This isn't the first time you've written about cars.
No. But then I'm usually mulling on one make and model in particular. Usually it's something that's near and dear to my own heart, or something that I consider noteworthy against the entire backdrop of cars. The Toyota Corolla for example, venerable nameplate that it is, isn't really noteworthy for anything but being an efficient, compact family car.
So what's on the menu today? The Fuller Dymaxion?
Not hardly. But that's worth a look so by all means, click the link. No, today is about your car. The hoopy in the driveway. Let's talk a little about that, and maybe a bit about the phrase "high performance."
My car's just a compact sedan. No high performance in it.
Yes, there is. There's the usual paradigm of high performance, making more power and going faster, which is fun in its own way. Then there's taking what you've got, and making the most of what you have.
Chances are that, like most Americans, you aren't trying to race your car. You just want to get there. And you want to do it while spending no more money than necessary because, well, who has money to waste? Not me, that's for sure. So you're going to make your car do more than it usually does
Is this going to be about fuel efficiency?
Some of it, not all of it. Some of it is just about making the car better.
First, an engine oil change is never a bad thing. Oil is what keeps your engine from grinding itself to powder. Under ideal conditions, there is virtually no actual metal-to-metal contact inside your entire engine wherever there are moving parts. They should all be floating on a microscopically thin film of oil and in a well-cared for engine, that's actually pretty much the case. But as oil ages in an engine, crud gets suspended in the oil and bridges the entire gap from one part to another, like a rock big enough to rest on the streambed and still poke out high enough for you to step on. So change the oil and filter and get that gunk out of there on a regular basis.
I change mine every 3,000 to 5,000 miles. You can go longer - no car manufacturer recommends an oil change interval that short, and in fact some Porsche models have 20,000-mile oil change intervals specified in the owner's manual. But my paradigm is this: cars are expensive. Engines are expensive. Oil isn't cheap either, but for the price of a new engine to replace the one you have, you can buy several hundred thousand miles' worth of oil changes. So I'll go ahead and change the oil.
That's basic maintenance. Anything earth-shattering in this post?
No. Nothing earth-shattering. Just record-breaking.
Keep your oil fresh. Keep your tires aligned - that's important - and the excess weight aboard to a minimum. Change the transmission fluid once in a blue moon while you're at it. What about the lubricant in the final drive? Many front-drive cars won't have this (it would be part of the transaxle), but if you're in a pickup truck, it's that big pumpkin back there between the rear wheels. It has a quart or two of lubricant in there...unless you've never checked the level. In which case you might be due for topping it up, or at least changing it with new.
You talk a good game, but can you offer any proof?
Yes. I'm a member of ecomodder.com, a fuel-efficiency enthusiasts' site. Among other things, the site features the Garage, where you can record your vehicle's performance results as you adopt new driving styles and modify your vehicle for better performance. With subtle changes in behavior, you can make your car deliver fuel mileage far in excess of what it's rated. My truck is supposed to whistle up mileage in the 25-27mpg range; I've recorded mileage in excess of 39mpg on a couple of trips, and tend to average 30-33 without working hard at it. You probably won't do as well as 33% above the EPA rating, but it isn't impossible either. NOTE: my average is down lately because I drive the truck so little that fuel is evaporating out of the tank. That's important to remember: fuel sitting around unused can actually just disappear.
What else can you do? Now that you're making the most of an unmodified vehicle, let's think about modifying it.
Do you listen to the radio, or do you just have an MP3 player plugged in? If you never tune the radio, take the antenna off. That's a little frontal area removed, and some turbulent drag too.
That's pretty small change. How sure are you that this will work?
I'm positive. Every little bit helps. The less drag there is, the less your engine has to do, and the less gas you have to burn to get around. You have to change your driving behavior first so you aren't driving in a wasteful manner, and doing it consistently. Once you've got that nailed, you can really start to see how all these changes add up.
Try replacing your existing wheel covers with ones that are smooth. The wheels are big whirling air buckets; if you can cover the bucket, the whirling isn't as much of an issue. It means you give up some style points, but if you're like most people, the car isn't for show. It's just a tool to get you back and forth, and saving money counts for more than style.
If you drive a sedan, add a spoiler to the trunk lid. This effectively makes the back of the car higher, and helps raise the trunk lid's edge into the smooth airflow zone tumbling off the back edge of the roof. Hot VWs magazine discovered the classic "Herrod Helper" spoiler bumped up their mileage on their "mileage motor" project (getting a classic aircooled VW Beetle to deliver something close to 40mpg at 65mph like other modern cars) by 2mpg - nothing to sneeze at. Not the silly wing style spoilers, just a little airdam lip poking up. It makes a difference. But to be sure, you have to test it with the spoiler on, then off, and compare results. This requires some datalogging. But if you aren't that meticulous or just don't feel like investing that much energy in it, a couple of coast-down tests can get the job done: find a spot where you can start at a known speed and let the car coast down, out of gear, to a slower known speed. Whichever configuration takes you a longer distance before slowing to the lower speed is the better one.
Add wheel skirts. At this point you have to get creative, because you can't just go and find wheel skirts to fit your car, not anymore. You're going to have to make them. Right now during election season there's lot of campaign signs around, and those things are made of Coroplast, which is the perfect material for making do-it-yourself wheel skirts. Cut them to fit inside your wheel arches, and make them go as far down over the rear wheels as they will without rubbing. If you don't want to screw them in, try sticking them on with 3M Command Strips or super-high-power rare earth magnets.
If I already have the smoothie wheel covers, do I need the wheel skirts?
Yes. In fact you want both if you can have them. The wheel covers reduce how much drag the wheel itself experiences - drag that your engine has to overcome. The wheel skirts reduce how much drag the car's body generates, and that's another reduction.
The single biggest recommendation I have: slow down. Nothing increases your fuel burn like driving fast. The slower you go, the better, down to the limit where the automatic (if your car has one) will continue to hold highest gear and the torque converter locked. If yours is a manual, your best mileage is probably right down there around idle speed, but that is generally not practical. Most engines don't like that in any case.
Where are you going in such a rush? Maybe if you left ten minutes earlier, you could cruise at a slower pace, arrive less stressed and having burned way less fuel per mile in the process. Life doesn't have to be a constant hurry. I've found that every car I've ever driven seemed to be especially happy right around 45mph, some of them seemed to barely even be running. Don't try to comment saying that your car does better at thus-and-such a speed and does even better when it goes faster, because then you're asking me to disregard physics. I'm too scientifically minded to disregard physics, especially for a hearsay report.
That's it. Drive slower, do a little super-easy wrenching, save money.
Saturday, August 4, 2012
Friday, August 3, 2012
Hell Freezes Over!
