Latest Dappled Things

Received the latest Dappled Things in the mail the other day.

I read through it.

The poetry is so good. So good.

Those aren't books

INTERVIEWER:

What do you think of e-books and Amazon’s Kindle?

BRADBURY:

Those aren’t books. You can’t hold a computer in your hand like you can a book. A computer does not smell. There are two perfumes to a book. If a book is new, it smells great. If a book is old, it smells even better. It smells like ancient Egypt. A book has got to smell. You have to hold it in your hands and pray to it. You put it in your pocket and you walk with it. And it stays with you forever. But the computer doesn’t do that for you. I’m sorry.

From a Paris Review interview with Ray Bradbury

Just Because

Garden Sprawl Friday

The West Coast Seeds 2011 catalog came in the mail the other day. That means dreaming about growing things as winter descends.



This one has, as usual, new seeds among the ones they always have; not new in the sense that they are new hybrids, but new in the sense that they haven't been featured before by the company. I've only browsed through it briefly, but already know I want to try those Cipollini onions in the bottom left corner:

Jury Duty

I have been officially "summoned".

An intimidating word.

I wonder, will it be like 12 Angry Men?

Because that movie was super realistic.

Olympic Mail

From John Taschereau:

Well, family and friends, it’s the day before the 2010 VANCOUVER WINTER OLYMPICS - the Vancouver Olympics have finally come. The story of Whistler’s original development is truly fascinating — from its very inception decades ago it was built purposefully to host an Olympic event one day, due to its spectacular beauty, location, and snow, and that day has finally come. Whistler was originally founded to host an olympic event.

For those that know the area, everyone is always taken aback by the astonishing beauty of the World Famous Sea to Sky highway with its glacial vistas, its majestic peaks and deep fjords lavishly strewn with islands of all sizes and shapes. It's considered one of the most beautiful places on earth and no-one argues it’s title. It is quite something to share it with the world.

At the BC Legislature, there is a door reserved for heads of state. It’s the centre arch. No-one, including the Premiere, can walk through it, unless he is accompanying a head of state and otherwise uses the doors to the side of the arch. Today would have been a rare occasion for him to pass under the arch as Prime Minister Stephen Harper came to address each of us: the province and the country.

Google has done a special Street View for the Whistler slopes which brings you as close as anyone can get.

Apparently, the opening ceremony Oh Canada theme is incredible. The few that haver heard it say it’s astounding. Also, and confirmed, CTV’s Canadian "I Believe" song for these games has become № 1 on iTunes beating out all the major pop stars.

Our family went to see the torch when it passed through Cloverdale. The excitement of this not-even-once-in-a-lifetime-event is pretty crazy.

I have to admit that I have retained a deliberately, exceptionally guarded position of “least fan boy”, but tonight, I am sure everyone can feel the excitement that is absolutely everywhere and completely pervasive. The atmosphere is absolutely charged. You can feel it! Anything human is never perfect, and we all have our own sensitivities to ideas about who benefits and other uses for the money being spent. However, C’est une afait acomplis. We democratically went forward with this, proposed and started by a left (NDP) government under Clarke and manifested under the right (Liberal) by Campbell. For better or worse, we collectively have a decision to live with. Like all of life, we can make what we want out of what is before us.

The Olympics are FINALLY is here — after YEARS OF WAITING since the announcement, and for some, long, long before. I hope everyone enjoys everything they can out of this tremendously unique opportunity and take delight in wishing everyone a FANTASTIC TIME!

Enjoy the Games Everyone! GO CANADA GO!!! And as Stephen Harper proposed, let’s check our obsessive national humility at the door for once.

All the Best!
— John

I agree: "Like all of life, we can make what we want out of what is before us", and, "...let’s check our obsessive national humility at the door for once".

Those protesters are not my cup of tea, as much as I may side with their views and as much as I don't care for competitive sports.

I don't know for sure, but the ones who would protest at the Olympic opening are probably those people who like it when people dislike them; that is, they are not happy until they generate antagonism towards themselves, and they feel they are getting somewhere by doing this. In short, they are little Michael Moores.

They hurt the justice they want to work towards.

From the Mailbox

You know you're a fan when you actually hope that the sign is real - and then start wondering to yourself about what other kinds of street signs could be similarly adapted.

The pass of Caradhras with a slash through it...for No U-Turns?

The Handiwork of Vancouver Police

The only wrong thing he did was open his door to the police (Oh, we were supposed to go to the basement suite door instead - whoops). Watch the video of this man's injuries:

http://ca.yahoo.com/s/1128766

Bones around his eye broken; lacerations and bruising to the knees; back and sides thumped swollen and deep red.

You have to wonder about headlines that use words like, "alleged beating".

