This is an interesting article about cetacean culture. We reported on another article that covered the breakdown of the dynamic and complicated language that dolphin utilize. It described the use of personal names, syntax and even grammar, but this article takes a more holistic approach and describes a sense of culture and society, much like humans.

This is an amazing thing to even contemplate. I, for one, have always thought of dolphins and whales as something a lot more special than we think. What if they are on par with our intelligence, but the lack of hands has hindered any way of constructing a physical representation of such intelligence? Who knows, but isn’t it fun to think about?

Here is a small portion of the article:

“Based on what we know, I’d guess that cetacean culture is intermediate between humans and chimpanzees. Not in material culture, but in most other respects,” said Whitehead.

Culture is an especially important measure of personhood in whales, since it’s difficult to administer the sorts of tests that have found chimpanzees to be capable of basic math, altruism, laughter and complex communication, the latter of which can be neurologically imaged in real-time.

But if cetaceans can’t take these tests, they have met one critical laboratory benchmark of higher cognition: self-recognition. With Wildlife Conservation Society cognitive scientist Diana Reiss, Lori Marino showed that bottlenose dolphins can use mirrors to investigate marks hidden on their bodies. “When they look in the mirror, they’re saying, ‘That’s me,’” said Marino. “They have a sense of self through time.”

And in a much-celebrated first documented example of tool use in marine mammals, a family of dolphins in Australia uses sponges to hunt.

Cetaceans even surpass most primates in their use of sound. “We’ve known for some time now that the communication systems of these animals is more complex than we can imagine,” said Marino. “People are starting to use some interesting statistical methods to look at their vocal repertoires, and they’re finding structural complexity that suggests there may be something like grammar, syntax, even language.”

Read Full Article Here!

Should information ever be censored? Should all media outlets be held responsible to present information in a “raw” format? Should information be a constitutional right? I believe so …

“Media Matters for America is a Web-based, not-for-profit, 501(c)(3) progressive research and information center dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media.”

- MediaMatters.com

The above quote from Media Matters’ about us page says quite a bit about our political environment. Although I would prefer to leave out “conservative” as that can demonize, I do believe that the majority of misinformation comes from their camp. Misinformation. What exactly is it? Misinformation, noun, is “false or inaccurate information, esp. that which is deliberately intended to deceive.” At least that is what Apple’s dictionary tells me, but let’s dig a little deeper.

Misinformation can be done in many ways. You can create information without any objectivity or evidence to back up your claim, also known as lying (Yea, that’s right. I can fly.). You can manipulate or massage real data to support your agenda (Yes, Ms. Jones. Hormone therapy doubles your health risk.) And, last but not least, you can censor or edit out information (S. Hannity: Obama sympathizes with those that committed the 9/11 attack. Listen to his last press conference … )

All forms of misinformation are plaguing our society. Our new contributing author, Alex Trusca, has recently written about how information is key to a successful democracy, but what if the information that saturates this society is corrupt, censored or manipulated? Is that anti-democratic?

We look at China, Venezuela and Iran with their draconian control, their religious or communist government and think how horrible it must be to live in a society where truth and information is suppressed. But, are we so free from it over here?

Okay, in our society, information may not be banned or systematically censored, but does it need to be to influence policy, to manipulate public perception? In many ways subtlety is more deceptive because it is seemingly benign at first. “So what? It’s just a little white lie, right?” Well, it is like the age old boiling frog story.

“If you throw a live frog in boiling water, he will immediately jump out to save himself. But, if you place him in luke warm water and slowly increase the temperature, he will not attempt to remove himself.” This is because our neurobiology is not adept at sensing small increases over time: “It seems as though all of a sudden, I was 50 lbs over weight!”

Our democratic society is the frog. We are not noticing how the Mass Media is ratcheting up their manipulation of information. If we mimic the frog, and not notice the subtle change, we will end up with a dead democracy and wonder, “How did this happen?”

Take for instance the Iraq War. This misinformation campaign killed over a hundred thousand people. The entire lead up to it was based off propaganda that is still repeated today. “Fight them over there, so we don’t fight them over here; Iraq was involved in 9/11; Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction … ” all are still repeated today.

Or, how about something as simple as Barack Obama being Muslim? In 2008, 12% of all people polled in the US thought Obama was a Muslim. Now, 11% think Obama is Muslim. This may not sound like a big deal, but only 48% knew Obama was a Christian. The remaining 39% were unsure. We are talking about our own nation’s president, not some foreign dignitary.