Fox News and I agree on something.
A young lady working the drive-through window at a Chick-Fil-A on the so-called "Support Chick-Fil-A Day" was harrassed and belittled by a customer who drove up for the free water and a captive audience.
She kept her cool. Rachel - no word on her last name and maybe she'd like to keep it that way - never raised her voice, kept her cool and let the guy have his little rant. No harsh language, even when he became insulting.
Fox News got hold of the video before the original was deleted and ran with it. Big mistake, posting video of yourself being a jerk to people. Sometimes you get caught before you realize how big a jerk you were and try to hide it. So Fox News' commentators hang the guy out to dry, and he richly deserves it. It isn't about who's gay or straight, who's married or not, who's working where or for what reason...
NEWS FLASH: the guy who shot the video? Yeah, he's fired. His boss won't tolerate that kind of thing. Nasty turnaround, when your intolerance gets you intolerated. That's a hot, juicy slice of irony right there.
...it's about personal behavior and rights. The lady has the right to work there if they'll employ her. The company itself never issued a statement regarding anything, it is the company's principals who did that. And being a jerk to a random stranger who has no power over any of that is just plain hateful.
And THAT's what it's all about. Accusing someone of hating and intolerance is a risky business when you think about it. Too often, the finger you point should be pointed at yourself.
A young lady working the drive-through window at a Chick-Fil-A on the so-called "Support Chick-Fil-A Day" was harrassed and belittled by a customer who drove up for the free water and a captive audience.
She kept her cool. Rachel - no word on her last name and maybe she'd like to keep it that way - never raised her voice, kept her cool and let the guy have his little rant. No harsh language, even when he became insulting.
Fox News got hold of the video before the original was deleted and ran with it. Big mistake, posting video of yourself being a jerk to people. Sometimes you get caught before you realize how big a jerk you were and try to hide it. So Fox News' commentators hang the guy out to dry, and he richly deserves it. It isn't about who's gay or straight, who's married or not, who's working where or for what reason...
NEWS FLASH: the guy who shot the video? Yeah, he's fired. His boss won't tolerate that kind of thing. Nasty turnaround, when your intolerance gets you intolerated. That's a hot, juicy slice of irony right there.
...it's about personal behavior and rights. The lady has the right to work there if they'll employ her. The company itself never issued a statement regarding anything, it is the company's principals who did that. And being a jerk to a random stranger who has no power over any of that is just plain hateful.
And THAT's what it's all about. Accusing someone of hating and intolerance is a risky business when you think about it. Too often, the finger you point should be pointed at yourself.
Irony in the News
Just remember: these are the representatives YOU voted for. And now, with little finished and lots left to do, Congress is taking a vacation.
When's the last time you took five weeks off from anything? Unless you've just had a baby, probably not since middle school have you had a full five weeks off. Granted, those elected representatives are probably kissing hands and shaking babies to build some currency with their constituents, but still...
My tax dollars are paying for the big gorgeous office, the expensive house in the DC Metro area, not to mention YOUR PAYCHECK (yeah, I'm talking to you, Fleischmann). So get your ass back in there and get back to work. I don't get five weeks off, and neither do you. If you want my vote at election time, earn it by doing some ACTUAL WORK, not by wandering the bizarre gigantic congressional district and gladhanding the voters.
And another thing: before you guys ever vote yourselves another pay raise, first ask us, the people paying the taxes that are the revenue behind the raise, whether WE approve it.
When Chick-Fil-A's founder and head honcho, S. Truett Cathy and his son Dan Cathy, stepped up to a mic and announced their support for traditional marriage, it raised one almighty ruckus.
As I said in a previous post, CFA is a privately owned company. The Cathys can do what they want with it. That includes using it as a bully pulpit, if they want.
But the thing about pulpits is that they usually have congregations. Here in the Southeast in particular, that means lots of conservative Christians. Our favorite CFA had to go to the nearby grocery store twice on Thursday, "Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day," a grassroots support for the Cathys and for CFA. They had to go to the store because they were out of bread for their sandwiches. Sales were off the charts.
So even though CFA is in the news for something that isn't necessarily good - alienating an entire segment of the population - it's getting lots of coverage, and coverage means recognition. And today is supposed to be "CFA Kiss Day," when gay couples go to CFA and make out.
What do you want to bet some are hungry and want a sandwich? No matter how you slice it, CFA is riding this crazy train all the way to the bank.
Obama thinks he's discovered the linchpin to the 2012 election. He says it's Virginia. There's a good chance he's right, and I'm not certain that this is an ironic bit of news. I'm just putting it here for future reference. We'll know whether this was ironic in November.
Russia is calling for UN monitors to remain in Syria to help maintain their struggle toward a democratic government. That whole sentence is ironic. Russia fighting for anybody's democracy in any capacity is just weird to someone who grew up during the peak of the Cold War.
When's the last time you took five weeks off from anything? Unless you've just had a baby, probably not since middle school have you had a full five weeks off. Granted, those elected representatives are probably kissing hands and shaking babies to build some currency with their constituents, but still...
My tax dollars are paying for the big gorgeous office, the expensive house in the DC Metro area, not to mention YOUR PAYCHECK (yeah, I'm talking to you, Fleischmann). So get your ass back in there and get back to work. I don't get five weeks off, and neither do you. If you want my vote at election time, earn it by doing some ACTUAL WORK, not by wandering the bizarre gigantic congressional district and gladhanding the voters.
And another thing: before you guys ever vote yourselves another pay raise, first ask us, the people paying the taxes that are the revenue behind the raise, whether WE approve it.
When Chick-Fil-A's founder and head honcho, S. Truett Cathy and his son Dan Cathy, stepped up to a mic and announced their support for traditional marriage, it raised one almighty ruckus.
As I said in a previous post, CFA is a privately owned company. The Cathys can do what they want with it. That includes using it as a bully pulpit, if they want.
But the thing about pulpits is that they usually have congregations. Here in the Southeast in particular, that means lots of conservative Christians. Our favorite CFA had to go to the nearby grocery store twice on Thursday, "Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day," a grassroots support for the Cathys and for CFA. They had to go to the store because they were out of bread for their sandwiches. Sales were off the charts.
So even though CFA is in the news for something that isn't necessarily good - alienating an entire segment of the population - it's getting lots of coverage, and coverage means recognition. And today is supposed to be "CFA Kiss Day," when gay couples go to CFA and make out.
What do you want to bet some are hungry and want a sandwich? No matter how you slice it, CFA is riding this crazy train all the way to the bank.
Obama thinks he's discovered the linchpin to the 2012 election. He says it's Virginia. There's a good chance he's right, and I'm not certain that this is an ironic bit of news. I'm just putting it here for future reference. We'll know whether this was ironic in November.
