A Dog's Life

Sorry, Can't Resist

Michele has asked what we're thankful for this Thanksgiving. I figured if it's not Monday, it's still Thanksgiving weekend. Not that I'm much of a trend follower, but here's my short list:

- My lovely bride (for making me grow up)
- Our wonderful animals
- Our vet
- The Constitution
- Modern asthma medicine
- Greasy truck stop breakfasts
- WD-40
- Cajun food
- The compact disc
- Classical music
- Costco
- Duct tape
- Pumpkin pie
- Baseball
- Coca Cola
- Police, firefighters and EMT's
- Pasta, whatever the shape
- Plastic tie wraps
- Portable generators
- Tastykakes
- Country life
- The riding lawn mower
- Ice hockey
- Our great nation

We're Number 1! (Part 2)

My lovely bride just called in from Lansing, Michigan where she was showing Miss Lacey at the Winterland Classic. Lacey took Best of Breed yesterday (Jaxon KC) and the group judge toyed with her and played games before deciding not to give her a placement.

Today (Ingham County KC) went better, with Ed Jenner giving Lacey Best of Breed (surprising, as we didn't fancy our chances much), then Theo Kjellstrom awarded our girl a Group 2, good for 154 all-breed points.

Lacey now has 6475 all-breed points in 2003. She has now holds the record for most all-breed points accumulated by a Borzoi bitch in a single year. The previous record of 6327 was set in 1986 by Ch. Majenkir Orchid of Po Dusham.

Unattainable, alas, is the single-year record for breed points by a Borzoi bitch (889) set by Ch. J.A.Y. Seabury JP Affectionately. Nara won the National that year, something Lacey failed to do. It's a long shot, but Lacey has an outside chance of setting the record for points by a Borzoi bitch in a career: Nara accumulated over 13,800 points and Lacey has 11,747 as of this weekend. It would take a good Best in Show to do it, but such things have been known to happen.

First Aid for Pets

This week, it's my turn to do the safety presentation at our weekly group staff meeting. To be unconventional, I chose pet first aid as the subject.

In researching the topic I came across an excellent Australian website which provides an overview of steps to be taken for fractures, injuries, bleeding, frostbite and heatstroke, insect and reptile bites and stings, and poisonings. It even has a section - mirabile dictu! - on how to give a cat a pill.

Well worth investigating before something nasty happens.

40 Years On - Another Perspective

It grieves me to disagree with someone for whom I have nothing but the highest regard, but I thought I should comment on a post by A. C. Douglas on John F. Kennedy, marking the 40th anniversary of his assassination. Mr. Douglas says:

For my own thought on the matter, and for the limited purpose of this brief weblog entry marking that terrific event forty years ago, let me say simply that one of its effects of lasting importance to this nation is that it robbed America of that rarest of persons: A politician of more than merely political substance; one who by his intelligence, vision, character, demeanor, and force of personality raised the perception of that corrupt and squalid profession to the level of one worthy of the best and brightest of men and women.

That would be better phrased “… one who by the perception of his intelligence, vision” etc. That his life was snuffed out so tragically robbed this nation of its President and his family of their husband and father. However it does the truth no service to pretend that Kennedy was a person of qualities he didn’t have or that his presidency achieved things it never did. That he continues to have such a high reputation is a result of the nature of his death as well as the assiduous work of his courtiers.

That Kennedy was an intelligent man there can be no doubt; no one with a mediocre mind makes it to the White House. But Johnson, Nixon and even Eisenhower possessed acute intelligence, the first two thought of as second to none. Kennedy’s claim to intellectual fame – the Pulitzer prize winning Profiles in Courage – is now known to be largely the work of Theodore Sorensen. Kennedy was a undistinguished legislator, to be polite. Far from exhibiting the sort of courage profiled in his book, the kind of courage that ends one’s political career, he seems to have ducked the censure vote on McCarthy, whose fell work was quite popular in Massachusetts.

Kennedy’s reputation as a patron of the arts probably owes more to his inexplicably iconic wife than to his own tastes, which ran more to country and western music and Ian Fleming novels (“Pablo Casals? I didn’t know what the hell he played – someone had to tell me”). This paragon of youthful vigor spent about half the day in bed with a vast number of ailments. As for his demeanor, it was certainly closer to the frat boy image that President Bush is regularly flailed with.

The most notable example of his “vision,” the space program, was spurred not by idealism but by desperation after the Bay of Pigs fiasco. That he got any of his New Frontier programs through Congress is probably less the result of Congressional enthusiasm and more of House Speaker Sam Rayburn breaking the power of the Rules Committee early in 1961.