Still don’t believe me? Take the housing market bubble from which we are now suffering. That too was misinformation. We, Americans, were told that owning a home was the best investment we could make; it was patriotic to own a home. We were told that housing will always increase in value and continually investing in the market was a near guaranteed win. Was it true? No. Were there people that knew better? Yes, but that information was not disseminated among the people.

When our country is designed to be a democracy, information being disseminated to all constituents is paramount for a “free” society to operate properly. Most importantly, this information is then individually processed for each member to properly own its responsibility to the democratic nation. If you are not an informed voter, you are, in essence, stripped of your rights. Free, uncensored information should be a constitutional right, not something that is treated like like pop culture.

Let’s use a very current example. When the Iraq War was authorized, one would think that pertinent information would be constitutionally guaranteed to the House and Senate, so that they could make a properly informed decision. Wouldn’t you? Well, it seems the CIA thought not.

It has been revealed this week that the CIA may have officially misinformed or misled the congress about Iraq, WMD’s, torture and more since 2001. Here is what the Wall Street Journal had to say:

Central Intelligence Agency Director Leon E. Panetta has told lawmakers that the agency “concealed significant actions” from Congress, according to a letter released Wednesday from seven Democratic lawmakers.

The letter also contends that Mr. Panetta said CIA officials have misled Congress since 2001.

Unfortunately, it does not stop with high level, government departments. It is right there in your living room, staring right back at you every night. Your news channels are now propaganda machines. The worst, FOX News. Let’s take a look:

We as a society, whether you are conservative or not, should never condone such blatant abuse of our right to factual information. Any organization that is considered “the press” should never edit, censor or manipulate the facts to perpetrate an ideology. It should be left up to the individual to believe what they want to believe.

You may say, “So, don’t watch FOX News then!” Yes, of course, but what if you didn’t know better? What if it’s the only channel that worked on your 20 dollar TV? How would one know that FOX News is not real news? They don’t have a disclaimer. They are not on a comedy channel. Hell, they even say “Fair and Balanced!” Was that person just stripped of their constitutional rights? Yes, I believe the person was … or should be.

Now, if you don’t want government controlled media, I don’t blame you, but we need some kind of countermeasure for regulating our journalism, news outlets and pundits. This has gone too far. We need to hold these people accountable for their actions.

This is where organizations like Media Matters of America … well, matter. They are trying to step in and fill a void, but they are up against very powerful entities. So, get involved, get familiar with Media Matters, donate to their cause and inform your friends and family about this abuse of power. Our government has let these institutions get too big and too powerful. They have allowed the power to shift away from us and into the hands of corporate conglomerates.

I would like to take this time to tip my hat over to Media Matters and encourage everyone to bookmark www.mediamatters.com and help keep our media accountable and donate if you can. If everyone was informed properly, FOX News would be forced to report accurately. Their power is your ignorance. Help create and enforce free and truthful journalism.

Full Disclosure: Blog4Brains.com and I are not affiliated or related to Media Matters for America.

If you are an infophile like me, then you may love this new computational “search” engine as much as I do. Woldram’s new project called WolframAlpha is very intersting. Then, when you consider this project is in an alpha state, meaning it is still in the beginning stage of development, you should be very excited to see where this is going in, say, 5 years.

Check it out for yourself at WolframAlpha.com. Type in all kinds of things that you are interested in. Speed of light, population of Uganda, how many websites are on the world wide web, the acidity of Coke. Anything, and it gives you data. Awesome!

Here is a small portion of the article:

This Monday, I had a chance to visit with researchers at Wolfram Research, in Champaign, IL, who are frantically putting the final touches on Wolfram Alpha, the new “computational knowledge engine” from physicist Stephen Wolfram.

This engine is meant to go live in two or three weeks; with it, you’ll be able to enter “GDP Germany Japan” and get not a list of Web pages, but comparative charts on the economic output of those two nations. Or you can enter “GATACTTCA” and find the spots on the human genome where that sequence appears.

Everybody at Wolfram Research characterized the new engine as something complementary to, and not in competition with, Google. (In short: Google uses elaborate means to find you the right Web pages, while Wolfram amasses databases and deploys myriad equations to compute answers for you.)

Read Full Article Here!

