Stay Away From My Ferrari!

If you live in an urban area, one of the indices of a declining economy is the increase in 'street people' (I put the phrase in quotes as people living/hanging on the streets may or may not be homeless). There is also often a decrease in the mental health of said group, particularly if they are homeless. Living in the U District, I have had ample opportunity to observe these folks over the years. I noticed this during the dotcom crash and shortly after 9/11.

In recent months a younger man with dreadlocks has been hanging out near a shortcut I use to access The Ave. We've been saying "hello" and nodding and such since April. His mood and state of mind have been quite consistent until the last week, when he apparently developed a serious case of paranoia. Serious enough that, when I walked past him today, he yelled at me to stay away from his Ferrari, a request to which I acquiesced easily. I'm pretty sure he doesn't have a Ferrari (although maybe that's where he sleeps), but what the heck. I said, "Sure, no problem." And he began to yell again, "You just stay away from it!"

"Understood!" I said as I was trying to make my escape.

"If you don't stay away from it, I'll have my military kick your ass, the military from my country. It will come here and kick your ass!"

"Yeah, no problem, you got it," I said with my most cooperative voice, hurrying to get away from him and vowing to never use my shortcut again.

And no, I did not call the police. They don't exactly patrol the U District religiously (in spite of what they might say), so even if they came and hauled the guy off, I'm sure he'd return. I don't care to risk calling and having him deduce that I was behind it (which would probably happen if the cops showed up on a call five minutes after he'd yelled at me). I have a friend who owns a nearby business who may do the dirty deed, but for now, I'm going to forgo my shortcut. And needless to say, if I see any Ferraris in the neighborhood, I will indeed steer clear of them, ten foot pole and the works.

In other news, the job offers are pouring in - if you consider being asked to be a test subject for a vaccination a job offer. Am I willing to risk my long-term health for short-term gain? You bet. If I get accepted, I'll get a minimum of $300. Since I bet none of my readers love me enough to give me $300 to keep me from being a human guinea pig, I'll risk turning into a 50 foot tall woman, or giant rabbit or reptilian creature of some sort.


To keep my readers apprised of each other's activities, I'm pleased to report that Goat Hostage's cunning plan to respond to the Prion News with vegetarian recipes was thwarted by the Cadbury chocolate recall. Yep, poison chocolate will take the fun out of a good taunt, rendering it very much a Pyrrhic victory. (For the full account, check the comments for "Not Enough Prion News In Your Life?".)

In final news, I understand that there have been payroll issues at MegaDyneCorp Technologies, the result being some folks receiving their compensation in the form of bushels of kohlrabi. Watch out, though - a kohlrabi much bigger than 5 cm in diameter can be woody. Hopefully the PeopleSuck software issues can be resolved and y'all will go back to being paid in wooden nickels.

Not Enough Prion News in Your Life?

I've got some exciting Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy news stories to relate, thanks to Annie's Annals. I enjoyed checking out Annie's BSE update, and look forward to future ones. And no, it's not possible to know too much about TSEs - really, it's not.

In early August, The Guardian newspaper from the UK printed an article about a second wave of vCJD outbreaks due to BSE. I could rewrite what they say, but instead I'll just quote the good parts:

But scientists warn that the worst may not yet be over. 'We must not forget that almost every person in the UK was exposed to the agent that causes variant CJD,' said Professor John Collinge, head of the MRC's prion unit in London. 'It went through the entire food chain, not just in burgers but in cakes containing gelatins made from meat products. Even cosmetics contained beef-derived chemicals then.'

In fact, the extent to which people were brought into contact with a deadly human pathogen was unprecedented. Hence the insistence that while some relaxation of BSE monitoring was now acceptable, there should be no reduction in efforts to understand CJD. Certainly it is far too early to assume that Britain - the country most affected by BSE and vCJD - is in the clear, say researchers. They believe a second wave of cases will probably occur, based on studies of a closely related disease, kuru, which affected tribes in New Guinea.

Researchers have found that a key gene shapes the body's defences against kuru and this exists in two forms: version-m and version-v. These gene versions produce different responses to kuru. Individuals who have two m-versions (one from each parent) are the first to succumb to kuru, while those with one or two v-genes have a delayed onset.

Crucially, scientists have now found a similar picture among vCJD patients. Every victim to date has possessed two m-versions, a point stressed by Professor Chris Higgins, chair of the government's Spongiform Encephalopathy Advisory Committee (SEAC).

Hopefully current and future governments in the UK will continue to support research into the mechanisms behind BSE and vCJD - research that has proven useful not only for these two diseases, but also for Alzheimer's and Parkinson's.

Not to be outdone, the US is still in the previous century in terms of dealing with the potential of BSE to get into the population:

• The USDA is proposing not letting downer cows into the food chain - wow! How radical is that?
• The Bush Administration doesn't want beef companies to test 100% of their cattle, and went to court to stop them - of course that doesn't make any sense, unless they're afraid of what might happen if all cattle farmers started testing all their cows.... (I may have mentioned this one before, but it's stupid enough to mention twice.)
• This article is less interesting to me for the BSE connexion than it is for the image of women bidding on vials of Danish sperm...the struggle to choose between the 30 different lewd comments running through my just ended with a decision not to post a one of them. Dear reader, you will have to come up with your own naughty comments. Feel free to send them to me.

Of course, when one is perusing articles, one notices links in the sidebar that pique one's curiosity. I noticed two in the process of reading up on my favorite disease. The first was Thermy (TM) Thermometer, a character developed by the FSIS division of the USDA. He tells you what temperatures your meat should be cooked to for it to be safe. Mind you, he neglects to tell you that prions pretty much cannot be destroyed by cooking (unless you like your roasts heated to about 800 degrees Fahrenheit). Thermy also mentions that the temperatures given are in degrees Fahrenheit, which means I'll have to throw out my Kelvin meat thermometer.