Russia is calling for UN monitors to remain in Syria to help maintain their struggle toward a democratic government. That whole sentence is ironic. Russia fighting for anybody's democracy in any capacity is just weird to someone who grew up during the peak of the Cold War.
Thursday, August 2, 2012
When Smart Becomes Dumb
I enjoy the Syfy show, "Eureka."
Not-quite-random aside: remember when the channel's name was "Sci-Fi?" They're leaning away from the name so they can run stuff that isn't SF. Too bad. SF shows work hard to get their story across, and generally they're pretty smart fare. But moving on!
"Eureka" is set in a fictional town, called Eureka (no state specified, but you get the feeling they're implying that it's in Oregon), that is entirely a government think tank and skunk works. Filled chockablock with geniuses and gee-whiz scientific gimcrackery, it's a special effects and visual effects director's dream/nightmare. Things fly or hover that shouldn't, cars drive themselves (or at least comment on your driving), the sheriff's gun shoots plasma bolts, et cetera.
Actually, the sheriff's gun doesn't shoot plasma bolts. The deputy's gun does.
The sheriff is Jack Carter (please note the tip o' the cap to Burroughs' famous character John Carter), an otherwise ordinary guy who, through a few happy accidents, becomes the head lawman in this unusual town. One of the defining characteristics of Jack Carter is that in Eureka, he's not just average. In the regular world where his 111 IQ would be merely average, he is in fact at the very bottom of Eureka's barrel. His own daughter's 157 IQ places her squarely in the middle of the pack among Eureka's brainy populace.
You would think that, lacking as much mental horsepower as the rest of the folks, Jack would be sorely outgunned at just about everything that goes on in Eureka. This being a fictional TV show of course, that isn't the case, but it brings to light many truths in the real world, too.
Very often in the show Jack is faced with a stupefying array of jargon and concepts that go way beyond his experience, and which stress his ability to even understand the problem at hand. But you don't get to be a US Marshal, and then recommended to be a sheriff for such a place as highly advanced as Eureka, by being stupid. He has an innate ability to cut directly to the underlying foundations of the problems at hand. The technologies and concepts are actually secondary - address the problem itself, using whatever technology and concept necessary while disregarding the complexities of those elements themselves, and the problem is fixed. It's a highly pragmatic, very effective approach to problem solving. I think any cop in the world could see the basic truth of this, and it stands to reason that, as a cop, Jack does exactly that.
I was watching video earlier today of the crewmen aboard the ISS entering the Spacex Dragon capsule once it had been mated to the Station. Flight Engineer Pettit can be seen, in the video, clicking a pen and writing (he's a lefty) on a pad, and it reminded me of the old "Space Pens."
Note: as a lefty, Space Pens are my kryptonite. The ink rubs right off the paper, directly onto my hand as it drags along the page behind the pen. This was a much greater problem with the so-called "erasable pens," and it's a truism of pens and indeed pencils in any case with lefties, but as a direct result of my handedness I never consider Space Pens to be much of a muchness.
The legend that NASA spent a huge sum of money to develop a pen for use in space is false. It was independently developed and the inventor invited NASA to try it out. They tried it, and used several.
Where does Eureka and Jack Carter's practicality come into this? Another show - I forget which - portrayed a disgusted Russian engineer pooh-poohing the Space Pen. "You spend meeelions of American dollars inventing fancy pen. We fly with pencil. Ten cents!"
NASA stuck with the pen - and Russia adopted it too - because of the assorted and demonstrable dangers associated with wood shavings aloft in a pure oxygen atmosphere aboard the spacecraft, dust and graphite bits from broken leads getting into electronics and machinery (not to mention lungs). The pen is actually a much better solution in a free fall environment. But on the face of it, if there weren't a free fall environment, the pencil would be even better.
What other places is there such a thing as being too smart? I recently watched a video of a 12-year-old Canadian girl holding the banking industry to task for running her country's debt into the billions of dollars for no demonstrable purpose other than to generate profits. She appears to be right, and her solution is not only simple but doable. Regardless of how old the kid is, when she lays it all out it's so simple it appears to be a crime, how the country's debt is handled. If she can figure it out, why couldn't somebody else, somebody ostensibly smarter, more experienced, better informed?
It would appear that they're too smart. This also starts to get into the neighborhood of "sacred cows," elements that have been in place for so long that nobody knows exactly why they're there, but they're treated as if they cannot be altered for any reason.
This is like when we were stuck with a disabled car on vacation. We rented a car to get around while we waited for our van to be repaired, but dismayed at how much time we were losing. Finally Son #2 said, "I wish we could just keep the rental, and keep going." Wish, indeed. We proceeded on our vacation with the rental car, having lost only a day. We got it back by paring off a long sightseeing leg of the trip.
How much of our economy's inflation is generated by activity that doesn't really have to be there? What are, exactly, commodities futures? When an investor buys commodities futures, he does so knowing that he has no use for the commodities themselves. He's purchasing their value, gambling on the possibility of being able to sell them at a profit. He does this by buying them now at a low price and hoping to sell them at a high price in the future, or he does it by guaranteeing to buy in the future while paying now, hoping that their value in the future will have increased against his original purchase price. Some of it is valid, like farmers buying insurance against their own harvests...but some is just capitalists gambling on the market, trying to make money out of thin air.
How productive is that? Not a bit. All it is, is shuffling numbers back and forth. I fail to see how commodities futures does anything useful for the economy, except drive up prices. Driving up prices doesn't necessarily drive up value, it only means that somebody has somehow managed to make the pie bigger so he can cut an extra slice out for himself...and we, the actual consumers, have to pay for this new, bigger pie that doesn't have any extra food in it. Eliminate artificial pie inflation and you eliminate a portion of inflation in general.
Is inflation necessary for a healthy economy? I don't think so. But I'm not that good at economics so I don't have many bullets in my gun where that's concerned. But I think the world's producer economy is rapidly approaching a cliff. There are only so many material goods you can have before you have enough and don't want any more. I have enough cars, enough houses, enough refrigerators and MP3 players. I buy food and that's about all. Other things I buy tend to be used or old - which is to say, they're already made and the only way they add to the economic machine is that I pay the person who found it for selling it to me. No wages, no taxes, no production.
We're looking for new ways to house the world's burgeoning population, new ways to power their many many cars and homes and feed their teeming masses. The new ways are brilliant, just staggering concepts vividly imagined and carefully considered. It's the work of geniuses.
Wouldn't it be better to stop having so many babies? Then we don't need gigantic cities that can house 20 million people in a space no larger than Manhattan. We don't have to come up with ways to feed a world population of 12 billion people.