  - Why Flex-Fuel Is America’s Next Biggest Blunder — Part One

  - Why Flex-Fuel Is America’s Next Biggest Blunder — Part Two

  - Bush’s Ethanol Blunder Continues

So, you may be wondering why were are alluding to a future in biofuels. Well, the problem is we are currently using edible food to convert to fuel. Mainly, corn. This takes viable food for feeding people off of the global stage. This is placing fueling cars and machinery above fueling our fellow human beings. Sick, right? Well, there is an alternative, and it is using the cellulose, or inedible part of agriculture, to convert into ethanol. This would be the stalks of the plants, the inedible leaves and roots, and/or grasses.

This would be using what is normally agricultural waste, to fuel our future. A good idea, but there is a problem. This stuff is very difficult to convert into sugar, which is then converted to alcohol. The carbohydrate of the cellulose is locked up in a matrix of ligands or what some may call “fiber.” You have to breakdown the “fiber” to retrieve the “sugar.” The old method to extract this stuff was gasification. This normally takes quite a bit of energy, so you would have to use energy to produce energy. This creates a lower net output.

Instead of energy, scientists are looking into using enzymes and bacteria. This would replace the heat used to breakdown the cellulose, and increase the net energy output. A while back, we found a special kind of bacteria in the gut of termites that help the termite digest the wood fibers into energy. This gave us insight into how we could reproduce this effect, but on a larger scale.

All of this is fascinating, but unfortunately, it’s still a ways off. We need to be able to cheaply make these enzymes, and the best way to do that is to allow bacteria to do all the work for us. Easy, right? Well, it will be once we figure out how to recombine the genetics of these little buggers to reproduce themselves and evolve into millions of enzyme producing factories.

Scientists are working on this right now at CalTech. They are getting close to the actualization of this very idea, but they are still working on the genetic recombination. Let’s wish them luck.

Now, If you are interested in the science of all this, check out this video below from Technology Review. It goes into a lot more detail than this article.

Watch the video here.

When my mother, Victoria, felt things, namely America, turn against her, she would sign and with her perfect accent say, “America is beautiful!”

I often wondered what she said the day after President Truman dropped the first atomic bomb, and then the next day after dropping the second. What did Mom say? I don’t know, although now I wish I did. While I grew up, I never questioned her about things like that.

Adolph went back to his village in Poland and brought Victoria home to the U.S. My mother died from a stroke. Years later, 1968 or thereabouts, Pop went back to visit Poland. My brothers and I wondered if he went back for another wife. He did ask Richie to airmail him his divorce papers to where he was staying in Poland. Much later we found out thru Uncle Alex that he almost married again, but lost the woman because of his false teeth. He lost his false teeth while visiting her and his “loved one” found them in the bread box in their kitchen. So the knot wasn’t tied that tight.

When he came back home from Poland, all Adolph could talk about was the to and fro via the airplanes. Then Richie and airplanes. I knew what that was all about…I knew what that was all about. I knew at the same time in his mind my father was counting lost money in Polish, cost-values of the new but unused college clothes, college tuition forfeited after Richie was expelled from Notre Dame for hankie pankie, but all I know about his joining the U.S. Air Force, was that Adolph had a long talk with him the day he came home from Notre Dame.

Nevertheless, when my mom was alive she was a seamstress for women; she could look at a lady, just once and make a dress that fit her perfectly. She gave her hard earned sewing money away to her three sons, one after the other, to use towards college for extras.

She wanted to be oh-so American and this incident happened when I was in the 7th grade. About that time, Tupperware parties started, became popular, surged as a women’s event.

My family knew not a whit about giving parties. On my first birthday party, my mother having decided I should have one like all the other kids, baked a cake and sent out in the street to round up the gang and any stray adult neighbors. I didn’t get any birthday presents except from my mom.

Such goes it!

But disaster came later. Victoria recruited me to clean the house, both floors, sweep the cellar floor, sweep off the front porch. Not to bother with the back porch because that’s where Koko lived. The small back porch was his “dog house”. Then I had to polish (not Polish, polish, you know, with a rag?) all the furniture in the dining room and the kitchen.

Victoria outdid herself; she made gumkees (pigs in the blanket) and the potato salad with the vinegar in it. All day long she baked, and fried, and now and then she would claim, “America is beautiful, isn’t it, Stashu?”

“Yeah, Mom, it sure is!”

