changing their elderly ways, they will oddly appear as hipsters by saying such things as "let's roll," or "I gotta roll," for "go."

So there's that. I mention it because once I said the word "world" backwards, it's a similar thing, what difference does it make anyway? I actually never did know which direction "world" rolls, but it didn't matter to me coming or going. But the guy I was speaking to suddenly broke off laughing

AT me

then turned to a side group and repeated what I did exaggerating the backwardness as if I did it exaggeratedly and they all laughed

AT me

And I'm still kind of pissed off at that.

But that wasn't so bad as the second time in Cancun when a waitress asked me directly, "How many of you are there? Cuantos?" ~..~..~.. doodlee doodlee doodlee do ~..~..~..~ flashback to Spanish 101, text for this situation says, [we are two] careful about the "are" estar=temporary ser=permanent, as if you are married, therefor,

"Estamos dos."

And she burst out laughing right

AT me

all the way through the restaurant. The type of place that buys the place next door and uses the space in between and uses the space intended for parking in back and opens it all up to tables, so we were seated way through the back in the back of the back to what would be a back yard and she laughed the entire way and to this day I do not know what was so funny.; 6/24/13, 4:17 AM
Saint Croix said...: The tagging post had me clicking on an abortion tag and re-reading some of old posts. That was a bit eye-opening. Some of my posts are highly effective, I think. I re-read them and I'm like, oh, that's really good.

Other posts, ugh.

And the other posts go bad almost entirely due to tone. Telling Achilles he's a pagan baby-killer just like the ancient Greek Achilles!

Obviously the point of something like that is to make somebody shut the hell up. And it's obviously fascist and mean. And ineffective! And I know this, I've been to frickin' law school, I know how to argue. I've been to church, I'm supposed to love my enemies.

Embarrassing.

I think all pro-lifers, but particularly myself, should use the opportunity Althouse has given us to do the journalism the journalists are not doing. Which means provide people with facts, facts, facts. Link to articles, link to photographs, link to information. Attack the argument, not the person.

I know I've influenced Inga, because she was nice enough to say so. Maybe I've influenced other people too.

Althouse yelled at me for being disrespectful, and repeating myself, and she explained how nobody was listening to me when I mischaracterize the Supreme Court cases. She was mad.

The truth, of course, is that lots of pro-lifers have influenced other people. I am a perfect example. My parents had no opinion about abortion, and said nothing to me about it. My school said nothing to me about it. Sex education? Ha! Fallopian tubes, that's all I remember.

When I was 24, I was helping a girl write a research paper on abortion. And I started off pro-choice--the default, non-thinking position in American society, since our media controls how this issue is portrayed--and I read an opinion piece about our death statutes.

Boom, I was convinced. Brain death statutes, apply them, solve that infanticide thing, there you go.

Althouse has also said, "I have been very respectful of your ideas." It's not my idea! I read it somewhere. Another pro-lifer put that idea in my head.

All I had was the pro-life dogmatic belief that human life has value and must be protected. And I believe liberals are dogmatic on this issue, too. They just dehumanize the baby, that's all. Like slave-owners dehumanized Africans.

Remind liberals of the humanity of the children we create. Wake up their hearts. We can do this. I can do this. I just have to watch my fucking temper.

Sorry, Achilles, I was rude.; 6/24/13, 4:38 AM
Saint Croix said...: It's natural to get angry about baby-killing. And pro-lifers are often angry, particularly on the internet. But we must control our anger, attack arguments but never people, and always take the high road. It's very effective.

For instance, Althouse loves her some Casey. It's the most feminist of the abortion cases. The Supreme Court is talking about abortion in the loftiest of terms.

It's largely fact-free and drives me up the wall. That entire case could be summed up in one sentence. "We replace our trimester shit with our new undue burden shit." And the rest is speech, speech, speech.

The Casey opinion does not realize it's dishonest. Because, of course, they are not trying to deceive anyone. But they're writing thousands and thousands of words about "choice" while they neglect to discuss abortion at all. That's a very basic and obvious self-deceit.

Carhart, on the other hand, is grounded in facts. The Supreme Court had been requiring the D&E procedure for 20 years or so, and for the first time they are discussing the actual procedure. And they are appalled!