I know it sounds kind of a simplistic answer. That doesn't mean it isn't a smart answer. It cuts to the foundation of the problem at hand. It doesn't gamble.
More on this later.
Not-quite-random aside: remember when the channel's name was "Sci-Fi?" They're leaning away from the name so they can run stuff that isn't SF. Too bad. SF shows work hard to get their story across, and generally they're pretty smart fare. But moving on!
"Eureka" is set in a fictional town, called Eureka (no state specified, but you get the feeling they're implying that it's in Oregon), that is entirely a government think tank and skunk works. Filled chockablock with geniuses and gee-whiz scientific gimcrackery, it's a special effects and visual effects director's dream/nightmare. Things fly or hover that shouldn't, cars drive themselves (or at least comment on your driving), the sheriff's gun shoots plasma bolts, et cetera.
Actually, the sheriff's gun doesn't shoot plasma bolts. The deputy's gun does.
The sheriff is Jack Carter (please note the tip o' the cap to Burroughs' famous character John Carter), an otherwise ordinary guy who, through a few happy accidents, becomes the head lawman in this unusual town. One of the defining characteristics of Jack Carter is that in Eureka, he's not just average. In the regular world where his 111 IQ would be merely average, he is in fact at the very bottom of Eureka's barrel. His own daughter's 157 IQ places her squarely in the middle of the pack among Eureka's brainy populace.
You would think that, lacking as much mental horsepower as the rest of the folks, Jack would be sorely outgunned at just about everything that goes on in Eureka. This being a fictional TV show of course, that isn't the case, but it brings to light many truths in the real world, too.
Very often in the show Jack is faced with a stupefying array of jargon and concepts that go way beyond his experience, and which stress his ability to even understand the problem at hand. But you don't get to be a US Marshal, and then recommended to be a sheriff for such a place as highly advanced as Eureka, by being stupid. He has an innate ability to cut directly to the underlying foundations of the problems at hand. The technologies and concepts are actually secondary - address the problem itself, using whatever technology and concept necessary while disregarding the complexities of those elements themselves, and the problem is fixed. It's a highly pragmatic, very effective approach to problem solving. I think any cop in the world could see the basic truth of this, and it stands to reason that, as a cop, Jack does exactly that.
I was watching video earlier today of the crewmen aboard the ISS entering the Spacex Dragon capsule once it had been mated to the Station. Flight Engineer Pettit can be seen, in the video, clicking a pen and writing (he's a lefty) on a pad, and it reminded me of the old "Space Pens."
Note: as a lefty, Space Pens are my kryptonite. The ink rubs right off the paper, directly onto my hand as it drags along the page behind the pen. This was a much greater problem with the so-called "erasable pens," and it's a truism of pens and indeed pencils in any case with lefties, but as a direct result of my handedness I never consider Space Pens to be much of a muchness.
The legend that NASA spent a huge sum of money to develop a pen for use in space is false. It was independently developed and the inventor invited NASA to try it out. They tried it, and used several.
Where does Eureka and Jack Carter's practicality come into this? Another show - I forget which - portrayed a disgusted Russian engineer pooh-poohing the Space Pen. "You spend meeelions of American dollars inventing fancy pen. We fly with pencil. Ten cents!"
NASA stuck with the pen - and Russia adopted it too - because of the assorted and demonstrable dangers associated with wood shavings aloft in a pure oxygen atmosphere aboard the spacecraft, dust and graphite bits from broken leads getting into electronics and machinery (not to mention lungs). The pen is actually a much better solution in a free fall environment. But on the face of it, if there weren't a free fall environment, the pencil would be even better.
What other places is there such a thing as being too smart? I recently watched a video of a 12-year-old Canadian girl holding the banking industry to task for running her country's debt into the billions of dollars for no demonstrable purpose other than to generate profits. She appears to be right, and her solution is not only simple but doable. Regardless of how old the kid is, when she lays it all out it's so simple it appears to be a crime, how the country's debt is handled. If she can figure it out, why couldn't somebody else, somebody ostensibly smarter, more experienced, better informed?
It would appear that they're too smart. This also starts to get into the neighborhood of "sacred cows," elements that have been in place for so long that nobody knows exactly why they're there, but they're treated as if they cannot be altered for any reason.
This is like when we were stuck with a disabled car on vacation. We rented a car to get around while we waited for our van to be repaired, but dismayed at how much time we were losing. Finally Son #2 said, "I wish we could just keep the rental, and keep going." Wish, indeed. We proceeded on our vacation with the rental car, having lost only a day. We got it back by paring off a long sightseeing leg of the trip.
How much of our economy's inflation is generated by activity that doesn't really have to be there? What are, exactly, commodities futures? When an investor buys commodities futures, he does so knowing that he has no use for the commodities themselves. He's purchasing their value, gambling on the possibility of being able to sell them at a profit. He does this by buying them now at a low price and hoping to sell them at a high price in the future, or he does it by guaranteeing to buy in the future while paying now, hoping that their value in the future will have increased against his original purchase price. Some of it is valid, like farmers buying insurance against their own harvests...but some is just capitalists gambling on the market, trying to make money out of thin air.
How productive is that? Not a bit. All it is, is shuffling numbers back and forth. I fail to see how commodities futures does anything useful for the economy, except drive up prices. Driving up prices doesn't necessarily drive up value, it only means that somebody has somehow managed to make the pie bigger so he can cut an extra slice out for himself...and we, the actual consumers, have to pay for this new, bigger pie that doesn't have any extra food in it. Eliminate artificial pie inflation and you eliminate a portion of inflation in general.
Is inflation necessary for a healthy economy? I don't think so. But I'm not that good at economics so I don't have many bullets in my gun where that's concerned. But I think the world's producer economy is rapidly approaching a cliff. There are only so many material goods you can have before you have enough and don't want any more. I have enough cars, enough houses, enough refrigerators and MP3 players. I buy food and that's about all. Other things I buy tend to be used or old - which is to say, they're already made and the only way they add to the economic machine is that I pay the person who found it for selling it to me. No wages, no taxes, no production.
We're looking for new ways to house the world's burgeoning population, new ways to power their many many cars and homes and feed their teeming masses. The new ways are brilliant, just staggering concepts vividly imagined and carefully considered. It's the work of geniuses.
Wouldn't it be better to stop having so many babies? Then we don't need gigantic cities that can house 20 million people in a space no larger than Manhattan. We don't have to come up with ways to feed a world population of 12 billion people.
I know it sounds kind of a simplistic answer. That doesn't mean it isn't a smart answer. It cuts to the foundation of the problem at hand. It doesn't gamble.