I’ve never seen her so happy.

Unfortunately, no one, and I mean, nobody, came to my mom’s party. I went across the street, tried to drum up some interest. I tried to bribe Mary Clandy all my savings, some $17.62. “I want you to come over and buy something from my mom.”

“With this money, Me? Stanley, what you talking about?”

“Nobody comes. I want you to come over to my mother’s party, eat a little of cake, and buy some of that plastic stuff from my mother,” I explained.

“What’s going on?” said a confused Ms. Clandy.

Mary Clandy’s brother Frank, who worked on the barges, was off that day. While at the kitchen table, he spoke up. “I’ll tell you what’s going on. I can guess what happened. Mary, did you receive an invitation to his mother’s Tupperware party?”

“Why, no”

“Mrs. Nodvik is — excuse me, son — is a dumb Polack. Polacks don’t know how to give a proper party.”

“Well, at the last party, she stood up and announced she was going to have a party, and we all were invited. But, I guess that’s not enough … ”

Frank laughed. His sister looked at him in a stern fashion, stern enough to silence him.

“I’ll be over, as soon as I change my dress,” said Ms. Clandy

“You’re a good neighbor, Ms. Clandy. Thank you.”

Miss Clandy did come over, talked a good while with Mom who sent me downstairs to pop some popcorn on the cellar stove. Later, Miss Clandy bought some plastic stuff, bowls with lids, and I went out with her and she said she tried to explain about party invitations, but my Mom told her they didn’t have parties that way in the old country. I watched her go home. I liked Ms. Clandy even though she was a spinster, and even though she was the last in our neighborhood to still have an outdoor outhouse.

My Mom came out on the front porch. I could see tears on her cheeks.

“America is still beautiful, right Mom?”

“I want Harry Truman to drop a big Ass-bomb on them,” she said.

“What!?”

My mom, Victoria, sighed, looked around, then repeated what she had said, “ … a big-ass bomb on those women.”

–30–

Guidelines

1) Dress as best as you can, be clean, look decent, be courteous, all so you’ll convey that you’re not on drugs — no one wants to be an enabler.

2) Try to be the first among any competition in asking strangers to buy you coffee or breakfast (“I was here first! I haven’t eaten for two days.”)

3) Don’t you ever feel ashamed, embarrassed, whatever, because you’re out on the sidewalk panhandling. It’s not your fault; it’s all Wallstreet’s fault.

Still, you may question yourself. How did it happen that you’re begging for a few coins? Stop. Don’t you ponder how or why. In today’s uncertain world, the economy sucks. Like so many others, you may have been forced out into the streets because your house is gone or you don’t have the rent money and/or you’re hungry … and all you need right at this moment is a cup of coffee, maybe a doughnut, too.

Every spare-some-change reason is good for at least a quarter, but what you’ll soon learn in this posting is that the wacky and goofy pitches get better results, especially when they make the mark smile. The Mark? Maybe I should say, “Make the Client smile.” You will further learn that there’s far more and better results this way — dollar bills instead of coins — than someone who uses a reasonable, logical, and compelling story. Often, guilt is involved for clients who hear the latter, reasonable pleas. Making clients feel guilty won’t cut it at all because people run from guilt. Have faith. The more outrageous your reasons for begging, the better are the odds that you’ll score and score more money at the day’s end.

Examples of bad reasons: The most common but poorer appeals are “Today’s my birthday.” and “I need a dollar and fifty cents for bus fare to get home.”

Hey, now, down-and-out pauper, Blog4Brains.com is going to provide you with much wilder, far-out reasons than those two lame why-I-need-money excuses. Let’s learn to be absurd, really absurd! As soon as possible, please try out these 8 Money-Begging Reasons:

8) I have a chance, just one chance to get off the streets with your help. I need a dollar to buy a megabucks lottery ticket.

7) Can you spare forty-four cents for a first-class postage stamp? I want to write my mother a letter to borrow $20.

6) My pacemaker is in the pawn shop, and I might die soon if I don’t redeem it. All I need is five dollars.

5) This is my little brother, Billy. I’ll leave Billy with you as collateral if you lend me two dollars. I can pay you back in three weeks.

4) I can get a job as a human guinea pig at Western Labs in their alcoholism study, but I need two dollars for a beer so I can qualify.

3) I need four dollars to buy a city map to find the best places with public restrooms. I gotta go and go right now!