So we must understand that our opponents--like the pro-slavery Americans who wrote our Constitution--are good people, with good hearts. It's just in this one tiny area, they are doing and saying some monstrous things.

I believe, since Jefferson was a smart man, if they had an internet in his day, he would have heard a lot of shit from abolitionists. And he would say, "I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just." And I would say, what about you, Tom? Are you protecting bad slave-owners, the rapists and killers and kidnappers?

Hey, did you hear that speech from Frederick Douglass? Boy, he's smart. What do you think, Tom?

I'm getting pissed at Jefferson just thinking about it! But he's not a monster. He's a good man. We just have to figure out how to wake him up.; 6/24/13, 4:49 AM
Aridog said...: creeley23 said...

I haven't heard them in over a year and I wonder if they are still there, whether they finally ran afoul of humans somehow or decided to move on.

The female(s) ran afoul of something and decided to move on...or she is dead.; 6/24/13, 5:41 AM
Rusty said...: Titus said...
Just returned from Ptown to hear what is hot for this summer. My contact is like the mayor and she knows the rules gave me the lowdown. Next weekend is Berkshires and rest, relaxation, yoga, rejuvy, finding our third eyes and Jacob's Pillow and Tanglewood...but I digress.

This is what is hot and will arrive in Jesusland, in approximately 9 months, even if you don't like it, because we make the list and even Walmart reluctantly responds with cheap knockoffs.

The list has been made, now abide pubes:

Kale
No coffee because of cals but just pop a Vivarin.
Going to 5 star restaurants and paying a boat load but only having 2 bites.
Puking.
Enema packs for 2.
Social responsibility-give or volunteer for a cause that you are passionate about.
Testim/Androgel and vicodin
Lena Dunham
Hillary!
Bristol/Joan in Wife Swap.
Rolling your pant legs up while wearing Pradas with LACES but no sock. All pant legs should actually be rolled up, it's the law.
Dining shirtless with flat front Tom Ford chinos.
Large breed rare dog and or a rescue, from the South, that everyone can automatically say, where did you get it? Reply? Hickory, NC, snicker snicker, natch.
Eastern European captial and northeast of U.S.
Romania.
Poland.
Michael Bastian.
John varvatos
Lobster Roll minus celery, bread and mayo.
Pecs, abs, glutes, bis and tris-which seem to never go out of style. Fur or no fur is ok this season.
Daft Punk's album Random Access featuring Pharell and Gioriga Moroder.
Drake.
Power lesbians who are hot and now actually have white children.
New York City.
Wealth, power and influence.
Organic and ecosmart slimfit white t's.
Fresh organic and local strawberries.
Kansas.
Children of all ethnicities.
Expensive baby carriages.
31 inch waist.
Gay friendly straights with children, as well as Grandparents taking their grand fag to Miss Richie 1981 performances at the Crown and Anchor.
Aaron Hernandez.
Money.
Being thin at any age.
No bras.
Brown University.
Exotic, expensive, unusual bottles to carry your water.
Monogamy.

Now get to work bitches.

6/23/13, 11:40 PM

Too contrived.; 6/24/13, 5:42 AM
Rusty said...: Or \better
honey. If you have to buy your cool, you ain't cool.

Tits.; 6/24/13, 5:44 AM
edutcher said...: Interesting line from Insta True The Vote founder Catherine Engelbrecht was targeted by not only the IRS, but also the FBI, the ATF, and OSHA.

It’s like they don’t want anyone looking into voter fraud. Why might that be?

More and more, it's no longer such a stretch.

Is it?

Inga said...

I got the no bra and kale thing, woo hoo! I'm ahead of the game!

That was her act at the Officers' Club in the Fuhrerbunker.

No, you don't want to know...; 6/24/13, 6:04 AM
Aridog said...: A cafe thread and St Croix happens to hint at a topic that puzzles me. Troubles me actually. I am fundamentally pro-life, but I make exceptions for exigent circumstances...such as the woman who sought abortion for a physically deformed child twin. Add in rape and incest to a relatively lessor degree [caveat: please, no further discourse on eugenics...I get the point, but not convinced].