Mr. Douglas concludes with this:

I've no doubt whatsoever that had JFK served a full two terms as president of this country, whatever else his tenure of that office may have accomplished (or not accomplished), it would have changed, at every level, the face and substance of American politics forever and to this country's huge and enduring benefit, and have made a political horror such as, say, the Nixon White House a thing absolutely inconceivable.

Mmmmmaybe. Or perhaps he too would have had to face escalation or quitting Vietnam as the result of his assenting to Diem’s assassination. Or perhaps it would have come to light that he was sharing a mistress with gangster Sam Giancana. That sure would have put a more ignominious end to Camelot.

[Postscript: I don't want to suggest in this post that Kennedy was a bad man or that his administration was a failure. Whatever his faults, Jack was a far better person that his utterly ruthless brother Bobby or The Fat Rich Kid, Teddy. I only want to look to the record and not the legend in assessing his place in history.]

We're Number 1

Unless there's something we really don't know about, Lacey will finish 2003 as the Number 1 Borzoi in breed competition.

Her competition, as inexplicably regular readers of this poor little blog know, has been Cassie (Ch. Kenai's Silver Glacier), a lovely young girl who's Lacey's spitting image. Lacey is a Midwest dog, rarely traveling beyond Ohio and the adjoining states. In the same way, Cassie is a West Coast dog, pretty much shown only in Washington, Oregon and California.

Going into this weekend, Lacey has 720 breed points to Cassie's 552. Looking over the entries for the remaining West Coast shows - the AKC Invitational, the Long Beach shows and the Burbank show - even if a) every dog entered showed up (highly unlikely) and b) Cassie took Best of Breed every day, she'd end up with 711 Borzoi defeated.

Cassie is a beautiful young bitch with a great specials career ahead of her. We wish her the best of luck. After, say, February 9th and 10th.

Our Strange House

If you want to get a too-affectionate cat out of your face, the easiest way is to blow into its face. Cats hate drafts and breezes. Except, it seems, ours.

With Winter coming soon and the temperature dropping, our cats want to find the warmest spots in our rather drafty house. If she's not burrowing under the blankets on the bed - depositing thereupon kitty litter carefully carried in her paws up from the basement - Sasha likes to sit atop one of the floor registers when the furnace is running.

It's hard even to explain adequately how atypical life is in our house.

Sad News

Hall-of-Fame pitcher Warren Spahn is dead at the age of 82.

Winner of 363 games, Spahn started his career with the Boston Braves in 1942 and ended it with the New York Mets in 1965. He said of the manager of those two losing teams, "I played for Casey Stengel before and after he was a genius."

News From the Show Scene

My lovely bride and the winsome Miss Lacey traveled to Illinois this weekend for the back-to-back Lake Shore KC shows. Lacey came away with Best of Breed wins both days, a Group 3 on Saturday under Betty Stites and a Group 2 today under David Miller. She now has 6309 all-breed points for the year. With eight shows left for the year, she should easily set the record for most all-breed points won by a Borzoi bitch.

Lacey's mother Possum went along for the ride and enjoyed herself thoroughly.

An Alternative Stereotype

Real Britain "At Odds with Media Caricature"

November 21, 2003 (AP) - Talking informally with reporters on Air Force One on the return flight to Andrews Air Force Base, President Bush said the Royal Family and Britain were "totally at odds" with the picture frequently painted by the news media.

"The Queen was a charming, courteous host," the President said. "You'd never think from meeting her that she was some dim-bulb descendent of lumpish German princelings." As for Prince Charles, "He's not the limp-wristed, poofter mama's boy everyone makes him out to be."

President Bush was also grateful that Prince Andrew didn't try to goose the First Lady during the state dinner at Buckingham Palace.

He said he was also favorably impressed by the children he met during a tour of Sedgefield, Prime Minister Tony Blair's constituency. "Nice, good-looking kids. Not in the least the underdeveloped, weedy product you'd expect after one thousand years of inbreeding. Their teeth weren't as scraggly as I thought they'd be either." (cont. page 93)

People Died! Dean Lied!

Howard Dean lights up an audience but is economical with the truth:

The room exploded when Howard Dean told the tale of an Iowa man who couldn't afford his blood pressure medicine because the price had jumped $30 and he decided to buy his wife's medicine instead.

"Twelve days later, he died of a stroke," Dean said. "Can you imagine that happening in this country?"

Dean's comments to labor union members in a Washington ballroom demonstrated more than the resurgence of the health care issue in the Democratic presidential campaign. Dean had already hit that theme in a spate of campaign ads. But by dramatizing the complicated issue with a heart-wrenching story, the former Vermont governor showed why his candidacy often packs more emotional punch than those of his rivals.

The details tend not to be so clear-cut.