2) Hey, Mister, I need some money to buy batteries for my DVD player so I can stand out here on the sidewalk longer.

1) Any spare change? This is a good location to solicit from. I rented it from Joey and I owe Joey today’s pavement rent.

A tip: Never laugh or ridicule your clients. It isn’t wise to be a smart-aleck. If you’re refused money, don’t say, “Well, have a nice day anyway.” Think about that. Don’t you think that won’t kill off future donations? The next time you accost that very same person, he or she will remember you as the guilt-giver. And thus, you killed off any free money forever from them.

And if, with luck, it goes down the opposite way, then, the same fellow might be making their daily trek past you and give. Give day after day. This kind of person starts to look for you and donates money like clockwork. And something else has happened — all to your benefit. You are now recognized as his or her personal panhandler — their “adopted human.” Your client will reach for his wallet or her purse once you’re in sight. Cool. And in time they’ll even drop off coffee, sodas, pastry, and sandwiches for you. I shat you not! Really!

May I repeat myself? Always give clients a bizarre reason for why you need the money. Furthermore, use your imagination to dream up additional wacky reasons. Find the one good reason that works for you. Just the fact that you’re living in dire straits isn’t enough of a reason.

You’ll discover that this practice is on the money when you see your clients smile at your most off-the-wall pitches for contributions. Most passersby have heard all the jaded reasons for wanting money which makes it easy for you to snag them. So, snag them with a crazy come-on.

And, in order to prop up your confidence, always keep the Blog4Brains 8 best tall-tales in mind in case you’re stuck for something far-fetched. Good luck!

–30–

The psychology of fear is an interesting study. Fear can turn a normally rational, lucid human being into a raving lunatic that couldn’t see logic if it smacked him in the face. Let’s look at Israel. Israel, in almost all accounts, is a superior nation. They have some of the greatest scientists, are technologically advanced, have advanced medicine, a true democracy and a good education system. So then, why are they so damn irrational?

Well, they have this all consuming fear that people want to “wipe [Israel] off the map,” even though to do that would be a death sentence for the offender. I understand that they have been victimized in a horrible way, but you can’t let that fact dictate your politics. If you do, you end up warping your environment to suit the bias of your fears. You read into things, you misinterpret things, and you act in a way that attracts negative attention.

So here’s a question: What happens when you mix a war-hawk armed to the teeth with the insecurity of a geek in a locker room full of jocks? Well, let’s find out …

Here is a small portion of an article about Israel ramping up their rhetoric concerning their thoughts on attacking Iran:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his top deputies have not formally asked for U.S. aid or permission for possible military strikes on Iran’s nuclear program, fearing the White House would not approve, two Israeli officials said. …

Israel is increasingly nervous that Iran is developing the capability to build a nuclear weapon, an intention Iran denies. However, Israel is unlikely to attack Iran without at least tacit U.S. approval, in part because that would require cooperation from the United States. At the very least, Israel likely would have to fly over Iraqi airspace, which is still effectively controlled by the U.S. Air Force.

But, this isn’t the scariest part. Read the comments following this article. They are ridiculously naïve, fearful and irrational.

cub62: You don’t need permission from us just do it and don’t tell our boy President.

kcosk: So what.. part of the job.. what did Lincoln say about office-seekers.. “There are too many pigs for the tits” ?

doublehook: The Israelies fear that any classified knowledge of a raid on Iran would be leaked so there is no basis to nclude the US in the plan.

MindTinker: Israel will be wise to not trust this current U S administration. It is full of liars who practice deceit. Israel should do what it needs to do in order to defend itself and protect its people.

Kroger: Here, no. If we can’t stop “rouge” nuclear programs, nobody can. Oh, don’t even get me started on “inspecting this or that.” It’s done. Just stop.

klesb: Israel should just knock out all Iranian conventional power plants and oil facilities, then mine their harbor and destroy their air force and landing fields. Pretend that Iran is Kosovo. Then negotiate.

g9m4: the messiah will throw Israel to the wolves. the messiah controls military re-supply to Israel and will cut off those items (ammo and fighter parts) the second it looks like Israel is going to defend itself. thats why the little messiah (biden) said Israel can defend itself…the way he said it….it is a message to them that if they attack..they are on their own. i hope they have a way to get the supplies they need somewhere else because they are going to need them. they have no choice now..hit em and hit em hard!

