Earthman’s Notebook

Had a weird moment just now. 

I’m looking out at the critters on the deck – numerous  doves, starlings, blue jays, cardinals, pine siskins, goldfinches, black capped chickadees, tufted titmouses, even the occasional woodpecker (plus the inevitable gray and red squirrels) – and thinking about how tough their lives must ordinarily be.

And I’m comparing them to me.

For instance, lucky human that I am, here I am inside a temperature-controlled, rain- and snow-proof house. The thermometer outside my office window reads 22 degrees, but the one inside reads 75 (I keep my work area a lot hotter than the rest of the house, because I sit for long periods).

I’m wearing soft, clean, comfortable, fairly new clothes, including nicely form-fitting shoes. I’m freshly showered. I can turn a faucet and have fresh water gush out, at two different useful temperatures. I had gingerbread eggnog French toast this morning, with maple syrup and cinnamon, and with orange juice and coffee served alongside. In fact, I’m so well-fed I’m overweight.

I’m sitting in an office full of computer equipment, including scanners, printers, graphics tablet, hard drives, speakers, and a cable modem hookup to the rest of the world — not to mention several thousand dollars of software in the computer itself.

I did my laundry a few days ago, in the in-house washer and dryer. I sat in front of a crackling fireplace last night and watched TV. I have a nice bed downstairs with an electric blanket, so I sleep in toasty comfort. I have a couple of hundred books on my shelves, including a half dozen library books, to read myself to sleep.

I have a truck outside that will take me anywhere I want to go. Less than two miles away, there are no less than two huge supermarkets, plus a McDonald’s, a family restaurant, a CVS drug store, a couple of gas stations, several pizza and sandwich places, a Chinese takeout, a clothing store, a discount clothing store, a barber shop, and TWO Donkey Nuts (so shoot me — it’s what I call Dunkin Donuts) within a half-block of each other.

I live in a rich country. I speak English, and I’m white, and male. I have a pretty good education packed into my head, and what is probably an unusually large package of salable skills.

And … I’m broke. I’m sitting here with less than 20 bucks in my pocket, and nothing in the bank. There’s a letter on my desk from my mortgage company, telling me to talk to their law firm from now on, and another from my auto insurance company … in an ominous red envelope.

So the weird moment is one of comparing myself to those poor critters out there on their own in the winter, while I get to be a rich, powerful, fat, safe human. The catch being that, without money, right now I’m not able to DO all the things a rich, powerful, fat, safe human might choose to do … and the birds and beasts outdoors actually have more freedom, within their wild domains, than I do right now in my human one.

I quit my job. I’m losing my house. Just barely made the late payments on my truck in time to save it from repossession. And oh, boy, do I have some credit card debt. I’ll probably have to declare bankruptcy, and I’m pretty sure that will nuke my credit for … well, just about forever. Can’t seem to interest an agent in either of my books.

I’m still not finished moving, and it’s turned winter with a vengeance here in Upstate New York. I couldn’t get a load from my old house today because it snowed, and it’s down to about 4 degrees right now, a few minutes after 1 a.m. I’m still paying for heating at the old house, and I’m late on that bill too, so I’m worried the power will be cut off and the pipes will freeze.

Read the rest…

Way back in October, No More Mr. Nice Guy tagged me with a list of questions about atheism. I was busy at the time, and eventually forgot it. I just came across the link today, though, and with apologies to my fellow blogger, I reply today:

Can you remember the day that you officially became an atheist? Do you remember the day you officially became an agnostic?

Nope. It happened gradually. As early as 13, I wrote that I didn’t believe in God. My stepfather found it and gave me hell about it. But I must have had doubts about it even before then. I just didn’t see any evidence for the god hypothesis, and worse, everybody said different things about it. No matter how certain they seemed, nobody knew anything for sure.

Read the rest…

A major ice storm. Forty-two hours without electricity. A tree-fall in my neighbor’s yard, and because the base of it touches the property line, the expectation that I’m somehow on the hook to help get it removed. The breakdown of my truck.

And yet it was just about the most perfect two days I can remember in a long time.

I’m moving in with a friend, fellow bachelor-buddy Carl. I’ve been painting and preparing the ground at his house, transferring a few boxes as I go. I got my office moved over earlier this week.

