Abandoned. Like an old deserted building. That’s a fairly decent assessment of my mind tonight. Empty. Lacking thought.

Some days… I just don’t know what to write about it here. It is times like these… that I wish I had a Magic Marker. Surely I could write SOMETHING with a Magical Marker.

When I was a kid… I thought a Magic Marker could do some kind of Hocus Pocus. You know. Shazam and all. I asked my Mom if I could get a pack of ten. She obliged. I felt that I had finally arrived in the mystical world. But. When I got them home… I tried to turn my sister in to a rat. Wouldn’t you know.  The only thing those markers did was put ink on paper. So….. As it turns out… it was just another one of those false advertising schemes. Magic Markers.

But back to the writer’s block thing. …. I think this next one takes the prize.

In the pre-Raphaelite Era, there was a poet & painter dude.. all rolled into one. His name was Dante Gabriel Rosetti. Dante… the old boy…. loved his wife, Elizabeth.

Welllllll……How much did he love his wife, you ask? So much…. that after she died of a laudanum overdose in 1862, he buried her with the only existing copy of his unpublished poems. Six Feet Under.

But here is the deal. About seven years later…. Rosetti found himself suffering from a really bad case of writer’s block. Not good. Soooooooo….. he dug up his wife’s body and retrieved his poems.

They were published in 1870 and were well received by critics, but he never forgave himself for pilfering them from her grave.

So while I am floundering this evening… along with many others, as of late…. I wouldn’t dig anybody up for something to write about here. No matter how much I love you all.

“The empty vessel makes the loudest sound.” – William Shakespeare

“I have tried lately to read Shakespeare, and found it so intolerably dull that it nauseated me.” – Charles Darwin

The past, present, and future walk into a bar. It was tense.

Ah. I couldn’t help myself.  So many times today I was reminded to try not to worry too much about the future, or to linger on the past. But instead, to truly be in each moment.

I had a really good day today. It was filled with many wonderful individual moments…..  rolled all into one.  A big pot of hot Cheddar Chowder and crusty bread… shared with family. Watching football on TV. Laughing, talking, playing. Even working, cleaning, cooking.

The thing of it is…. every moment you experience, is a result of a cumulation of ALL the moments in your life which have gone before it. It all had to line up… just as it did… for you to be right here, and right now, in this moment.

So for that reason, we should honor the point in time we are experiencing. And live it.

It is all good in theory.
I am especially glad for the times when I can actually do this.

Oh. The Past, Present and Future can be tricky.
But.  Seriously though. I guess time is relative.
The importance of time largely depends upon which side of the bathroom door you are on.

“How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.” – Anne Frank

I have read some interesting articles this week.
Most of them were in Scientific American Magazine. That last issue is a good one, in case you didn’t see it.

Things you never knew before…. and all you do is open the pages of the magazine… and POOOOOOF. All of a sudden you DO know something.

I may save the most of these for a later time… but the one I found highly interesting was this. Some animals fornicate themselves to death.
I had a sneaking suspicion this was true.

You know, every once in a while you will be out here or there…. and right smack dab in the middle of the “here or there” you find some kind of animal…. which has fallen by the wayside. Drop Dead Fred.

And you wonder…”Heart attack? Drug overdose? A bad fall, perhaps?” I am always miffed. This happened earlier today. Walking up the driveway… I found this tiny little fellow. Right in the middle of the drive.

No apparent indications of foul play, or homicide. He was just soaked to the bone from the rain.

NOW…. after reading this article in SA, I bet he died from over-fornication. I’m not kidding.

The article happened along like this: There is a mousy little marsupial known as the antechinus. Apparently…. the males of the genus make the VERY most of their short breeding season. As I mentioned, in some cases it will end their lives.

For a few weeks each year…. those little fellas will mate nonstop with as many females as they can… AND…. as often as possible. They’ll screw wildly for hours on end. The article goes on to say… they will forgo sleep and even food.
But. Not without a price… I’ll tell you. Under the severe stress….. those little mousey bodies begin to fail.

They lose their fur, bleed internally, and develop gangrene. AND. Sad but true….. they eventually die from infection or hemorrhaging…. because their immune systems fail.

I swear… I am NOT making this up.

So. I guess if a little mousey marsupial has to have a bucket list… this should about do it. Death by sex. Second, only to death by cheese.

“Do not bite at the bait of pleasure, till you know there is no hook beneath it.” – Thomas Jefferson

Electricity. It works without our thinking twice about it.

What is it…. exactly? Energy… we know that. But succinctly… it is a form of energy resulting from the existence of charged particles. You know.. like those teeensy weeeeeensy electrons or protons. Those little particles get all revved up…….and live either statically, or as an accumulation of a charge, or they can exist dynamically …… as a current.

Sounds simple… but even the electricity has it positives and negatives. It can get complicated…..

For example.