Saturday, July 21, 2012
Chick-Fil-A Isn't Wrong, But Isn't Right Either
It's become a news item - why the hell does it have to be a news item? - that Chick-Fil-A, a fast food establishment that focuses on chicken-based dishes, has an anti-gay stance.
So what? So do lots of churches, individuals, and assorted other organizations. What's the big deal?
Well, the big deal is the Chick-Fil-A is a service company. They provide a service, but they propound a philosophy that alienates a segment of the population. That's just bad business. More on that in a moment.
What other organizations have an anti-gay stance? The Boy Scouts of America, for one thing. Never mind that evidence exists that Robert Baden-Powell, founder of the Boy Scouts, himself might have had a homosexual pedophilic inclination of his own, they are a privately held organization with a deeply religious foundation. As such, their philosophy isn't something that can be regulated by government. They are their own deal, and should be. And how to deal with their anti-gay stance is simple:
If you find that objectionable, don't join the Boy Scouts. I did join the Scouts, but shouldn't have. I didn't enjoy it very much, though there were a few lessons that stick to this day. The most useful ones have had to do with how to tie assorted knots, but I picked some of those up from my dad, and Dad was never inclined to recommend anything as harebrained as a winter campout, so on balance Dad wins out as a more trustworthy former of young minds than the BSA.
So, back to Chick-Fil-A. I'm going to be completely honest, I love Chick-Fil-A. The food is very good and did you know that if you asked them nicely, they'll make a lunch sandwich for your breakfast? It takes a few minutes extra, but it's no problem at all. Anywhere else you go, the lunchtime menu is simply not available and won't be until 11:00 or so; Chick-Fil-A's people (in my admittedly limited experience of exactly ONE store on Clinton Highway in Knoxville, TN) are extremely pleasant, accommodating, and efficient. You want the chicken club sandwich for breakfast? "Just take a seat and we'll bring it to you when it's ready." Table service at a fast-food joint, no less. The quality of service at CFA blows everyone else out of the water.
But now here's this other matter: CFA's anti-gay stance, or to be more precise, anti-gay marriage stance. Well, that bugs me a little - it's kind of like being bitten by a dog you like. I like CFA and that isn't going to change, but I stand firmly in approval of gay marriage rights. I don't think that's a right that should be withheld from anyone for any reason.
As comedian Denis Leary says, "Gay people should absolutely have the right to marry each other. Then they too can harbor years of resentment, bicker about bills and be generally miserable just like everyone else."
I never understand where comedians are coming from when they say stuff like that. I don't harbor resentments or bicker with my wife. If I did, we wouldn't have gotten married.
The Bible-based argument against gay marriage is right there in black and white, and since CFA is both privately owned and operated by a devout Southern Baptist who takes his denomination seriously, he's totally within his rights to use his company as a bully pulpit, if he wants, to make his convictions known. I hope he backs away from them just a bit, however: as I said, alienating a portion of your market is just bad business. If it bites you on the ass, you have no one to blame but yourself. But again since it's a privately held company, no one else will be blaming you, either.
One of the arguments I keep hearing against gay marriage is this: that it somehow dilutes straight people's marriages. How is that, exactly? I only married the one person, the only dilution my marriage can experience is going to come from exactly two people: her or me. No sign of that yet.
No, if you really want to prevent the devaluation of marriage, don't get divorced. Make the commitment and stick to it. I think it's asking too much to do something as crazy as outlaw divorce, people change over the course of years and undisclosed preexisting issues can come to light that cause intolerable interpersonal strain. Divorce has to exist as an option. But the fact that it does exist, in my mind, is one of those things that makes marriage even stronger. If I've been married for forty years when I could've gotten divorced at any time, doesn't that simply point up the depth of my commitment? Not lashed to each other by laws or religious tenets, our marriage is what the Bible intended for it to be in the first place: a permanent, voluntary union of souls, not an artificially enforced union of government assets or religious practitioners.
My point, at the end of all this verbiage, is the Chick-Fil-A is actually doing marriage no favors. Not in my opinion.
And on an aside, it's absolutely stupid of Boston (yes, the city) to disallow Chick-Fil-A to open any locations because of their professional convictions. They're many of the same convictions espoused by churches of many different denominations; have they disallowed any churches?
So what? So do lots of churches, individuals, and assorted other organizations. What's the big deal?
Well, the big deal is the Chick-Fil-A is a service company. They provide a service, but they propound a philosophy that alienates a segment of the population. That's just bad business. More on that in a moment.
What other organizations have an anti-gay stance? The Boy Scouts of America, for one thing. Never mind that evidence exists that Robert Baden-Powell, founder of the Boy Scouts, himself might have had a homosexual pedophilic inclination of his own, they are a privately held organization with a deeply religious foundation. As such, their philosophy isn't something that can be regulated by government. They are their own deal, and should be. And how to deal with their anti-gay stance is simple:
If you find that objectionable, don't join the Boy Scouts. I did join the Scouts, but shouldn't have. I didn't enjoy it very much, though there were a few lessons that stick to this day. The most useful ones have had to do with how to tie assorted knots, but I picked some of those up from my dad, and Dad was never inclined to recommend anything as harebrained as a winter campout, so on balance Dad wins out as a more trustworthy former of young minds than the BSA.
So, back to Chick-Fil-A. I'm going to be completely honest, I love Chick-Fil-A. The food is very good and did you know that if you asked them nicely, they'll make a lunch sandwich for your breakfast? It takes a few minutes extra, but it's no problem at all. Anywhere else you go, the lunchtime menu is simply not available and won't be until 11:00 or so; Chick-Fil-A's people (in my admittedly limited experience of exactly ONE store on Clinton Highway in Knoxville, TN) are extremely pleasant, accommodating, and efficient. You want the chicken club sandwich for breakfast? "Just take a seat and we'll bring it to you when it's ready." Table service at a fast-food joint, no less. The quality of service at CFA blows everyone else out of the water.
But now here's this other matter: CFA's anti-gay stance, or to be more precise, anti-gay marriage stance. Well, that bugs me a little - it's kind of like being bitten by a dog you like. I like CFA and that isn't going to change, but I stand firmly in approval of gay marriage rights. I don't think that's a right that should be withheld from anyone for any reason.
As comedian Denis Leary says, "Gay people should absolutely have the right to marry each other. Then they too can harbor years of resentment, bicker about bills and be generally miserable just like everyone else."
I never understand where comedians are coming from when they say stuff like that. I don't harbor resentments or bicker with my wife. If I did, we wouldn't have gotten married.