Read the rest…

I’m starting the rumor that President Bush plans to go back to Crawford, Texas and open a tire store, “Presidential Tires — Where the Rubber Meets the Rode” (sic), or possibly a small roadside barbecue stand, “Leader of the Free World Bar-B-Q.”

You heard it first, right here.

No, seriously. Undisclosed Capitol Hill sources have revealed that Bush will return to his ranch, which he has now successfully cleared of brush after 8 years in the White House, and will trade on his nationally-recognized name to launch a private business venture.

“I’m going to show everyone that my success in Washington, D.C., was no fluke,” said Bush. “This will pin down my legacy as the 43rd President of the United States with a commercial triumph in the field of rubber, or possibly barbecue.  I expect my venture here in Crawford to become a national chain, or maybe even worldwide.”

[Photo: Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson listens as President Bush (man in gray suit on right) speaks about his upcoming venture into barbecue, or possibly tires.]

Thanks to PZ Myers of Pharyngula, and all the great commenters there.

Thanks to Carl Sagan and Isaac Asimov, Terry Pratchett and Richard Dawkins. Thanks to Ray Bradbury, and Robert Heinlein, Anne McCaffrey and Diane Duane, George Chesbro and Jim Butcher. Thanks to David Brin and Larry Niven. Thanks to Robert Service and Mark Twain. Thanks to Arthur C. Clarke, and to Chris Clarke.

And what the hell, thanks to Stan Lee, and Siegel and Shuster! Thanks to Bill Watterson, Berkely Breathed, and Walt Kelly.

Thanks to Mrs. Nicholas who took my friend Johnny and I to the library every Saturday when I was a kid. Thanks to Miss King, geometry teacher, who taught me that sometimes there really is only one right answer. Thanks to my “dad,” Dan Farris, for the years of tolerance, and to Lou and Mary Roeser, for the years in the saddle.

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Whew.

I’m sooooo happy to be voting Tuesday, here in the U.S.

For Barack Obama, in case you wondered.

I kept a promise to myself, some of you may be unhappy to hear, that I would never donate another dollar to the Democratic Party, after they failed to impeach George W. Bush. Which is the ONE thing I wanted in the 2006 election cycle.

But oh, yeah, Obama gets my one little vote.

I’m so tired of Republicans. Ready for as much change as the Dems can manage.

And I still hope for some prosecutions. Heck, I still think we could SELL Bush to the Iraqis for a year’s worth of free oil. Considering how many other people Bush has sacrificed, I’d think Bush would be proud to finally show his American stripes and sacrifice himself. Talk about service to your country!

And there’s no worry about national secrets getting out, even if they torture him. I mean, it’s not like Bush KNOWS anything.

I still think he’ll go back to Crawford, Texas, and open a tire store. And then fail at it.

Seriously, here’s something I do expect, if I bother to follow Bush’s career post-presidency: Beyond giving a few speeches, he will accomplish exactly nothing of note. I doubt if he’ll even show an INTEREST in anything. For the rest of his life.

[Apologies to my readers. This is more than 1,700 words, but I couldn’t say it in less. Exploring a new thought, and linking it to things you already know, just takes time. And when you write it out, it’s … longish. But I do have a couple of ideas here that were “Ahas” for me, so if you have the time, I’d love to know what you think. — Hank the Interminable]

Say you did something you thought was good at the time, but later turned out to be bad. You could admit the mistake. Or you could refuse to admit it.

Any sensible person would probably say the first option was the best one. If you can admit a mistake, you can probably do something to fix it, or correct your course so you don’t do it again. And you can move on.

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I grew up in Texas. Spent part of my childhood in Alabama. And I grew up among racists.

So I was a racist. When you grow up when and where I did, you can’t not be.

By the time I was in high school in the late 60s, racism was passé. It was no longer okay to hate the people who had progressed from being n*****s – also called, among my own relatives, “Negroes” or, given our accents, “niggrahs” – to being “black” people, or “African-Americans.”

But just because society changes, that doesn’t mean you do. I’m afraid the racism was still there in my head. (I like to think I can admit this not because I’m evil, but because I’m honest.)

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