The basic question for me is this: Is a woman obligated, in the pro-life philosophy, to carry a baby to term under such exigent circumstances as known physical deformity? If so, why? Who is the God-decider here on earth? Even if atheist , why would you bring a child in to the world full term from a brief period, only to live in misery for a much longer period, in the case of the physically deformed. [Caveat: Please, skip Steven Hawkings...how many Steven Hawkings are there in the entire history of time?]

Finally, the hardest question, at least for me: Who and why does anyone else get to decide that a young woman must be a mother of a physically deformed child? If said woman makes her decision within the 1st or 2nd trimester, how is she "wrong." Who gets to decide it is her obligation to radically change her own life ... and why?

In the case cited here earlier where the chest & abdomen were developing abnormally to a significant degree, a life threatening degree for the child, ... how is even 3rd trimester abortion any different than pulling the life support for very ill person with zero recovery potential? I know with certainty that full delivery can be made and the infirm child can be euthanized humanely....the Dr Goslen procedure is not necessary.; 6/24/13, 6:05 AM
rhhardin said...: I've been watching Jodrell Bank's webcam for a few weeks.

Britain never has a sunny day, is my conclusion.

Mt. Wilson is better for an astronomy mood lift.

Or Sydney NSW harbor for nighttime day viewing.; 6/24/13, 6:25 AM
Aridog said...: Drudge is headlining [at present] Senate to vote on [immigration] bill before reading it.

Why is this not illegal? Can it be made illegal under the Constitution? How does a representative "represent" a constituency by this method? Could not a law be drafted on one sheet of paper that specified that all bills be both read and analyzed by GAO and OMB, and published, before a vote is taken? Analysis would clarify the frequent citations to other statues that Joe Sixpack won't or can't research.

Short of declarations of war and spot defense appropriations for troops in the field, in my time in both the military and as a Fed, I've never seen anything so critical as to justify voting before reading and comprehending.

WTF?

Pssst: Yeah, I know I am hallucinating about unicorns and rose scented song bird flatulence ... I mean, how else does a government travel promotion agency amendment [Sen Reid ] get attached to an immigration bill, right? Oh, wait...why is there a federal travel promotion agency in the first place? More not reading?; 6/24/13, 6:25 AM
KCFleming said...: That's supposedly a fish in the picture.

But boys named Coy define themselves as girls, and gays define themselves as married.

So I say that is not a fish, but a weed, and weeds are bad, so it's okay to pull the weeds.

Personal feelings permit a single person to define the world for everyone else. The "reasonable man" definition is dead.

So koi are weeds and that's my definition, and you have nothing to say about it.; 6/24/13, 7:15 AM
pm317 said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 6/24/13, 7:20 AM
pm317 said...: I agree with this.. Who cares what the motives of the source are and Gregory is asking that question of Greenwald only because he is a Obama poodle. {BTW, I am surprised that Ben Smith wrote what he wrote. What has come over him?}.; 6/24/13, 7:20 AM
KCFleming said...: The Chief Justice agrees with me, given his "tax not a penalty" redefinition.

Palladian felt I had dissolved into parody for pointing out the current meaninglessness of words, but it's hard to out-parody real life, where judges can say that a boy is a girl and a penalty is a tax.; 6/24/13, 7:22 AM
pm317 said...: Aridog said...

----------------

I hear you. In fact I would go further and say that it unnerves me to think (intellectually) that I would be responsible for another being's misery (the Buddha moment) so much so that I would decide not to have a child at all. I know that is extreme but when the woman does know that the future-child will have a life of misery, the decision should be best left up to her conscience.; 6/24/13, 7:32 AM
pm317 said...: For those who don't want to click the buzzfeed link in my previous comment, here is a little teaser:

You Don’t Have To Like Edward Snowden

Reporters have always been comfortable ignoring their sources’ motives. Now everybody else needs to get used to that. posted on June 23, 2013 at 2:37pm EDT
Ben Smith BuzzFeed Staff; 6/24/13, 7:36 AM
lemondog said...: Did you know that Tolstoy as a schoolboy went to Hanoi to fish for koi that he ate with soy and a side of poi?; 6/24/13, 8:41 AM
Anonymous said...: I looked up the coyotes / canyon scene on the web. Apparently the coyotes have been there as far back as 2004. They migrated down from Marin. (There is videotape of coyotes crossing the Golden Gate Bridge late at night.)