Iowa farmer Kevin Middleswart, who told Dean the story, confirmed that his 77-year-old father had died after failing to buy the medicine. But that was in 1993, when Bill Clinton was president, so the problem can hardly be blamed on President Bush. And although Middleswart has "no doubt" that the missed medicine caused the stroke, other factors could have been involved.

So may I take it from the complete story that the immediate former president of these United States killed Mr. Middleswart? Who knew that Governor Dean was such a Clinton-hater?

A Masterpiece Comes Home

A glowing review by David Patrick Stearns of the Theâtre du Châtelet production of Hector Berlioz’s The Trojans – conducted by John Eliot Gardiner – says it is:

… the first complete staging of the opera ever in Paris, believe it or not…

But why not believe it? That this is the first complete staging would be typical for Paris, the city that turned its back on Berlioz during his life and has remained equivocal about him since his death; typical for Paris, the capital of that most anti-musical nation, France.

If the Symphonie Fantastique is the masterpiece of Berlioz’s early career and The Damnation of Faust the masterpiece of his middle years, then The Trojans is his last. Berlioz wrote his own libretto after Virgil’s The Aeneid for this five-act, five-hour fusion of Romanticism, Spontinian grandeur and Gluckian classicism.

It is not true, as the review suggests, that “Berlioz wrote the opera with no serious prospect for performance; he was venting his lifelong fascination with Virgil mainly for his own sake, free to ignore theatrical practicality.” Berlioz spent practically his entire adult life in the theatre in his capacity as a musical journalist. He knew that there was only one place where his entire creation could see the light of day: the Paris Opéra.

The Opéra! A sinkhole of shabby singing and shabby performance; a political plaything run by mediocrities to produce operas by mediocrities; the place where Berlioz’s fizzing Benvenuto Cellini was massacred twenty years earlier. It was still the only theatre capable of an adequate production of The Trojans. Berlioz knew its management was dead set against him but hoped that the Emperor Napoleon III would order the staging of The Trojans just as his uncle had ordered Le Sueur’s The Bards to be put on.

It was not to be. Napoleon III was a philistine of the deepest dye, Berlioz has the wrong advocates and Wagner’s Tannhäuser was ordered instead. Tannhäuser flopped spectacularly with the Parisian audience; Berlioz in his bitterness privately gloated over the debacle.

With no future at the Opéra, Berlioz allowed The Trojans to be produced at a lesser theater. The scale of the work proved too much for the theater’s resources and only the last three acts (The Trojans at Carthage) were put on. Despite the inadequate production and performance, it was something of a success and ran for 22 evenings, growing ever shorter as the director instituted cut after cut. To Berlioz’s fury, the score published by Choudens reflected the Théâtre-Lyrique production and not the full opera, as the contract stipulated. The disillusionment was so great that Berlioz largely withdrew from musical life for his final years. As Gounod said, “Like his great namesake Hector, he died beneath the walls of Troy.”

Berlioz was forced through much of his career to earn his living as a journalist, denying him the leisure to compose. His efforts to put on independently performances of his works in Paris – he was also the finest conductor of his day - brought him scant repayment and, in the case of The Damnation of Faust, left him ruined. His tours of Germany, Austria, Hungary and Russia – conducting court and theatre orchestras – were renowned in those lands but did nothing for his position at home. Had he emigrated he might have found a position worthy of his fertile mind, but he had an unaccountable attraction for a France that repeatedly kicked him in the teeth. “I love our absurd country,” he once said.

There is an ongoing debate in this country about government support for the arts. Berlioz’s career is instructive in that respect. The government of France supervised the arts through the Ministry of the Interior, subsidized the theatres in Paris, appointed their personnel and established new ones. Berlioz – the greatest composer in France between Rameau and Ravel – was unable to garner an official position during his lifetime. The French musical establishment – the Cherubinis, the Aubers, the Girauds – were dead set against him, denying him both a place to work and a place to perform.

And without such an artistic establishment, a “closed shop”, against him? David Cairns’s biography of Berlioz (Volume 1, p. 384) notes that between 1791 and 1807 there was no government subsidy of or interference in the theatres. The arts flourished: in Paris there were as many as 23 and no fewer than 17 theatres, some 11 of them performing opera. Both French music and French singing reached their heights during those years, without a penny of government support.

In our own day, has the not-inconsiderable investment by the government in music in France produced any world-class conductors (apart from Boulez), orchestras, instrumentalists or singers? In the 1960’s the Metropolitan Opera was touring Europe and had a rocky performance of The Barber of Seville in Paris. Responding to criticism of the Rosina, the Met’s general director Rudolf Bing said that Roberta Peters may have had a bad evening, but the Paris Opera had had a bad century.

