The world is a mask that hides the real world.
Thatâs what everybody suspects, though the world we see wonât let us dwell on it long.
The world has ways - more masks - of getting our attention.
The suspicion sneaks in now and again, between the cracks of everyday existenceâ¦the bird song dips, rises, dips, trails off into blue sky silence before the note that would reveal the shape of a melody that, somehow, would tie everything together, on the verge of unmasking the hidden armature that frames this sky, this tree, this bird, this quivering green leaf, jewels in a crown.â¦
As the song dies, the secret withdraws.
The tree is a mask.
The sky is a mask.
The quivering green leaf is a mask.
The song is a mask.
The singing bird is a mask.
Tuesday, April 26, 2005
Unscrambling the titanosaur omelette
Classic It's A Jungle Out There!, from the 2005 archives.
What's really surprising is how little difference there is between the programming of 2005 and the stuff they're doing today. The preoccupation with Mother Nature in all her exotic manisfestations, oddities, freaks, and her undeniable dangers and pitfalls, fear-mongers...
It's a Jungle Out There!
Dinosaurs were just overgrown chickens!
That’s the startling conclusion announced [1] by scientists who recently compared protein in chicken eggs to eggs of the titanosaur, a humongous, giraffe-necked plant-eater that roamed the wilds of Patagonia some 70 million years ago.
After sequencing the amino acids of the ancient proteins, the titanosaur DNA will be used to improve current poultry and reptile breeding stocks by increasing meat yield and nutritional value.
We'll need all the strength we can get to defend ourselves from swarms from the south. Bees, I mean, not infiltrators from the Caliphate.
This just in: Assume any bee you see is Africanized and dangerous, warns Exterminator Doug [2].
Killer bee
But, these bees are the least of our worries, judging from this lovely encounter, from the Guardian [3]:
Quite.
Don't forget, "It's a Jungle Out There!"
What's really surprising is how little difference there is between the programming of 2005 and the stuff they're doing today. The preoccupation with Mother Nature in all her exotic manisfestations, oddities, freaks, and her undeniable dangers and pitfalls, fear-mongers...
It's a Jungle Out There!
Dinosaurs were just overgrown chickens!
That’s the startling conclusion announced [1] by scientists who recently compared protein in chicken eggs to eggs of the titanosaur, a humongous, giraffe-necked plant-eater that roamed the wilds of Patagonia some 70 million years ago.
After sequencing the amino acids of the ancient proteins, the titanosaur DNA will be used to improve current poultry and reptile breeding stocks by increasing meat yield and nutritional value.
We'll need all the strength we can get to defend ourselves from swarms from the south. Bees, I mean, not infiltrators from the Caliphate.
This just in: Assume any bee you see is Africanized and dangerous, warns Exterminator Doug [2].
Killer bee
But, these bees are the least of our worries, judging from this lovely encounter, from the Guardian [3]:
....residents of the blossom-filled streets of Sydenham were still shaking last night as a father of three told how he had been mauled by a black cat the size of a labrador.
Police armed with Taser stun guns sealed off roads in south-east London, school gates were locked and teachers warned pupils to keep away from wooded areas after Tony Holder escaped with a cuff around the face from the big cat.
Mr Holder, 36, was calling in his tabby, KitKat, at 2.15am yesterday when he spotted his pet being savaged by a 5ft-long animal.
The black, panther-like creature then sprang at him in his back garden.
"It had pinned the cat down, but when it saw me it let the cat go and jumped on my chest, knocking me to the ground," he said.
"I could see these huge teeth and the whites of its eyes just inches from my face. It was snarling and growling and I really believed it was trying to do some serious damage.
"I tried to get it off but I couldn't move it, it was heavier than me.
"I was scared. I really thought my life was in danger but all I was worried about was my family. It was an absolute nightmare."
In the gloom, Mr Holder's 11-year-old daughter Ashleigh, watched from a bedroom window. I just saw my dad flying backwards and struggling with something," she said. "I was really scared."
As Mr Holder was being treated for scratches by ambulance staff, he saw the beast saunter past again.
Armed police arrived, sealed off the streets around Mr Holder's home, loaded their stun guns with tranquillisers and searched for it with flashlights.
The animal gave them the slip, but as tabloid reporters scoured the streets in safari gear brandishing butterfly nets, the Guardian picked up the scent of something big across the railway line by Catling Close.
Billy Rich, 44, was looking out of his window at 5.30am when he saw a black creature leap across the road and bound south towards Mayow Park.
"I see a ... thing," he said.
"What's he supposed to have seen?" asked his ex-wife.
"The beast of Sydenham," your correspondent explained.
"The only beast of Sydenham is him," she replied, prodding a finger at Mr Rich.
"On the news they said it was as big as a Doberman, but it wasn't," insisted Mr Rich. "It was big and black and I thought, fucking hell, what was that?
"It definitely wasn't a pussy cat. It was too big. The way it jumped, you could tell it wasn't a dog. It definitely wasn't a fox, but it can't be a panther - where would a panther come from in Sydenham?"
The British Big Cat Society estimates there could be 100 big cats roaming the land. A £5,000 reward has been offered for the Beast of Burford, a large black cat spotted near the Oxfordshire town.
Scotland Yard confirmed the beast of Sydenham was the second serious sighting of a large black cat in south-east London in the past three years.
Officers responded to reports of a large black cat in Oxleas Wood in Shooters Hill, south London, in 2002 but failed to trace the animal.
Danny Bamping, the founder of the society, warned that if the cat was a melanistic leopard or a black panther, it could kill. "They can be very, very dangerous," he said. "There have been incidents in North America where joggers have been killed by these creatures."
A Scotland Yard spokesman confirmed that officers had visited schools to warn them about the big cat. "A police officer who attended the incident said he thought he saw what looked like a black labrador," the spokesman said.
One pupil at Sydenham high school for girls said the gates had been locked at lunchtime and students had been told to stay away from wooded areas and dark alleyways.
She said they had also been instructed to make a loud noise wherever they went to scare off the beast.
Parents said they would be keeping their children indoors. "The garden is secure but I wouldn't let my little boy Morgan go out and play today," said Kelly Wood.
"He's 19 months. I think he's quite an edible size."
Quite.
Don't forget, "It's a Jungle Out There!"