The coyotes are becoming more of a problem. The city has put up more warning signs. There have been face-offs with dogs walking in the park.

The city's solution: start giving $118 tickets to dog owners for allowing their dogs off-leash.; 6/24/13, 8:42 AM
Saint Croix said...: Is a woman obligated, in the pro-life philosophy, to carry a baby to term under such exigent circumstances as known physical deformity? If so, why?

We all want our children to be happy and healthy. Nobody wants a blind kid, or a deaf kid, or a child in a wheelchair.

Their life is going to be harder because of the handicap. And, let's not kid ourselves, our life as a parent is going to be harder.

But our life is going to be harder any time we have a baby. A baby will demand our time, energy, support. They are a need machine.

I have no sympathy for people who kill their child. My sympathy is with the weak and the helpless. Liberals taught me that. Liberals taught me to speak truth to power.

You, as the adult who created the child, are the powerful. Step up and do what you know is right.; 6/24/13, 8:44 AM
Saint Croix said...: I will say more! The number of handicapped children has increased dramatically because we have told people to put off marriage, put off having a baby, put off being an adult. Enjoy your extended childhood! That's what we say.

But your child will be healthier if you get pregnant in your 20's.

In other words, it's our society's choices that are creating a lot of these handicapped children. And then we kill them because they are not what we want.

It's the me, me, me generation. And we are the worst parents ever.; 6/24/13, 8:45 AM
Anonymous said...: The closest I got to the coyotes was once at dusk about fifteen yards away. All three of them were huddled together off the trail to my right, just watching. They looked like dogs, only leaner with more angular features. I felt like I could walk up and pet them, but I knew I couldn't.

However, what bothered me was that twenty yards to my left was a small building used as a children's summer camp.

I think it's neat to have coyotes in the middle of San Francisco. I get that. But I put children and pet dogs way over coyotes in the city.

San Francisco is a Sanctuary City for illegal immigrants, so predictably SF Animal Control is bending over backwards with policies for humans, pets and coyotes to "coexist" as officials put it on the proliferating warning signs.

No. Trap them and remove them.; 6/24/13, 8:59 AM
Meade said...: Palladian said...
"Kale? Varvatos? LOL. Poor Titus, about 2 years behind the trends. What a drag it is getting old."

Ha ha. Cool woud be growing ornamental kale in an old pair of Varvatos boots you bought in SOHO a dozen years ago. Hot: Italian wedding soup.; 6/24/13, 9:07 AM
Saint Croix said...: I don't have kids, by the way. As far as I know, always have to qualify it.

Everybody's selfish, everybody's a sinner. Including me, all the time.

Children are the only thing that redeem us. Love, I should say, will redeem us. But if we can't love our own children, we are really in trouble.; 6/24/13, 9:13 AM
Freeman Hunt said...: Two of our sons burst into our bedroom at four in the morning, demanding to see the supermoon.

Space is a popular subject around here.

The resulting lack of sleep meant that much of soccer camp was spent lying in the grass. So it goes.; 6/24/13, 2:15 PM
dbp said...: A small bird has built a nest, complete with egg to sit on, in our garage. It is close-by to the door from the house to the garage and the bird flies out of the nest everytime we walk by, which is often, given the location.

Middle daughter (13) has taken it upon herself to be the bird's protector and is bossing everybody around about not bothering "Fantine" as she has named "her".

I have pointed out to her that it could be the male which is sitting on the egg or even both parents taking turns--they may well look alike.

I don't see it working out well but who knows? She (see even I am doing it now) didn't fly out when I got home today, so maybe Fantine is getting used to us.; 6/24/13, 5:41 PM
Meade said...: dbp, it sounds like they could be Carolina or House Wrens.; 6/24/13, 5:53 PM
dbp said...: Thanks Meade.

Could well be: I pulled up an image on Google and it looks right--though it is too shy for a close examination.; 6/24/13, 6:08 PM
Meade said...: Very sweet that your daughter assigned herself protector. Wrens are shy but they like to nest near human habitat. If it is a wren family, you and your family could be in for a treat. The parents mate for life, share in raising the young, keep a very clean nest, and often return year after year to raise more broods.; 6/24/13, 6:41 PM
Meade said...: Freeman, you are raising a couple of lunatics!; 6/25/13, 5:30 PM