For all its faults, I think the American system of support of the arts through tax-deductable contributions may still be the best. It encourages support while tacitly recognizing that lovers of the arts and not the government are in the best position to make choices. Best of all, it avoids putting the arts in a tug of war between right-wing yahoos who have the vapors at the sight of a bit of skin and left-wing loonies who think that transgendered dulcimer ensembles are the artistic equal of Beethoven and Mozart.

Your Tax Dollars at Work

This story on the fate of the energy bill and all the trimmings Our Elected Representatives put on the Christmas tree contains this gem:

Sen. John Kyl, R-Ariz., said he found it curious that the Senate approved $15 billion in tax breaks, the House gave $17 billion, but the compromise worked out in the final bill would provide $23.6 billion. "Guess who lost — the taxpayer," he said.

Reminds me of a wrangle in the British Parliament in the early 20th century on naval rearmament. The government and the Admiralty were at loggerheads on the number of dreadnoughts to be built. The issue was resolved, in Churchill’s words: "The Admiralty asked for six ships, the Government offered four, so they compromised on eight."

The MTBE Problem

(Disclaimer: One of the owners of my company is a producer of MTBE)

A filibuster has been threatened by Senator Charles “Microphone Chuck” Schumer (D.-NY) over the MTBE liability exemption in the energy bill working its way through Congress. The waiver would protect MTBE producers from lawsuits filed after September 5th. Opponents of the provision say that it represents a gift to companies while proponents say companies should be immunized from suits against a legal, mandated product.

MTBE (methyl tertiary butyl ether) was added to gasoline to reduce pollution as mandated by the Clean Air Act in the early 1990’s. Its greatest rival is ethanol, now being pushed as an alternative oxygenate. MTBE – which has an appreciable solubility in water - was later found to migrate more rapidly from leaking underground storage tanks than the gasoline hydrocarbons and contaminating ground water. It also adds a pungent, turpentine-like taste to water and is a suspected – but not a proven – carcinogen. Oddly enough, its taste threshold (20-40 micrograms per liter) is far less than that of benzene (500 micrograms per liter), a known carcinogen.

Now one would think that the real culprit here is the leaking underground fuel tank and not the ingredient itself, but there’s less money in it for trial lawyers to go after the tank owners than to sue the MTBE producers. Indeed, MTBE producers have been successfully sued in California and Nevada for allegedly selling a defective product.

It has been suggested by conspiracy theorists that the oil companies, particularly Chevron and Atlantic Richfield, pushed this “unsafe” product onto the market. Actually, MTBE is a fairly sensible oxygenate for refiners to produce. It is the product of isobutylene – a refinery stream fraction – and methanol, easily produced from natural gas. Therefore, oil companies can produce both gasoline and MTBE in a single refinery and ship the blended product through pipelines.

Compare with ethanol. Ethanol is produced from corn, principally in the Midwest. Anhydrous ethanol voraciously attracts water and is corrosive to pipelines, so it has to be transported either by truck or by railcar to the East and West coasts. While I don’t want to treat with the question of whether ethanol costs more energy to produce than it burns, ethanol production is now subsidized to the tune of $0.54 per gallon or 5.4 cents per gallon of gasoline. The subsidy is scheduled to be eliminated in 2006; what do you bet that it gets extended?

Are there any alternatives? Among the ethers, ETBE (ethyl tertiary butyl ether) migrates in ground water more slowly than MTBE, but it suffers from ethanol’s drawbacks: it is not produced in the refining process and would have to be brought in to be reacted with isobutylene. Other ethers are uneconomical.

A non-oxygenated alternative is isooctane. This is produced from the dimerization of isobutylene to isooctene, followed by hydrogenation. It has the advantages of being from refinery feedstocks as well as having low solubility in water and a good octane value of 100. Whether it is economical to produce is another question entirely; my understanding is that ETBE and isooctane would also require tax subsidies.

Of course, the best alternative would be to eliminate the additive requirement altogether. A report from the National Research Council in 1999 found that oxygenates did little to reduce smog-forming emissions. Improvements in engine design and non-oxygenate gasoline formulation mean that cars produce ever less pollution, so as older cars are replaced by newer ones, the problem becomes smaller and smaller. It would also have the advantage of removing the “balkanization” of gasoline across the country, where different regions have different gasoline formulations depending on EPA requirements. Such fragmented markets can fall prey to price spikes when refineries go down or distribution is disrupted.

The Prodigal Son

London mayor Ken Livingstone, expelled from the Labour party, may be welcomed back. But what kind of lost sheep is returning to the flock?

Reading this story, one no more rational than before:

Mr Livingstone recalled a visit at Easter to California, where he was denounced for an attack he had made on what he called "the most corrupt and racist American administration in over 80 years". He said: "Some US journalist came up to me and said: 'How can you say this about President Bush?' Well, I think what I said then was quite mild. I actually think that Bush is the greatest threat to life on this planet that we've most probably ever seen. The policies he is initiating will doom us to extinction."