LuckyBarker: Iran can protect itself only with a modern air defense system or… a nuclear bomb. :) Israel fear only an effective self-defense (not as… helpless victims) or power retaliation. “Words”,”talks”,” interview” are only “idle talk”, “twaddle”, “tittle-tattle”. Jews more clever(!) than the Georgians (to 10 levels or to 10 times). I thing Jews were not to provoke with empty words.

BLEE: Would the United States ask permission to defend it’s self? Why should Israel ask permission of any country, they have a madman next door that makes public speeches stating he’s going to wipe them off the face of the earth. GO ISRAEL

collardgreens1: Israel is a sovereign nation with its own set of interests. The U.S. is a different sovereign nation with a very different set of interests. Iran wants nuclear weapons because Israel already has them. If Israel decides that she must attack Iran to prevent that, it will be Israel’s decision, and Israel’s war to fight–not ours….The U.S. doesn’t owe Israel anything, and is in no way obligated to defend her. In fact, just the opposite is true. The U.S.–at the behest of a small number of American Zionist Jews with dual loyalties–went way out of her way to pressure the U.N. to establish the state of Israel in Palestine, and has backed Israel militarily and economically and politically ever since, to our very great cost. This has mired us in Middle East politics and intrigues, has greatly increased our fuel costs, has opened us to terrorist attacks, and has resulted in our getting involved in several expensive (in terms of money and blood) Middle East wars. If we get sucked into a war with Iran, we’ll likely end up in a world war with Islam. Enough, already.

TexRancher: That’s OK. Joe (The Slip Lip) Biden forgot to ask “The One” for permission to give them permission before he gave them permission!!!

bHUSEINo: Israel does not need an apology from hussein to feel all warm and fuzzy.

Listen to how “conspiratory,” angry and irrational they sound. These were just the first 12 of the comments; I did not cherry pick them. They are all, except one of them by collardgreens1, completely ignorant to a global perspective. This is what we have to deal with. This is what we are up against.

I like the bHUSEINo commenter. He is so clever, he figured out how to make Obama look evil. Wow, great work! Just next time you might want to at least spell it right… it’s Hussein.

Read Full Article Here!

The Gift of Guilt

The worst kind of guilt felt is when you pass your personal guilt onto another. He or she assumes your burden as you come up smelling like pure innocence. The very worst thing about guilt is when there aren’t any scapegoats around to assimilate your redirected guilt; bad for you, too, is when there are witnesses around to testify about your bad deeds.

I remember when I was four or five years old, my father Adolph labeled me as a “murderer,” a “killer” for over a month. He had just shoveled the six stillborn kittens and their mother, who also died, through the door into the licking fire inside our cellar’s furnace. As I sat on the stair’s top step, my gaze fell upon this home-crematory consuming the dead mother cat, and her six stillborn kittens.

As I watched the fire burn bright, I started to reminisce about how I had found Daisy myself, a huge, mostly all gray cat with a beer belly. She was my cat now, so I, all by myself, named her Daisy because daisies were my mother’s favorite flower. I was …

Bam! Adolph slammed and secured the furnace door, jolting me from my daydream. He saw me sitting at the top of the cellar stairs and said, “Don’t run away, Stashu.”

We left the cellar, but my father didn’t closed the cellar door. Adolph told me to go upstairs and get his razor strap from the bathroom. I cried all the way up the stairs, cried all the way down. I wanted to tell him, “Hey, pop, I’m just a little kid!” But before I could speak the words, he grabbed me and carried me back down into the cellar. I handed over his long, thick, double-belted strap and I got whopped. My father didn’t ask if I was guilty. He knew I was guilty. I knew I was guilty. Yes, I did kill Daisy and aborted her children. This whopping was my punishment. And yes, I know today it was wrong what my father did, and it’s called corporeal punishment abuse.

There was another long-buried reason I feared Adolph, so deeply buried that the memory didn’t surface and break brain-water until later in life. Once it did, I learned from memory how my father blinded me in my right eye, while I was a baby, to save me from being recruited to kill or be killed in any war in my lifetime.

Although this act may have saved me from the traditional militaristic wars, it placed me on the front-lines of a different kind of war. A war with my father, and a war with myself. And as I grew older, it seemed everything I did was at odds with Adolph.