The Bible-based argument against gay marriage is right there in black and white, and since CFA is both privately owned and operated by a devout Southern Baptist who takes his denomination seriously, he's totally within his rights to use his company as a bully pulpit, if he wants, to make his convictions known. I hope he backs away from them just a bit, however: as I said, alienating a portion of your market is just bad business. If it bites you on the ass, you have no one to blame but yourself. But again since it's a privately held company, no one else will be blaming you, either.
One of the arguments I keep hearing against gay marriage is this: that it somehow dilutes straight people's marriages. How is that, exactly? I only married the one person, the only dilution my marriage can experience is going to come from exactly two people: her or me. No sign of that yet.
No, if you really want to prevent the devaluation of marriage, don't get divorced. Make the commitment and stick to it. I think it's asking too much to do something as crazy as outlaw divorce, people change over the course of years and undisclosed preexisting issues can come to light that cause intolerable interpersonal strain. Divorce has to exist as an option. But the fact that it does exist, in my mind, is one of those things that makes marriage even stronger. If I've been married for forty years when I could've gotten divorced at any time, doesn't that simply point up the depth of my commitment? Not lashed to each other by laws or religious tenets, our marriage is what the Bible intended for it to be in the first place: a permanent, voluntary union of souls, not an artificially enforced union of government assets or religious practitioners.
My point, at the end of all this verbiage, is the Chick-Fil-A is actually doing marriage no favors. Not in my opinion.
And on an aside, it's absolutely stupid of Boston (yes, the city) to disallow Chick-Fil-A to open any locations because of their professional convictions. They're many of the same convictions espoused by churches of many different denominations; have they disallowed any churches?
Thursday, July 5, 2012
Stay Fired, Lopez
Tomas Lopez is a lifeguard with a conscience.
Monday, July 02, Lopez was alerted by beachgoers that a man was in distress and needed his assistance. Lopez immediately arranged for other lifeguards to cover his station and ran to help.
Typical everyday drama, right? Handsome young fellow pelting across the sand to provide CPR or first aid. Except there's a twist to this story: Lopez got fired for doing his job.
These things don't happen in a vacuum, of course. Lopez wouldn't get canned just for saving somebody. It turns out that two pertinent things happened in conjunction with this event: the man in distress was way outside his zone - completely outside the zone that is covered by the company that provides the lifeguard services and is Lopez' employer - and Lopez had to leave his station to provide the assistance.
It's one thing that he had to leave his station. Ideally, there's two lifeguards at every station: one to provide assistance when needed, the other to continue watching the water while one is away. Lopez says his station was covered while he was away.
But Lopez wasn't just outside his zone. He sprinted a full quarter-mile to go aid the victim. The victim had already been brought up to the beach by the time Lopez arrived, but Lopez, along with the assistance of an off-duty nurse, stabilized the victim and monitored his condition until an ambulance arrived. Then he returned to his duty station, filled out an incident report, and was fired.
According to the company's spokesman, it was because he had violated company rules against leaving his station. Lopez, in his own defense, is unrepentant. He's quoted in a Miami Herald article as saying, "...someone needed my help. I wasn't going to say no." Good on you, Lopez. That's the right attitude.
The company's defense that Lopez' actions opened them up to liabilities because of the unguarded station is weak. Lopez says other lifeguards watched his station while he went to assist the swimmer who was swimming in an unprotected area. Here's where the relationship breaks down.
Lopez is hired as a lifeguard. Thankfully this young man - he's only 21 - has ironclad principles and stands by them. He's a lifeguard, someone's in trouble, he's helping out. That's the equation he works under. Not exactly in his area? Okay - he's going after the trouble regardless. But the company's policy of punishing workers who deliver above and beyond the sharply delineated boundaries of its service area is caddish to the extreme.
There are three ways this could have played out. Let's look at them:
Lopez does nothing
Imagine the PR nightmare for both the company and Lopez if, suffering and drowning a mere fifty yards beyond the service boundaries, Lopez had adhered to company policy and not moved to provide assistance to a drowning victim? He would be covered by company policy, but would suffer dreadfully in the public eye...and the company would, too. It's slightly less damning if it happens a solid quarter-mile away, but still not great.
Lopez acts and is punished
This is where we are now. Lopez is a hero but Jeff Ellis and Associates is coming out of this looking like some serious beancounting, coldhearted bastards. Sorry guys, that's just how it looks. And turning around in the heat of public scrutiny to offer Lopez his job back doesn't make it better.
Lopez acts and is lauded
The best bet would have been if someone at JEllis had given Lopez an "Over The Top" gift card for dinner somewhere. He leapt into action, overdelivering and generally saving the day like a hero. Open the company up to liability, maybe - but there were other workers on hand to continue protecting the service area. Add a sound bite to any interviews, something like "Well, we don't actually police that part of the beach. Mr. X got crazy lucky that Lopez was able to help in a timely fashion. Violate company policy? Well, in a word, yes. It is a violation. But he helped save a man's life, so I think we can let that slide."
As you can see, the best option would be for Lopez to act - which he did, thus holding up his end of the social contract - and to not be punished for saving someone's life. That that action stands in violation of an arbitrary company policy is beside the point and should not come into play, not in this instance. You don't take disciplinary action against people who are helping other people, not when the actions the helpers take aren't in violation of any law. Go ahead and make it clear that policy exists, policy whose intent is to protect the company from ill intent, but don't let it be what defines your company's culture.
And that brings us to the current conundrum. JEllis is offering Lopez his job back. I don't think he should take it.
"And why not?" You might ask. "It's a tough job market, you know." Indeed it is, but there are some jobs you just shouldn't take. If the company's kneejerk reaction to delivering far in excess of the company's promised coverage is to fire the individual who actually did the delivery, he should stay the hell away. They don't deserve him.
Will he be inundated with job offers? I don't know, but I certainly hope so. If this young man's instinct is to bust his ass to save mine, regardless of whether it's his job to do so, that's somebody I'd definitely want to keep around, and put on the payroll. I should think that any company that has any kind of customer service would be extremely fortunate to have Lopez on its side.
Good luck to you, Tomas Lopez. You've earned it.
Monday, July 02, Lopez was alerted by beachgoers that a man was in distress and needed his assistance. Lopez immediately arranged for other lifeguards to cover his station and ran to help.
Typical everyday drama, right? Handsome young fellow pelting across the sand to provide CPR or first aid. Except there's a twist to this story: Lopez got fired for doing his job.
These things don't happen in a vacuum, of course. Lopez wouldn't get canned just for saving somebody. It turns out that two pertinent things happened in conjunction with this event: the man in distress was way outside his zone - completely outside the zone that is covered by the company that provides the lifeguard services and is Lopez' employer - and Lopez had to leave his station to provide the assistance.