Proof, if more were needed, that the Left has become the playground of lunatics. Wotta wanker.

Sweet Thunder

A quite informative article in the November issue of the AKC Gazette on fox hunting. There is no link available, but the magazine is often available at Barnes and Noble or Borders.

There are several formal fox hunting clubs, principally on the East coast in New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia. The organization is not inconsiderable, with kennelmen, farriers, road whips, huntmasters and whippers in. Of course, the hunters are on horseback. Dress is quite formal, with livery and even top hats worn by the riders.

Fox hunting season in the U.S. formally runs from late September to the Sunday after Thanksgiving, though it may go on as long through the Fall as weather permits. Some hunts have their packs blessed by a priest on St. Hubert's Day (November 3rd), after the patron saint of hunting.

The dogs, of course, are foxhounds, mostly the heavier American Foxhound rather than the lighter, lither English. Crossbreds between the two are used as are other strains. All share the necessities for a hunting Foxhound: determination, a good nose and a voice "like the bells of Moscow." They work as a team, with the "strike" hounds picking up the fox's scent and the "tail" hounds bringing up the rear.

In Europe, the sport has been banned on ground of cruelty and has been replaced by drag hunting, where the hounds follow a previously-laid trail of aniseed scent. In the U.K., legislation is working its way through the legislative process to ban the sport completely as well, despite protests from hunting advocates that this would lead to the loss of dogs and kennel help.

The difference between the European attitude toward the sport and the American one is that in Europe the fox is considered destructive vermin and all hunts are intended to lead to a kill. Here in the States, it is quite rare to catch the fox. Some hunters brag that they've never been in on a kill. The unfortunate foxes that are caught are usually sick or old.

20th-Century Classics

Via Lynn Sislo, I saw this list of the 101 essential 20th century classical works. With most of them I agree, but may I make some other recommendations? None result in a violation of Steven Hicken’s rule about no more than three pieces from any one composer.

Elliot Carter: String Quartet No. 3 instead of the String Quartet No. 1. Add the Concerto for Orchestra.

John Corigliano: Add the Symphony No. 1. I love the Clarinet Concerto too.

Charles Ives: Add the Symphony No. 4 and the Concord Sonata.

Carl Nielsen: The Symphony No. 4 (Inextinguishable) is my favorite, but the Symphony No. 5 is a greater work.

Sergei Prokofiev: Symphony No. 5 instead of Lieutenant Kije.

Sergei Rachmaninoff: Substitute the Symphonic Dances for the Piano Concerto No. 2.

Maurice Ravel: Bolero?? <*splutter*>. Try Daphnis et Chloe instead.

Dmitri Shostakovich: Symphony No. 4 or 10 instead of the Symphony No. 5.

Jean Sibelius: Add Tapiola. And substitute the Symphony No. 7 for the Violin Concerto.

Richard Strauss: Substitute Elektra for Ariadne auf Naxos. Add Der Rosenkavalier.

Ralph Vaughan Williams: Substitute the Symphony No. 4 for the London Symphony. Add the Symphony No. 6.

William Walton: Add the Symphony No. 1 and the remarkable oratorio Belshazzar’s Feast.

You CAN Fight City Hall

This post is in Fritz Schranck territory, but I was delighted by this story, of which I learned about in a column in my weekly county newspaper.

Bill and Ruby Bosher of Euclid, Ohio were fortunate enough to win 3.5 million dollars in the Ohio state lottery. They paid federal and state taxes on their winnings, but later received a bill from the city of Euclid for $102,378.81 for the 1998 tax year. The city claimed that the lottery winnings were income subject to Euclid’s 2.85 percent income tax, imposed in 1994.

The Bosheres paid under protest, then filed an appeal with the Euclid Income Tax Board of Review, claiming that the ordinance establishing the tax on income:

… on the net profits attributable to the City earned on or after January 1, 1967, of all resident unincorporated business entities or professions or other activities, derived from sales made, work done, services performed or rendered and business or other activities conducted in the City.

did not cover lottery winnings. “Taxable income” was defined as “wages, salaries and other compensation paid by an employer… and/or the net profits from the operation of a business, profession or other enterprise or activity.” The Boshers claimed that their winnings didn’t come from business and could not be taxed under the Euclid ordinances.

The board, not surprisingly, sided with the city. The couple appealed through the courts, saying that if Euclid wanted to tax lottery winnings, its ordinances should say so. The Supreme Court of Ohio, in a unanimous decision, agreed. The majority opinion stated that “… the activity must be business-related in order to qualify as taxable income. Although the catch-all language ‘any activity’ is couched in broad terms, it refers only to business-related activity or activities undertaken for profit.”