Or as John Taschereau writes in an e-mail concerning the release of the article he links to below:

"HERE WE HAVE THE VANCOUVER POLICE Chief desperately trying to fool the reader into thinking the police were “just doing their job” while they ARRESTED AND MERCILESSLY BEAT UP THE WRONG MAN.

And it’s worse than that…Turns out the guy was not even resisting arrest which begs the question: why the police beat the shit out of someone who was not resisting arrest?

And why did the police originally say the man was resisting arrest?

We have two crimes against a law abiding citizen by a corrupt police force.

The answer is because the LAW in this country no longer stands for anything other than the inside boys club of what they can get away with. BC citizens will have to take it to the face a bunch more before they decide the police and the RCMP need to be disbanded and a new, local force put in place.

Vancouver police chief says innocent man beaten by officers did not resist.

Regrettably, the police cannot be trusted. When this kind of thing happens, they are criminals."

Go to the link John provides for an article that gives some details of the case, which took place 2:20 a.m. Wednesday (Jan. 20).

Most of the articles so far, as well as the video linked to above, use words that try to focus one's attention on it being a "wrongful arrest" of "mistaken identity". Well yes, they got the wrong guy. But that doesn't mean beans in this case. One of the sources even uses the words that Yao Wei Wu was "roughed up" during the arrest.

No, actually; he was severely beaten the second he opened up his door.

Vancouver, which is going to host the winter Olympics this February, may have one of the most corrupt police forces around. In the past few years, story after story has come out about beatings - and drunk-driving (then fleeing the scene) - but especially the beatings, and the use of stupid, over-aggressive force, leading to death.

The most well-known to date is the case that took place, and which was caught on video, three years ago at Vancouver airport. Robert Dziekanski, fresh from Poland to be with his mother, after being held in some area of the airport, was shot with Tasers five times, only 25 seconds after police arrived. The first shot brought him to the ground where he started convulsing. The officers proceeded to shoot him with Tasers four more times, and Dziekanski died.

Confiscation and suppression of the video; a lot of testimonies made by the officers in court totally contradicted by evidence later brought out; corrupt investigation into the case; it can be gleaned in this wikipedia article.

Here's the video:



One of the officers involved in the Dziekanski case was later involved in a drunk-driving accident, where he fled the scene and went home where - so he testified - he drank some vodka to calm himself down, and then walked back to the scene whereupon he was given the breath-test.

Police corruption in Vancouver goes back some:

"The Vancouver Police was at the centre of one of the biggest scandals in the city's history in 1955. Feeling frustrated that blatant police corruption was being ignored by the local media, a reporter for the Vancouver Daily Province switched to a Toronto-based tabloid, Flash. He wrote a sensational article alleging corruption at the highest levels of the police department in Vancouver, specifically, that a pay-off system had been implemented whereby gambling operations that paid the police were left alone and those that did not were harassed. After the Flash article appeared in Vancouver, the allegations could no longer be ignored, and a Royal Commission, the Tupper Commission, was struck to hold a public inquiry. Chief Constable Walter Mulligan fled to the United States, another officer from the upper ranks committed suicide, and still another attempted suicide rather than face the inquiry.[5] Other scandals and public inquiries plagued the force before and since this one, dubbed "The Mulligan Affair," but none were so dramatic." --wikipedia

How Cold Is It?

My Friend John writes the following:

Edmonton −60°c

The forecast for Edmonton was about −40° celsius, −50° Celsius with windchill. Today Edmonton reached −48° Celsius without windchill, −60° Celsius with windchill!

Let’s discuss that for a moment, shall we? How cold is −60? Edmonton’s temperature, −60 Celsius, is the Eutectic Point for all biological life. The Eutectic Point is the point at which all entropy (activity) stops in molecular biophysics. All activity stops in biological molecules. That includes decomposition. That includes oxidization. That means whatever biological material is −60 will no longer be alive, but also not decay or change in any way due to internal activity (there is none). Commercially, it’s the lowest temperature used by mankind in practical application. It’s used for “superfreezing” foods. It’s so cold that meat a foot thick will “freeze to the bone” quickly. Super-frozen foods don’t discolour and look as fresh as when they were super-frozen once thawed. That’s not subjective, it’s fact. There will have been no ability for any decomposition, decay or oxidization to change the biological matter. Science uses temperatures lower than −60, but they are uncommon and not commercial in nature. Most frozen foods are actually done much warmer than −60 as well. −60 is the premium of flash freezing.

For all intents and purposes, −60 is as good as anything colder. Anything colder really makes absolutely no difference to any form of life. Activity in molecules stops and from there it only effects atoms. That’s cold! Finger skin starts freezing at −10° Celsius. At −30° Celsius, any exposed skin freezes in 20 minutes or less. If a person’s core temperature reaches 23° Celsius, they will have a heart attack, respiratory failure, pulmonary edema and die. Edmonton is very cold! I’ve been there at −30 or so (without windchill). I can’t imagine −50!

--John Taschereau