It's one thing that he had to leave his station. Ideally, there's two lifeguards at every station: one to provide assistance when needed, the other to continue watching the water while one is away. Lopez says his station was covered while he was away.
But Lopez wasn't just outside his zone. He sprinted a full quarter-mile to go aid the victim. The victim had already been brought up to the beach by the time Lopez arrived, but Lopez, along with the assistance of an off-duty nurse, stabilized the victim and monitored his condition until an ambulance arrived. Then he returned to his duty station, filled out an incident report, and was fired.
According to the company's spokesman, it was because he had violated company rules against leaving his station. Lopez, in his own defense, is unrepentant. He's quoted in a Miami Herald article as saying, "...someone needed my help. I wasn't going to say no." Good on you, Lopez. That's the right attitude.
The company's defense that Lopez' actions opened them up to liabilities because of the unguarded station is weak. Lopez says other lifeguards watched his station while he went to assist the swimmer who was swimming in an unprotected area. Here's where the relationship breaks down.
Lopez is hired as a lifeguard. Thankfully this young man - he's only 21 - has ironclad principles and stands by them. He's a lifeguard, someone's in trouble, he's helping out. That's the equation he works under. Not exactly in his area? Okay - he's going after the trouble regardless. But the company's policy of punishing workers who deliver above and beyond the sharply delineated boundaries of its service area is caddish to the extreme.
There are three ways this could have played out. Let's look at them:
Lopez does nothing
Imagine the PR nightmare for both the company and Lopez if, suffering and drowning a mere fifty yards beyond the service boundaries, Lopez had adhered to company policy and not moved to provide assistance to a drowning victim? He would be covered by company policy, but would suffer dreadfully in the public eye...and the company would, too. It's slightly less damning if it happens a solid quarter-mile away, but still not great.
Lopez acts and is punished
This is where we are now. Lopez is a hero but Jeff Ellis and Associates is coming out of this looking like some serious beancounting, coldhearted bastards. Sorry guys, that's just how it looks. And turning around in the heat of public scrutiny to offer Lopez his job back doesn't make it better.
Lopez acts and is lauded
The best bet would have been if someone at JEllis had given Lopez an "Over The Top" gift card for dinner somewhere. He leapt into action, overdelivering and generally saving the day like a hero. Open the company up to liability, maybe - but there were other workers on hand to continue protecting the service area. Add a sound bite to any interviews, something like "Well, we don't actually police that part of the beach. Mr. X got crazy lucky that Lopez was able to help in a timely fashion. Violate company policy? Well, in a word, yes. It is a violation. But he helped save a man's life, so I think we can let that slide."
As you can see, the best option would be for Lopez to act - which he did, thus holding up his end of the social contract - and to not be punished for saving someone's life. That that action stands in violation of an arbitrary company policy is beside the point and should not come into play, not in this instance. You don't take disciplinary action against people who are helping other people, not when the actions the helpers take aren't in violation of any law. Go ahead and make it clear that policy exists, policy whose intent is to protect the company from ill intent, but don't let it be what defines your company's culture.
And that brings us to the current conundrum. JEllis is offering Lopez his job back. I don't think he should take it.
"And why not?" You might ask. "It's a tough job market, you know." Indeed it is, but there are some jobs you just shouldn't take. If the company's kneejerk reaction to delivering far in excess of the company's promised coverage is to fire the individual who actually did the delivery, he should stay the hell away. They don't deserve him.
Will he be inundated with job offers? I don't know, but I certainly hope so. If this young man's instinct is to bust his ass to save mine, regardless of whether it's his job to do so, that's somebody I'd definitely want to keep around, and put on the payroll. I should think that any company that has any kind of customer service would be extremely fortunate to have Lopez on its side.
Good luck to you, Tomas Lopez. You've earned it.
Monday, June 25, 2012
Tastes like 'Possum
There's a line in the movie The Matrix where one character, Mouse, suggests that the machine overlords that run the Matrix couldn't figure out what chicken actually tasted like. So to compensate, the machine overlords made chicken taste like a lot of other stuff. And since we eat chicken more than we do, say, rattlesnake, chicken becomes the yardstick we measure against instead of those other things. Alligator tastes like chicken, frog legs taste like chicken.
There is no Matrix of course, but it does raise a few questions along the way to its unsatisfying conclusion. I'm going to step off the topic of the Matrix and step over to chicken. Chicken...and precedence.
Chicken is delicious. Some resources describe it as bland, some describe it as "so okay it's average." It's a very democratic kind of meat. It's not a mammal with large, sad-looking eyes and a personality you can relate to. Even some vegetarians will bend their rules for chicken. You can have a fabulously fancy meal that features chicken as the main protein, or you can have the lowest-common-denominator kind of dish that is Kentucky Fried Chicken, hot, cheap and fast.
I don't consider it bland at all. Add a dash of soy sauce while it's cooking and even otherwise unadorned chicken is excellent food. But what does it taste like?
It tastes like chicken. But why do we say it tastes like chicken? We don't we say it tastes like rattlesnake?
Domestication of chickens may go back as far as 6000 BC, a goodly long time by any measure. That's not as far back as, say, cows and dogs, but it's plenty long. And chickens are almost entirely derived from Red Junglefowl and share some traits in common with them, traits that make them excellent for domestication:
1) Chickens are flocking birds. They prefer to stay together.
2) They'll eat anything: bugs, worms, plant material, small mice, whatever. If you have something around that you can't eat, that cannot help you survive, let the chicken eat it. Then whatever it is stops competing with YOUR food, and actually helps grow your food. That's a double bonus.
3) Eggs are a great way to eat the same chicken for a good long time. And then when the chicken stops laying eggs, eat the chicken anyway.
With these facts in mind, it's easy to see that chickens would become a staple in the field of agriculture pretty early. Not requiring a lot of space or attention, they make it easy for people to feed themselves. If you can feed yourself on chicken easily, it becomes a large part of your diet. So large a part, something you get often enough that you don't think that everything tastes only like itself; now you have something to compare other tastes to. Something that both you and to whomever you might be describing some new flavor are likely to have in common. So when you eat something that other people aren't familiar with, you can tell them whether or not it tastes like chicken, since it's likely that you both have experience with chicken.
A couple of years ago I was driving Son #1 to a friend's house so he could check on the friend's pets. On the way, an opossum ran across the road right in front of me. *thump* "Dang it!" I wasn't driving fast and I saw the silly thing zip out across the road at the last possible moment, and though I swerved mightily, it managed to fling itself under my wheels all the same. I was very annoyed at it, and very sorry for it too.
We pulled over, and stepped over to look at it. Sure enough, it was dead. It looked okay, no obvious deformation, just...dead.