The Boshers, the Court said, are entitled to the return of their $102,378.81 with interest. Dontcha just love it?

News from the Show Scene

An excellent weekend at the Cardinal Cluster shows in Columbus. Lacey took Best of Breed all four days over good sized entries and got placements in the Hound Group each day as well, with a Group 1 on Thursday (Sandusky KC, Betty-Anne Stenmark) and Group 4's on Friday (Dayton KC, Robert Berndt), Saturday (Lima KC, Barbara Dempsey Alderman) and Sunday (Central Ohio KC, Kent Delaney).

The competition in the Hound Group was of the highest level, with a number of top hounds of their breeds present. With the size of the shows we figure Lacey picked up over 800 all-breed points, pushing her well above 6100 for the year and putting her within striking distance of the record (6324) for a Borzoi bitch. Just three weeks of shows left for the year, so we're hoping for the best.

Statistics for October

The October statistics are up at Canine Chronicle. Through the end of the month, Lacey remains the Number 1 Borzoi in all-breed competition with 5193 points, leading Cassie (Ch. Kenai's Silver Glacier), who has 2930.

In breed rankings, Lacey again leads with 607 Borzoi defeated year to date through October. Cassie is making a strong run with 520; she picked up an incredible 170 points last month, principally from winning the Borzoi Club of California specialty for 81 points, then going Best of Breed at the all-breed show the next day for another 49. We never get entries like that around here!

So it's going to be tight through the remainder of the show season. We have good entries and favorable judges this weekend at Columbus, less favorable judges at the big Cleveland shows. Lacey took Best of Breed yesterday and today and is likely to repeat tomorrow and Sunday. Fingers crossed!

Just Plain Tired

The stress of waiting to find out whether I'd be counted among the sheep or the goats was relieved on Monday, but it's the relief that makes one more tired than the stress. My lovely bride and I went to bed early (for us) that evening.

At 2:00 AM the phone rang; wrong number, the idiot. I couldn't get back to sleep and got up at 3:30. Worked all day, then my lovely bride and I had an all-to-rare dinner out together. Loafed at the book store for a while and got home late.

Wednesday evening I drove up to Columbus to drop equipment off at the site for this weekend's shows. The hall opens up at 3:00 PM and I wanted to leave work at that time for the 90 minute drive up there. Someone scheduled a meeting from 4:00 to 5:00 that I was compelled to attend. Got up there at 7:30 and found almost every bit of room taken up. Squeezed our stuff in a sliver of space and drove home against 40 mile an hour winds.

So I'm not feeling terribly energetic. This weekend is no better, as I'll be stewarding and have to be there at 7:30. No rest for the wicked or the good.

Citizen Soldiers

“The average man already had firmly in mind the one war aim that carried or ever carried any weight with him. His war aim was to get out as soon as possible and go home. This didn’t mean that he wouldn’t fight – on the contrary. Brought to within fighting distance of the enemy he saw well enough that until those people over there were all killed or frightened into quitting, he would never get home. He did not need to know about their bad acts and wicked principles. Compared to the offense they now committed by being here, and by shooting at him and so keeping him here, any alleged atrocities of theirs, any evil scheme of their commanders, were trifles. Though the level of intelligence in the average man might be justly considered low, in very few of them would it be so low that they accepted notions that they fought, an embattled band of brothers, for noble 'principles.' They would howl at the idea; just as, in general, they despised and detested all their officers, hated the rules and regulations and disobeyed as many as they could; and from morning to night never stopped cursing the Army, scheming to get out of it, and hotly bitching about the slightest inconvenience, let alone hardship…

“When the fighting began the bitchers would fight all right. Indeed, the event, the battle, proved that – still bitching, only more so; despising their officers still more; hating the Army still more, and regarding orders still less – they would usually fight to somewhat better purpose, man for man, than whoever was opposite them.”

-- James Gould Cozzens, Guard of Honor

To all veterans, no matter how you felt, thank you.

You're Too Dumb to Read This

Howard Mortman tells us that there’s no dearth of celebs telling Americans that they’re idiots:

Michael Moore: “They are possibly the dumbest people on the planet. ...We Americans suffer from an enforced ignorance. We don’t know about anything that’s happening outside our country. Our stupidity is embarrassing.”

Ted Turner: “The United States has got some of the dumbest people in the world. I want you to know that; we know that.”

Jane Fonda: “I don’t know if a country where the people are so ignorant of reality and of history, if you can call that a free world.”

Martin Sheen: “Every time I cross this border, I feel like I’ve left the land of lunatics. You are not armed and dangerous. You do not shoot each other. I always feel a bit more human when I come here.”