You may have heard of direct current (DC) and alternating current (AC). Or even the Rock Band, AC/DC. BUT….. the difference between the two is in the way the electrons flow.

In DC electrons move in a single direction while in AC they change directions, switching between backwards and forwards. To and Fro.
The electricity use in your home is AC while DC comes from sources that include batteries. Tell the Energizer Bunny he is on a one way street. Bang that drum slowly… rabbit.

Yet….. even electric has its dark side….. You see… back in the 1880s there was even a ‘war of currents’ between Thomas Edison (who helped invent DC) and Nikola Tesla (who helped invent AC). Both dudes wanted their system to be used. Egos in electric.

However…. Tesla went to town on this one. AC eventually won out due to the fact that it is safer and can be used over longer distances.

So…. when I have nothing important to say… I always say I am thankful for my blessings. Like electricity. And being wired.

“To see things differently requires you to be wired a little differently.” – Fred Wilson

No secret here. I love our dogs.
Dang. When I was a kid, we weren’t allowed to have a dog. I don’t recall ever really wanting one. We were sort of instilled with the belief that dogs were mean. And dirty. Dogs were just no good at all.

Steer clear… or you’ll get bit. So. I believed it. It was all I knew growing up.

I’d like to get off the subject of dogs for just a moment and switch gears about that very thing. When we are young, we receive a LOT of conditioning. It seems to be the natural order of things. Our parents give us the same ideas their parents gave them… and on and on. We are surrounded by people… pretty much just like us…. when we are growing up.

Rural white America, for example. Catholic private school, for another. Inner-city poverty, as one more citation. But the scope of how we are raised in our own little “pockets” of the world is far and wide.
But as children, we only know what we are shown… mostly.

So we learn about life, and religion, and politics… just that way.

As adults we are exposed to other things. Sometimes we open our minds and listen to different possibilities. Other times, we just keep that tunnel vision. It is all that we know… it is all that we want to know. Our parents were that way… and we have always been that way. So. Stay the course.

I wonder about this thought process. Because… at every level of our lives… if we don’t consider all the possibilities…. we never find those new things we grow to love.

Like Strawberry Short Cake, Roller Coaster Rides, Dill Pickles…. a different view of religion, or politics…. or perhaps, even …. changing our mind about dogs.

And those “mean & dirty” dogs… of my youth…. . have turned out to be one of the best parts of my every, single day….. now that I’ve grown a little older. And hopefully, a little wiser.

“The world is full of people who have never, since childhood, met an open doorway with an open mind.” – E.B. White

I think much of what is wrong with me today, is largely related to my early interaction with Nursery Rhymes as a child.
They are quite disturbing really. And as a result, I have ongoing consequences and effects due to that exposure.

For instance. Little Miss Muffet. Now…. she sat on her tuffet… eating her curds and whey. Okay. Gross. Why the heck would anyone munch down a bowl of curds and whey? Was she being punished? To this day… whenever I see the Cheesy Curds advertised on the Kentucky Fried Billboard… I have Miss Muffet Flashbacks. I would like to try a Cheesy Curd. But I can’t.

And what about Pease Porridge. What is Pease Porridge? Does anyone want it hot, or cold? I am not sure I want to eat any stinking thing that is nine days old.

People are perishing in Nursery Rhymes, left and right. Everybody is falling and they can’t get up. Ring around the rosy… we all fall down. Jack and Jill bite the dust. And that poor big egg… Humpty Dumpty. He fell off the wall. A great fall… but still… a fall.

Finally, Psychopath Peter. Could not keep his wife… so he stuffs her in a pumpkin shell.  Call CSI.

I have a feeling I’ll probably have some bad dreams tonight.

Maybe if I face my fear…. run in to town… and pick up an order of cheese curds? Maybe pumpkin pie would be better? Eggs over easy? No way in hell I’m eating rotten porridge though.

There……I draw the line.

Are you a Monkey or a Mule…..

Ya’ know….. I love the old Bing Crosby song… Swinging on a Star.

And tonight… I give you the first verse…

“Would you like to swing on a star
Carry moonbeams home in a jar
And be better off than you are
Or would you rather be a mule?

A mule is an animal with long funny ears
Kicks up at anything he hears
His back is brawny and his brain is weak
He’s just plain stupid with a stubborn streak
And by the way, if you hate to go to school
You may grow up to be a mule.”

I think this first verse should be dedicated to the members of the U.S. Senate and Congress this evening.

Yes. What a bunch of asses.

Now… this last verse I dedicate to all my good and fun-loving friends. Who are the epitome of the Sock Monkey Personae. Rocking…..
And they inspire me to be better than I am…..

“And all the monkeys aren’t in the zoo
Every day you meet quite a few
So you see it’s all up to you
You can be better than you are
You could be swingin’ on a star…..”

Now… I have to go catch some Moonbeams in a Jar.

“The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.” –Chinese Proverb

This summer…. we had bees. Not just any bees… but Honeybees. Honeybees rock….