The First Shot

I wanted to be a writer; it was no secret. Adolph didn’t like that, not at all. This was a his casus belli, his justification for war. He just mumbled in Polish and drank his beer with my mother nearby talking in Polish too but gently to calm him with soothing words.

I hated when they spoke Polish; I couldn’t understand a word of it. They tried to make me learn, but I wanted no part in it. When they said something to each other in Polish, I as a kid would plead, “Speak Cannonsburg!” Cannonsburg is the small town in Pennsylvania where I spent my childhood.

One summer vacation, I joined the staff of a group of very talented people at a theater-in-the-round off Route 19. I learned how to work the stage lights, the sound effects from the control booth, and I was the props boy for the plays. I not only loved it, but I was good too. The only complaint I received was that my real lettuce for the restaurant scene was too wilted and too brown when cut up. The actors wanted me to buy fresh lettuce every day. I can’t remember the entire title of the play, “(something) in New York.”

My father found out from my mom, Victoria, where I was driving the car every evening. Thus on the third day, the offensive began. Adolph could have ordered me not to use his car and that would have ended my theater apprenticeship, but he didn’t. My father wanted me to decide to quit on my own. So Adolph resorted to his standard brainwashing routine — verbal abuse; he would harangue me and my ambition to write. “You’ll never make a penny with that kaka! Nobody would give a fart for your writing. No money in writing, Stashu!” my father repeatedly barked. At times, alternating from English to Polish. Never any physical violence. There wasn’t any need for it. For Adolph, words were his hollow-point bullets.

My father always won with his type of words, almost all of which I didn’t understand. Eventually, I couldn’t take any more verbal abuse and had to drop out of the summer stock theater, as props boy, as potential actor, as budding playwright. Adolph was happy then. Very happy on the day that he won.

The Second Passing

Once decided upon San Francisco, I lived in a SRO “apartment,” and I had a cat I had brought across the country with me named Max. When I moved in, this guy named William warned me when he saw him that his own cat had been poisoned in this building. “Keep an eye on Max,” he advised. Eh, Max is different, I thought. One could throw a plastic fork or plastic spoon and Max would fetch it and bring it back to you like a dog. Since he was such a good cat, I always kept my room door open and allowed Max to roam the hallways for fun.

One day, a guy named Conrad from down the hall rapped on my open door, telling me something’s wrong with Max. Right away, I rushed out into the hall certain that Max had been poisoned by one of the tenants. Damn it! I should have heeded William’s warning, I was thinking to myself.

I looked for Max, found him. I checked him over. Conrad was right; something bad must of happened. Who in the world would want to poison my Max?

I called for help on the phone and was told it does sound like poisoning and to rush my cat to the clinic as soon as possible. I rushed down the stairs to outside to the street but could not find a cab. Midway down the block I ran into a hotel lobby and asked their receptionist to call me a cab. The whole time, I had Max wrapped in a towel, holding him cradled in my arms. The receptionist said it is not their policy to call cabs for non-residents, so bafungu you bitch, and then I ran back to the street.

Running out of the hotel I finally saw a cab and it stopped in front of me. I wrenched open the back door and there was a passenger already sitting inside. Startled from my panic, he yelling insults at me now. Instead of fighting with this guy, I rushed back to my SRO place and ran to the end of the hall to a bathroom and tried to get Max to regurgitate, even moving my finger around inside his throat. Nothing was working! I put his mouth under the cold water faucet tap even though I knew he was probably already dead. I thought to myself that maybe I could dilute the poison in his stomach, so I still gave him water anyway. I didn’t think about whether I could fill his lungs with too much water and drowned him, but no, no, he was unconscious and or already dead when I entered the building, right? ….

The Misdirection

Max was mine, and I was his. I was responsible for Max, and I failed him. He was buried in a pet cemetery outside of San Francisco, with a tombstone plate flush with the ground. “From my hands to His hands” is engraved in bronze for Max.

After burying him, the guilt and blame for his death needed a place. I could shift it to Conrad; I could shift the it to William. After hearing from another resident that William was seen kicking Max, I decided upon William. He carried the burden of my guilt for years even after I found out the truth. I avoided it for far too long.

The truth. That afternoon, after Max’s funeral, my friend dropped me off at home. It was a silent drive back from Colma. I entered my room and sat down in one of my two wooden chairs and tried to relax, to calm myself. I began to ruminate.

