Season's Absence

This year Spring got forgot. The weather jumped straight from cold to hot.

Jane & Brocklehurst

Our production of Jane Eyre is over. I had a wonderful time playing an evil man, a bad memory, a kernel of doubt in a young woman's soul. But she persists and achieves her goal.

Scribblings

So the Joker scrawled a note in the boat:

The note -- scrawled with a marker on the interior wall of the cabin -- said the bombings were retribution for U.S. military action in Afghanistan and Iraq, and called the Boston victims "collateral damage" in the same way Muslims have been in the American-led wars.

Of course, this wasn't a case of collateral damage, which involves aiming at a military target and incidentally killing the innocent. This was a case of aiming at the innocent.

Even monsters cling to their rationalizations, I guess.

It's interesting that the note was held back for a month. It speaks directly to motive. Pretty hard now to say this wasn't another case of... whatever we officially call it now... you know, this thing where various people declare that their Quran-based religion requires them to kill us.

I'm not sure how the "self-radicalization" narrative is going. That's the one where it somehow makes a big difference that Joker and Speedbump were not recruited by Al Qaeda... they were just deeply influenced by internet articles... which were posted by Al Qaeda followers.

So, Deval Patrick, governor of Massachusetts, what were you thinking?

The governor said he has no idea why someone would deliberately harm "innocent men, women and children in the way that these two fellows did."

Really. No idea. He seems to have said this on the Sunday after the capture. Didn't any of his state troopers tell him about the note in the boat?

I figure they told him. I think he knew. I think he had a clue.

I figure he just couldn't figure
how on earth to say
what the motive was
in a properly delicate way.

Beyond Belief

Hmm...

The ousted head of the Internal Revenue Service apologized Friday for the agency's "foolish mistakes" in singling out conservative groups for intrusive and time-consuming scrutiny, but said that the effort was not driven by partisan motives.

Ah, singling out conservatives was non-partisan foolishness. That explains it!

So, they acted like fools,
but broke no rules?

Obviously, he thinks we're tools.

Synchronicity

It's hard to keep a handle on simultaneous scandals. We need a law, mathematically based, to keep the scandals evenly spaced

Hemlock Memories

Socrates, in argument, could be offensively smarter. And in the end it meant - he died a speech code martyr

It Has Legs

The situation at the IRS keeps sounding like more of a mess, yes? Whoever ran that show has got to go, no?

UN Recommends Eating Bugs

Would you like some crickets fried? Organically raised - no pesticide was used to kill them: Open wide!

Mother's Day Polling

This seems like a poll they ran just to make a splash on a slow news day:

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that 64% of American Adults whose mothers are still alive will visit them for Mother’s Day. Another 31% plan on calling their mothers in honor of the day.

So, 95%, in total, plan to get in touch.
Will they all succeed? Probably not quite so much!

Some children are forgetful,
which leads to being regretful.

HMD

Llamas all have mamas, but protozoa... no-uh.

Getting Our Goats

Can't wait to see how this works out:

A herd of about 25 goats will soon arrive at Chicago’s O'Hare International Airport and go to work munching weeds and invasive plants on about 120 acres of airport-owned land that is difficult to get to with traditional landscaping equipment.

In the past, some of the "weeds" grown in these areas were being cultivated by sneaky pot-trepreneurs.

They plan to keep the goats away from the runway.

But when you tell a goat he should go one way,
he frequently goes the other.

In which case... oh, brother!

Hearings Today

I don't know whether the actions of that night - or lack of action - is defensible.

It's clear the failure to provide security in the first place is indefensible.

And the cover-up is looking terrible.

I'm still not sure what they've got to hide,
but there's a smell coming from inside.

For My Son's Birthday

An early-eighties flashback:

BIRTH BALLAD

It was just about midnight
And up out of bed
Jumped Marsha. "I've got
A contraction," she said.

They kept coming on,
And I timed them with care.
They lasted ten minutes,
Which didn't seem fair.

By one they were coming
Five minutes apart.
So I called up the doctor
And he said to start.

So I shaved and I dressed
And was ready to go,
But Marsha threw up
And held up the show.

Then we got in the car
And I stepped on the gas
With the perfect excuse
For speeding - at last!

The rest - it all blurs,
But after six hours
Out came a boy!
Sweet joy! He was ours!

Charles Ramsay, Actual First Responder

I love this interview with the guy who rescued Amanda Berry.


This guy can tell a story,
with no attempt at self-glory,
but he's the heroic one
and he got the job done.

Waiting For The Truth

The whistle will blow
and trouble will grow
and whatever they did
will no longer be hid.

But what it was exactly, I really don't yet know.

Complete Run of Jane Eyre

11 days away and the show is going well from all that I can tell.

42

Minireview of 42: heartwarming story of baseball glory, but not a lot of plot.

Finding Ground

Not a complete surprise:

A Massachusetts funeral home owner said he is struggling to find a graveyard willing to accept the body of Boston Marathon bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev, killed in a shootout with police four days after an attack that left three dead and 264 injured.

A burial at sea
sounds best to me.

Charisma Aftermath

Some who can run a brilliant campaign
find governance a chore
or, really, a crashing bore.

Then the citizens complain
more and more
about their own selection
from the last election -
someone they used to adore!

Tough Minded Woman

At the Art Institute, they had more classical pieces out than usual. They tripled the space for the period and they're calling it the Jaharis Gallery.

I don't remember seeing this head of Athena before. Yes, that's a woman in a military helmet - that's one of the ways you can spot Athena, actually.

The sign described it as Roman, 2nd century AD.

She was known for delivering fearsome blows,
but it looks like she took one herself on the nose.