The second turned out to be a huge disappointment - I thought the headline read "Dad chases nude boy from daughter's room with pie". I mean, that's a great headline, right? Was I let down when I found out it was a pipe, not a pie, that was used to threaten the nekkid laddie. The one thing I found interesting was that this had been going on for a year before Pops caught them in the act. So kiddies, let this be a lesson to you - be ever vigilant. Don't become complacent regarding parental stupidity!

And finally, one of the most wrong things to cross my path in recent weeks, a photo sent to me by one of the chair-moisteners at MDC. The photo was sent in regard to not taking candy from strangers; however, when I look at where the handle is placed on this man's gumball machine outfit, I'm thinking candy ain't what I'm going to get for my nickel.

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ETA: I suppose one could use the Z-machine at Sandia National Laboratories to cook one's roast or steak to a temperature that would destroy all prions (2 billion kelvin), although I bet it would be a little tough to chew.

Image courtesy of Sandia National Laboratories

Well Said, Blue Llama!

Blue Llama is one of my semi-regular readers and commentators, and left an excellent response to my "God's Away On Business" column, which I think worthy of sharing:

The song is an apt tune for our MDC. I hear a lot of "D*mn that last CEO" downstairs. People are reminiscing about the happy times of yesteryear and lamenting the instabilities of the future.

Well nothing is sacred at MDC. We knew that!

Yep - there's always free cheese in the corporate mousetrap - woo hoo!

Also, let me know if I should reset my Blogger settings to have the comments show up automatically, instead of youse guys having to click on them. It's not as if I get hundreds of comments, but I do get them, and some of them are enlightening.

God's Away on Business

Having been laid off, I am immune to the ups and downs of workplace rumour mills - but I still like to hear them. Perhaps I enjoy hearing them even more now - I know longer have to worry how they will impact me. So in the last day or so I heard some big rumours about MegaDyneCorp Technologies which brought to mind this little ditty from the (sometimes) wonderful Tom Waits - but I have to confess, many big corporation rumours I've heard over the years bring this song to mind, and not just ones about MDC.

I'd sell your heart to the junkman baby
For a buck, for a buck
If you're looking for someone
To pull you out of that ditch
You're out of luck, you're out of luck
The ship is sinking
The ship is sinking
The ship is sinking
There's a leak, there's a leak,
In the boiler room
The poor, the lame, the blind
Who are the ones that we kept in charge?
Killers, thieves, and lawyers
God's away, God's away,
God's away on Business. Business.
God's away, God's away,
God's away on Business. Business.

Digging up the dead with
A shovel and a pick
It's a job, it's a job
Bloody moon rising with
A plague and a flood
Join the mob, join the mob
It's all over, it's all over, it's all over
There's a leak, there's a leak,
In the boiler room
The poor, the lame, the blind
Who are the ones that we kept in charge?
Killers, thieves, and lawyers
God's away, God's away, God's away
On Business. Business.
God's away, God's away,
On Business. Business.

Goddamn there's always such
A big temptation
To be good, To be good
There's always free cheddar in
A mousetrap, baby
It's a deal, it's a deal
God's away, God's away, God's away
On Business. Business.
God's away, God's away, God's away
On Business. Business.

I narrow my eyes like a coin slot baby,
Let her ring, let her ring
God's away, God's away,
God's away on Business.
Business...

With any luck, I won't be singing this song about the fine folks at the unemployment office ;-)

Sorry, I just can't help it!

I try not to do too much political/economic/philosophical ranting here. The first reason is that I don't want to be going off like some half-assed moron, so if I were to start blogging on the p/e/p end of things, I'd need to spend much more time reading on these topics than I currently do. (That may change, of course, but not in the near future.) The second is that my readership, whilst not unenlightened, are not the hardened p/e/p junkies I've been known to be. So I don't want to bore y'all with every p/e/p observation I come across that has merit.

Having said that, I have to share a little quote with you, gentle reader, from a recent Ted Rall article on Sarah Palin. Ted Rall is many things to me - political cartoonist extraordinaire, brave traveller and lover of Central Asia, a man with an incredible grasp of history, a man who wrote the most accurate predictions regarding the actions of the Bush Administration of any pundit out there. I mean, these essays are scary accurate. So when Mr Rall writes something like the following, it gives me a stomachache of fear, dread - the kind I would get before a PPE Zone meeting. The kind that has me running for the plastic forks (Mubbs knows, don't you?).

Asked about rumors the Alaska governor was being considered as McCain's running mate, she told CNBC: "As for that VP talk all the time, I'll tell you, I still can't answer that question until somebody answers for me what is it exactly that the VP does every day? I'm used to being very productive and working real hard in an administration. We want to make sure that that VP slot would be a fruitful type of position, especially for Alaskans and for the things that we're trying to accomplish up here for the rest of the U.S., before I can even start addressing that question."

"Working real hard"? Doesn't the University of Idaho require its graduates to learn English? Does she know that she isn't running for VP of Alaska? Or that the VP presides over the Senate*? With the nation facing enormous economic, political and military challenges, do we need another numbnut in the White House?

Ted points out that intelligence and open-mindedness are the traits that seem to produce the best presidents. It seems that neither one of these is Sarah's strong suit and, in fact, I'd like to suggest that she's really and truly just another Dan Quayle, except her stupidity doesn't express itself in nearly as amusing forms as Dan's did. She's compared herself to a pit bull (not my words, don't get all hivey just because I'm quoting her), but I know I've seen smarter pit bulls than Sarah Palin.


*According to Al Gore, the Vice President's role is not only to preside over the Senate, but "... protect the space-time continuum. Read the Constitution."
-- from Futurama, Anthology of Interest 1