Lefties are under the delusion that to be a Clinton-hater was an indication of mental derangement but Bush-hating is a sign of healthy dissent, patriotism and other self-proclaimed virtues. But have you ever noticed how quickly Bush-hatred slides into hatred for Americans in general? Apparently, living outside certain enclaves (Manhattan, San Francisco, Boston, Hollywood) leaves you vulnerable to accusations that you’re just some SUV-driving, gun-loving, WalMart-shopping, mouth-breathing knuckle-dragger. During the administration of the previous past President of these United States, I don’t recall lots of conservatives running off abroad to tell foreigners how stupid Americans were for putting the fellow in office.

As I’ve said, I have no regard whatsoever for the tastes of the American people at large. I have infinitely more respect for their common sense, which, despite a little family quarrel 140 years ago, has spared us the turmoil and totalitarianism suffered by those countries before which we’re expected to bow our heads in shame for being the people we are.

Caring for the Elderly Borzoi

A friend posted this set of rules her 10 1/2 year old Borzoi girl set down for her family. In no way does it differ from those laid down by our matriarch, Miss Possum:

- Serve dinner on time.
- Fluff pillow by bedside.
- Do not move pillow by bedside or I will sleep in the same spot on the hardwood floor and make you feel guilty.
- Keep wild puppy away.
- Keep other dogs away.
- Do not let other dogs bump me.
- Never leave me in same room with wild puppy.
- Give wild puppy to someone else (a suggestion).
- Provide chew treats at regular intervals.
- Never ever ever give plain dry food.
- Garnish food generously with garlic, veggies, oil, cooked chicken, or liver pâté.
- Go to bed when I go to bed. I do not like having to remind you.
- Provide regular massages.
- Leave my nails alone or I will scream bloody murder.
- Take me on short jaunts around the lake when the temperature is below 70 and there is a nice breeze.
- Take me for car rides, but not with wild puppy.
- Leave human dinner on counter where I can snatch it.
- Let me out to potty when I want to go out to potty, which is not at the same time as the others... it's 5 minutes after they have been let out and you have gotten back under the covers.
- Never forget for one minute I am queen of all I survey.

Spared

"They shall take some of the blood and put it on the lintel of the houses in which they eat it...

"The blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live. I will pass over you and no plague shall destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt."

-- Exodus 12:7 and 12:13

There must have been the blood of the lamb on the lintel of my office door today because the plague passed me by. It is a bittersweet day though, as some good people - guilty only of doing what they should have been doing - got the axe.

Making Up For It

Howard Dean, desperately attempting to repair his reputation among the Democratic activists critical to the nomination, told an audience in Tallahassee, Florida that Southernerns need to stop basing their votes on "race, guns, God and gays."

Governor Dean went on to say that he hoped to resurrect the coalition of conservative Southerners that Franklin D. Roosevelt forged during his administration. I don't think this is a good way to start.

Zero-Star Restaurant

A story from the CBC:

Health officials are investigating after the carcasses of what appears to be four dogs were found in a Chinese restaurant in Edmonton.

The skinned, frozen carcasses were discovered in a freezer at the Panda Garden restaurant early Tuesday.

Health inspector Richard Reive says he got a call from Edmonton animal welfare officers after they were tipped off by mall security guards.

"They took me back to the walk-in freezer and when you open the door there were four carcasses," he said. "Two were inside black garbage bags and the other two were exposed on the floor of the freezer."...

The restaurant has been closed and so far, the restaurant owners can't be found.

For their own good, they better not be.

The Stupid Party

Howard Dean's remark about wanting to appeal to "guys with Confederate flags in their pickup trucks" of course has been leapt on by his rivals for the Democratic Party nomination.

I suppose it's is the natural reaction of ambitious politicians to fixate on the word "Confederate" and not on Governor Dean's uncharacteristically sensible notion that a sizable section of the electorate shoudn't be written off. But when a similar lack of reflection is apparent in the Democrats' tame-tabby press organs, the disease is worse than we thought.

A New York Times editorial this morning has nothing at all to say about the Governor's message, only talking about his "gaffe" and questioning his political skills on the big stage. A stupid column by Richard Cohen - but I repeat myself - strives for even-handedness by bashing Bush and Reagan 65 percent of the time and Al Sharpton 35 percent of the time, better than usual for this Clinton suppository. But he too fails to address the bigger issue of whether it's right to treat a significant portion of the country as socially retarded.

George Will points out:

Until Oct. 7, 26 states with 46 percent of the nation's population had Republican governors. Then Californians remembered that they really wanted a Republican governor after all. Then on Tuesday, Mississippi and Kentucky elected Republicans to replace Democrats. When all three are inaugurated, and if Republicans on Nov. 15 retain the Louisiana governorship, the GOP will govern 29 states with 60.6 percent of the population.