Son #1 is kind of into skulls and animal bones. Go hiking with him someday, he'll find a bone. It's pretty weird. "Can I have the skull?"
Still feeling bad for the animal, I said, "Sure."
He goggled at me. "Wow. I didn't expect you to say that."
We went on and checked on the pets, changed their water and added to their food bowls. And on the way home, we paused the truck, tossed the dead 'possum in the back and went on our way.
The next day, we set up the fire pit and and placed a large stock pot on it.
"Why are we cooking it?"
"Just in case of rabies. If it were an old dry skull, I wouldn't worry. But this is fresh. We'll cook it up real good and that'll kill any virus left in the tissues, if there was any virus."
"Okay." And Son #2 built an excellent fire and kept it going, and Son #1 placed the entire body, fur and all, in the stock pot and covered it with water. Let me point out at this time, this stock pot is not used for anything else. I'm kind of freewheeling about some things I eat, but not that freewheeling.
After it had been boiling vigorously for about half an hour, we took the cover off the pot.
Son #1 sniffed. "That smells ... really good."
I smelled it and did what I always do: I thought about everything else I've ever smelled and compared it to a known quantity. "Wow. That smells just like hot dogs." And it did. Really good hot dogs. Not chicken, though the phrase did go through my mind very clearly in light of the situation.
Son #2 leaned in for a sniff and put things into perspective. "I think you've got it backwards. Hot dogs smell like 'possum."
Of all of us, he was the rightest. Opossum have been around rather longer than hot dogs. To the best of my knowledge, there has never been a hot dog found in the fossil record. If I am wrong, someone please write in and let me know! Because that would be awesome.
We didn't eat the 'possum. Not having field dressed it, it wasn't suitable for eating. But the skull was lovingly cleaned and polished and now occupies a space on a shelf in Son #1's bedroom...along with many other bones.
And I can't eat hot dogs without thinking about opossums, chicken, and which came first: the possum or the hot dog. At least in this case it isn't a debate of any kind: possums came first, which means I can say that while hot dogs do not taste like chicken, I have a sneaking suspicion that they do in fact taste like 'possum.
There is no Matrix of course, but it does raise a few questions along the way to its unsatisfying conclusion. I'm going to step off the topic of the Matrix and step over to chicken. Chicken...and precedence.
Chicken is delicious. Some resources describe it as bland, some describe it as "so okay it's average." It's a very democratic kind of meat. It's not a mammal with large, sad-looking eyes and a personality you can relate to. Even some vegetarians will bend their rules for chicken. You can have a fabulously fancy meal that features chicken as the main protein, or you can have the lowest-common-denominator kind of dish that is Kentucky Fried Chicken, hot, cheap and fast.
I don't consider it bland at all. Add a dash of soy sauce while it's cooking and even otherwise unadorned chicken is excellent food. But what does it taste like?
It tastes like chicken. But why do we say it tastes like chicken? We don't we say it tastes like rattlesnake?
Domestication of chickens may go back as far as 6000 BC, a goodly long time by any measure. That's not as far back as, say, cows and dogs, but it's plenty long. And chickens are almost entirely derived from Red Junglefowl and share some traits in common with them, traits that make them excellent for domestication:
1) Chickens are flocking birds. They prefer to stay together.
2) They'll eat anything: bugs, worms, plant material, small mice, whatever. If you have something around that you can't eat, that cannot help you survive, let the chicken eat it. Then whatever it is stops competing with YOUR food, and actually helps grow your food. That's a double bonus.
3) Eggs are a great way to eat the same chicken for a good long time. And then when the chicken stops laying eggs, eat the chicken anyway.
With these facts in mind, it's easy to see that chickens would become a staple in the field of agriculture pretty early. Not requiring a lot of space or attention, they make it easy for people to feed themselves. If you can feed yourself on chicken easily, it becomes a large part of your diet. So large a part, something you get often enough that you don't think that everything tastes only like itself; now you have something to compare other tastes to. Something that both you and to whomever you might be describing some new flavor are likely to have in common. So when you eat something that other people aren't familiar with, you can tell them whether or not it tastes like chicken, since it's likely that you both have experience with chicken.
A couple of years ago I was driving Son #1 to a friend's house so he could check on the friend's pets. On the way, an opossum ran across the road right in front of me. *thump* "Dang it!" I wasn't driving fast and I saw the silly thing zip out across the road at the last possible moment, and though I swerved mightily, it managed to fling itself under my wheels all the same. I was very annoyed at it, and very sorry for it too.
We pulled over, and stepped over to look at it. Sure enough, it was dead. It looked okay, no obvious deformation, just...dead.
Son #1 is kind of into skulls and animal bones. Go hiking with him someday, he'll find a bone. It's pretty weird. "Can I have the skull?"
Still feeling bad for the animal, I said, "Sure."
He goggled at me. "Wow. I didn't expect you to say that."
We went on and checked on the pets, changed their water and added to their food bowls. And on the way home, we paused the truck, tossed the dead 'possum in the back and went on our way.
The next day, we set up the fire pit and and placed a large stock pot on it.
"Why are we cooking it?"
"Just in case of rabies. If it were an old dry skull, I wouldn't worry. But this is fresh. We'll cook it up real good and that'll kill any virus left in the tissues, if there was any virus."
"Okay." And Son #2 built an excellent fire and kept it going, and Son #1 placed the entire body, fur and all, in the stock pot and covered it with water. Let me point out at this time, this stock pot is not used for anything else. I'm kind of freewheeling about some things I eat, but not that freewheeling.
After it had been boiling vigorously for about half an hour, we took the cover off the pot.
Son #1 sniffed. "That smells ... really good."
I smelled it and did what I always do: I thought about everything else I've ever smelled and compared it to a known quantity. "Wow. That smells just like hot dogs." And it did. Really good hot dogs. Not chicken, though the phrase did go through my mind very clearly in light of the situation.
Son #2 leaned in for a sniff and put things into perspective. "I think you've got it backwards. Hot dogs smell like 'possum."
Of all of us, he was the rightest. Opossum have been around rather longer than hot dogs. To the best of my knowledge, there has never been a hot dog found in the fossil record. If I am wrong, someone please write in and let me know! Because that would be awesome.
We didn't eat the 'possum. Not having field dressed it, it wasn't suitable for eating. But the skull was lovingly cleaned and polished and now occupies a space on a shelf in Son #1's bedroom...along with many other bones.
And I can't eat hot dogs without thinking about opossums, chicken, and which came first: the possum or the hot dog. At least in this case it isn't a debate of any kind: possums came first, which means I can say that while hot dogs do not taste like chicken, I have a sneaking suspicion that they do in fact taste like 'possum.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)