I watched the ones here, this evening.  They are slowing down for the end of the season… for sure.

You see. We humans need them. Food production would cease without those bees. Careful folks… we are threatening their existence with our careless human living. We don’t want to put the lights out on these little guys and gals.

So… this year, we helped raise bees. Well. We weren’t changing diapers, or sending the little bees off to college or anything. We just provided the place for their colony.  They lived in boxes, called Supers.

You see… Honeybees live in complex communities. When I say complex… I MEAN SUPER Complex. A community may contain as many as 100,000 members. And this I can tell you…. their government NEVER EVER shuts down.

The vast majority of these are the unfertile female bees known as workers. HA! No wonder the bees are always in business. These little females work like crazy, I’ll tell you.

Now… I am NOT making this up. The women run the hive. Listen to the list of tasks: They feed and clean the queen; gather nectar, pollen, and water; cool or heat the hive, as needed; feed developing larvae; and make the beeswax they use to build all the hive’s cells.

And… talk about giving everything for the job. …… …. During the peak of the season, a worker will live only six weeks before she dies from exhaustion.

Now here is the sad part… to me. She’ll have gathered enough nectar to make 1/12 of a teaspoon of honey.

There are only a few hundred male, or drone, bees in a hive. They don’t work one little iota. They just eat honey, fly around and look for an opportunity to mate.  Huhhhnnn…..

I’m not making that up either.

But.. .they don’t get lucky very often. They have to wait for a Queen to go out on her high mating flights.   IF… she picks them….. AND after the sperm is delivered… the male drops dead.

Speaking of the Queen. At the heart of the hive is its Queen, the sole female bee with fully developed reproductive organs. Indeed, all she is, is a royal egg layer…..  AND…. just like the Queen of England….. she has absolutely no decision-making authority. But what an egg-layer! In the height of the season, she can produce 1,500 eggs — more than her own weight — in a single day.

When the Queen quits doing her job in full force… the workers replace her. They raise one of the eggs…. and voila… a new Queen is born.

I love all of this. It is quite miraculous.

Just think. This whole process goes on without a hitch. On time. Just as it should. A perfect design.

So many worlds in our one little world… spinning around flawlessly.   And WE…..  are never even privy to all of these comings and goings.  It is astounding to me sometimes.
But just stop and think.  We are just one little planet in this whole big universe.

Overwhelming.  Yet.   As with it all….. I think we all have a part to play in the vastness and infinity of this existence. No matter how small we are. We have a part. We decide.

In each moment we are faced with decisions about life, and what we are doing with our life energy.

And in those moments…. we can make a choice.
We can make a choice to do our little part and do it well.
Or we can make a choice to do it poorly.

Busy as Bees.

“It is our choices… that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.” – J.K. Rowling

Today…. I met the most delightful insect. Maybe my favorite one ever.
She was a Mantis. “Mantis” comes from an ancient Greek word which means “prophet”. That in itself is very cool, although I don’t know why that is relevant.

Around these parts, they are commonly known as the Praying Mantis…. because of their often prayer-like pose. I think most are Catholic. They stand up, sit down, kneel, stand up, sit down, kneel…. over and over again.

At any rate, this one was totally great. She was a little afraid of me and my camera at first. But once she figured out I was not a threat… well…. then she started hanging out. Her name was Marge.

So. We talked about girl things…. you know… WILL the Steelers win a game this season? ….. what is your favorite brand of Beef Jerkey? … THOSE sorts of things.

Then, I asked if I could take her photo. She obliged. She looked right in my lens… grinned a goofy grin… and said… “Cheese!” Finally… I thought I was pressing my luck… but I asked any way.

“Marge… no one will believe your size. If I put a dime on the ground, will you go over and touch it?”
“I like you Pol. Sure thing.”

“Well, Marge, you are one nice lady.”
“Not really. I feel terrible. I just bit my husband’s head off.”
“You got mad and yelled at him?”
“No. I literally bit his head off. And now I have indigestion. Got any TUMS?”
“Uhhhhhh…….Fresh out of TUMS Marge. (Long Dang Awkward Silence……. ……. …….) Uhnnnnn…. hey…. nice talking with you. I think I left the iron on in the house… or something.”

And she seemed like such a nice Mantis.

“Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul.” – John Muir

When you spend the day with two little boys… 3 years old, and 6 years old… you learn THREE letters of the alphabet more than any others.

The first one. Y.
Not so much as in x, y, z…. but WHY, why, why?

That grass is green. Why?
You are a good little dude. Why?
I am opening your chocolate milk right now. Why?

Oh… such wonder.

The second letter. C.
See. See the world with a perspective unlike any other… so incredible and bright.

And the third. B.
BE with them. In the moment. That is the most precious time of all… the time to be. Right here. Right now.

I have to say.  It just doesn’t get any better than this.

“Wisdom begins in wonder.” – Socrates