Running for the endorsement of Le Monde and The Guardian isn't going to reverse that trend.

A Lapse of Judgement

Andrew Sullivan considers opposition to Gene Robinson's elevation to Episcopalian bishop to be "backlash, panic and fear." In Sullivanland, because the Reverend Robinson is gay, there can be no principled reason to oppose his becoming a bishop.

Mr. Sullivan also says: "Although Jesus said nothing that we know of about homosexuality, his ministry is emphatically about welcoming - not excluding - the marginalized, the stigmatized, the condemned, the pariahs." While it's true that Jesus sought out the tax collectors and sinners, nothing in my reading of the Bible indicates that He saw no problem with their remaining tax collectors and sinners. The Great Physician, He said, came to care for the sick, not the well.

As to Bishop Robinson, what I find objectionable about the Episcopalian Church's determination to elevate him is not his sexual orientation. It is that he left his wife and children, not to follow Christ as James and John did, but to follow his own carnal desires. It would have been enough to sink a heterosexual minister; why should Bishop Robinson have been treated differently?

Forecast: Cloudy with Magnetic Storms

Sunspot activity is at its highest in over 1000 years, according to a story in New Scientist. Combining historical measurements with isotopic analysis of ice core samples, scientists in Finland and Germany found that there have been more sunspots since 1940 than in the previous 1150 years.

The team is unwilling to draw any correlation between increased solar magnetic activity with global warming. Quite right too: correlation does not equal causation. Besides, global warming is solely - solely! - the fault of the United States. Got that? You'd better.

News from the Show Scene

My lovely bride and Miss Lacey went to Fort Wayne, Indiana for the Old Fort Cluster of shows. Saturday and today were large entries, supported by the Midwest Borzoi Club one day and the Borzoi Club of America the other.

Lacey was Best of Breed on Friday under Jane Forsyth and again - over 32 dogs - on Saturday under Joan Frailey. Ms. Frailey was doing the Hound Group as well and gave Lacey a Group 1. The peanut gallery was predicting that today Lacey would go Best in Show.

Disaster! Lacey didn't get out of breed competition today, going Best of Opposite Sex. The judge was a provisional, doing one of her first, if not the first, Borzoi assignment. We seem to have remarkably bad luck with provisionals (or derisionals); Sandy Simmons gave Lacey a Best of Breed at Muncie in 2001 and that seems to be it. Is puzzlement.

Dopey Letter of the Day

Where else but the New York Times?

To the Editor:

This whole "issue" of electability versus Democratic Party values is completely phony ("In the Candidacies of Clark and Dean, Democrats Confront the Issue of Electability," news article, Oct. 30).

No one ever gets elected because of his electability. People get elected because they stand for something the voters want. The reason the Democratic Party is out of power is its gutless, poll-watching, unprincipled attempts to simulate the statistical center of the American public's diverse and conflicting views.

Voters recognize and despise this manipulative strategy. Pushing for an "electable" candidate is more of the same, and if registered Democrats fall for this scam, they will land the party out in the street once again.

JERRY CAYFORD

Brunswick, Md., Oct. 31, 2003

Geez, Mr. Cayford, "gutless, poll-watching, unprincipled attempts to simulate the statistical center of the American public's diverse and conflicting views" were how the immediate former President of these United States was elected and re-elected. And he's held up by the whole Democratic party as a political genius!

Nuts!

A story in the Independent on, uh, prosthetic equipment for dogs:

Looking for something to give Fido for Christmas? Well, if he's been neutered, how about a pair of Neuticles? Yes, the American pet product industry has the perfect gift for the dog that once had everything: prosthetic testicles.

More than 100,000 pairs have been installed since they were launched in 1995. They come in two styles and three different sizes - all marketed under the slogan: "It's like nothing ever changed."

Gregg Miller, an American entrepreneur, invented Neuticles after seeing his own dog's post-operative trauma. "The day after," says Mr Miller, "he went to clean himself, and I'll never forget the look on his face." Thus inspired, he developed the phoney cojones - and the first lucky recipient was a rottweiler called Max.

Neuticles are also a not-so-clever dodge around a requirement for eligibility in conformation shows: that for males both testicles be present, of normal size and fully descended. And yes, judges reach down and check.

One exhibitor had one installed in a monorchid (one testicle) dog and took it off to a show. Little did he know that in the meantime the inguinal ring had relaxed and the normal testicle came down. In the ring on examination, the judge (my lovely bride says it was Anne Rodgers Clark) felt down there and bellowed, "My God! He's got three of them!" No doubt a bench show hearing and a lengthy suspension resulted.