So there I sat in my wooden chair, overcome with grief, the chair before my computer and … Ping! … Ping! … Ping! … Ping! and I look up at my small round smoke alarm on the ceiling. That’s where the occasional “ping” is coming from. The smoke alarm is signaling that it needs a new battery.

The enormity of Max and everything else falls like that falling safe in those cartoons where the guy walking down the sidewalk is about to get clobbered! I roughhoused my chair under the smoke alarm and ripped it down, to stop that damn Ping.

I see it all now, the whole scenario. No one poisoned Max. Max was not poisoned. What happened is that Max heard that Ping, and ran out of my room into the hall, freaked out of his mind. Conrad saw him acting funny this way, and called my attention.

I had run down that hallway and found Max to be scared, I had been positive that Max had been poisoned. I had been told that such a thing had happened in this building. When I had not been able to find help for him and had assumed Max had been poisoned, I had to save him. I just had to. I couldn’t be responsible for another murder! I could hear Adolph again, “Murderer, cat killer!”

My Responsibility

I know today that Max was alive when I had put his mouth under the running faucet tap. Instead of becoming a hero, I had become a killer, a murderer, again. Oh, not again. I was one when I was four, and now years later, I had committed the same act. I became the self-fulfilling prophecy that my father bestowed on me.

My father had been dead and buried; my mother Victoria, too, in graves side by side. There remained my father’s guilt given to me like a family heirloom. This burden, it was now my own personal guilt to carry. The old man had fixed me good, my eyesight, my guilt … the prophecy.

Sure, I killed that first cat, the gray one with the beer belly that was pregnant. I loved Daisy so much; so much so, I squeezed her tightly, too tightly. I suffered my Dad’s strap because of it, the cries of ‘Murderer” and “Cat killer” from my father for weeks.

I resurrected this guilt and made it mine when I killed my cat Max. I still carry that guilt, to this day, some ten years later. Other people ease their guilt, bypass their sorrow by drinking alcohol, taking painkillers, smoking weed; this was not my way. It was for Adolph, but I am not him. Time might heal me, but I’ve come not to think so. Can I forgive myself? Where do I start?

Adolph, did he ever harbored guilt for any of his actions, his mis-actions, his non-actions; certainly not for partially blinding me. My father did keep me out of the Vietnam war. Do I forgive him? Should I forgive him? No. No way. He may have given me a long life, but at what price, with what honor?

I never could imagine myself ever forgiving my father. First, I would have to forgive myself…. Oh, Max. Oh, Max ….

–30–

To continue the photography theme today here at Blog4Brains, I thought I would post this nifty how to article on photographing fireworks, aka. night photography. This can be a disastrous situation if you don’t know what your doing, but if done right, you can be the family hero.

Here is a small portion of the article:

Is your city puting on a massive pyrotechnics display this weekend? Or maybe just your neighbor Carl? Either way, you can learn how to capture the moment in all its noisy, exploding glory with a digital camera.

Ideally, it pays to use a camera that offers some level of manual control over the settings. That way, you can dial in the best exposure, aperture and focus settings to achieve the best results.
But you can still take good photos of a fireworks display no matter what kind of camera you have. Yep, even the iPhone!

Read Full Article Here!

What I have gained throughout my experience as a novice photographer is a deep appreciation for the photograph, and how it can reveal a side of life that is not normally observed. These following photographs are just such a case. The color, the depth of focus, the arrangement … perfecto!

I hope you enjoy these photographs.

Here is a small portion of the article:

Buelteman’s technique is an elaborate extension of Kirlian photography (a high-voltage photogram process popular in the late 1930s) and is considered so dangerous and laborious that no one else will attempt it—even if they could get through all the steps.

Buelteman begins by painstakingly whittling down flowers, leaves, sprigs, and twigs with a scalpel until they’re translucent. He then lays each specimen on color transparency film and, for a more detailed effect, covers it with a diffusion screen. This assemblage is placed on his “easel”—a piece of sheet metal sandwiched between Plexiglas, floating in liquid silicone. Buelteman hits everything with an electric pulse and the electrons do a dance as they leap from the sheet metal, through the silicone and the plant (and hopefully not through him), while heading back out the jumper cables. In that moment, the gas surrounding the subject is ionized, leaving behind ethereal coronas. He then hand-paints the result with white light shining through an optical fiber the width of a human hair, a process so tricky each image can take up to 150 attempts.

Read Full Article Here!