ANNIVERSARY: THE DETHRONING OF PLUTO

Below are previous posts about Pluto.

Astronomers anticipate 100 billion Earth-like planets

03 April 2013 13:32 http://www.ras.org.uk/news-and-press/224-news-2013/2239-astronomers-anticipate-100-billion-earth-like-planets

The planet formerly known as Pluto now just plutoid!

Pluto and Charon

Charon

After weeks of online ballot casting by people around the world, the poll asking the public to name two of Pluto's moons — currently called P4 and P5 — ended Monday.

As of 12 p.m. (1700 GMT) Feb. 25, the polls closed with a total of 450,324 total votes cast since Feb. 11 with 'Vulcan,' a Pluto moon name proposed by Star Trek's William Shatner, is the clear winner.

http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2013/0226/Vulcan-and-Cerberus-are-favorite-names-for-Pluto-s-moons

*

First, the planet Pluto was demoted and re-classified as a dwarf planet.

I don’t know whether this made dwarves happy or mad.

But hold the phone---the cell phone!

Now Pluto is being called a plutoid.

And I just read today that Pluto…or rather Plutoid the Dwarf Planet…

Has ice water!

And lo and behold, its core is an iron-nickel alloy!

And Pluto’s round!

*

“No longer a planet, Pluto is just a member of the Kuiper Belt; a collection of icy objects that extend out past the orbit of Neptune. If you brought Pluto into the inner Solar System, it would start to act like a comet – blasting out gas and particles from the solar wind. It’s a good thing Pluto is in the cold, dark outer Solar System, far away from the Sun.”

Read more: http://www.universetoday.com/13875/what-is-pluto-made-up-of/#ixzz2M3gpDq13

*

Captain Kirk has taken time from his space travel and work as a commercial for Priceline to tell us that one of Pluto’s moons should be named Vulcan.

I don’t know if this made Spock happy or sad.

Sure, name it Vulcan…or Cerberus…or Pluto’s Son…

But call Pluto a planet again!

 

IT’S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3156916/Pluto-s-bizarre-terrain-revealed-Latest-images-unexplained-complex-shapes-dwarf-planet-ahead-historic-flyby.html

Pluto....

Not the Disney dog...

NoT THE planet....

But THE dwarf planet.

This dwarf planet will soon get its day in the sun.

(It takes over five hours for the sun's rays to reach this plutoid.)

Really close-up pictures of this dwarf planet will be seen next Week.

In the meantime, let's do some eavesdropping.

AlPHa:

Well, the cat will soon be out of the bag.

Beta:

Cat?

Alpha:

Alright, no cat, but us, and where we live.

Beta:

We knew that humans would eventually travel here. Well, not them, but their machines. There's no place to hide.

Alpha:

Especially now, because sources of their fresh water are getting so low.

Beta:

Give them time. They'll soon be here to steal our water.

Alpha:

And put their fast food restaurants here.

Beta:

And their cars, Politicians, and Lawyers.

Alpha:

Let's get the blue blazes out of here.

Beta:

O.K. Let me pack. Go fire up the Chariot.

IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES AND PLUTO!

Monday, July 13, from a distance of 476,000 miles.

How would you feel if someone told you one day that you were no longer a human?

Now imagine that you were a planet one day (or for almost a century), and then you were told that you were no longer a planet.

Zap!

Goodbye!

Good Riddens!

The solar system's ninth planet has been eliminated.

Number nine has been voted out.

This is not so much sad as it is wrong.

Poor Pluto.

After being so far away for so long.

After having a dog given its name.

After possessing a mystery that none of the other planets had.

Then...Poof!

You're out of here you round and puny ball of cosmic dust!

And how would Pluto's expulsion make its discoverer Clyde William Tombaugh (February 4, 1906 – January 17, 1997) feel?

Bring Pluto back!

Bring Pluto back!

Can the Long War President do anything about this?

(P. S. Pluto’s new title is dwarf planet. Better than nothing, I suppose.)

IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES!

http://madplatonews.blogspot.com/2006/02/planet-without-name.html

http://madplatonews.blogspot.com/2006/01/visit-to-small-ice-dwarf.html

THE CAR CHASE

I hired a taxi to take me to a Thanksgiving party.

 I thought it was in Kart-e-Char, the part of Kabul where I first lived, and close to the University of Kabul.

I usually rode my bicycle to get to Kabul University, and I got around fine, but at night I was totally lost.

My taxi driver had been driving for about five minutes. I told him to stop at one particular house and I would ask for directions.

 I saw a large American car in the garage, and I hoped that Americans lived in the house, but before I could find out I had to pay my taxi driver.

 He wanted more than we had agreed on, and so I paid a higher amount. 

But he wanted even more afghanis. I told him to forget it, and I walked to the house and knocked.

 A man (an American!) greeted me and asked what I needed. 

I told him my problem.  

He said, "Don't worry about him, just come with us. We're on our way to the movies." 

His wife and son were walking down the stairs, joined by a friend of the family, a minister.

The husband directed me through a door and into the garage, and told me to get into the large car.

 We were on our way, but so was the taxi driver, right on our tail.

Finally, we stopped and paid the taxi driver even more afghanis, but it was still not enough for the taxi driver! 

The husband sped off, and the taxi driver followed.

 It was now a car chase.

The minister in the back seat was praying.

The little boy said, “This is just like in the movies."

 I was getting nervous.

 I was sorry that I had gotten an innocent family involved.

We finally arrived back in Shar-i-Naw where I lived. The big car stopped in front of the United States Information Service building where the movie was being shown. 

I told my friends that I would get out before they parked and handle the situation. 

I thanked them, apologized, and got out of their large luxury car.

The taxi driver stopped his car and got out.

He started yelling at me, and I said in Farsi that he was crazy. 

This was the wrong thing to say. 

Before I knew it he was running after me.

I had on my over-sized Italian hiking boots and my usual three or four pairs of socks on. 

I kept just ahead of the taxi driver, turned a corner, and ducked into the entrance of a German restaurant that was on the third floor.

 I ran up the stairs and into the restaurant.

I sat down. 

I waited.

 For about five minutes I kept my eyes glued to the curtained entrance door.

 Ten minutes. Nobody entered. 

I bought some cigarettes. I started smoking again. I had quit two weeks earlier. 

As I was lighting up I knocked over the salt shaker when a couple entered. 

But it was not the taxi driver. 

He apparently had given up on finding me.

I stayed in the restaurant for two hours. 

I finally mustered up the mettle to leave.

 I cautiously looked up and down the streets, and found another taxi driver. 

This time I knew exactly where I was going: to my own house. 

I got out of the taxi a few blocks away from my house, and lo-and-behold, I walked right into the Thanksgiving party. 

I stayed long enough to tell a couple playing pool what had just happened.

 I wanted to go home and relax.

IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES

ABSURDITY

“Absurdity is king, but love saves us from it.”

Camus

I first read Albert Camus while taking a course at the University of Colorado called French Writers and God.

Professor Richard Chadbourne taught this course.

It was then that I also met Montaigne and Pascal.

My soul was opened up, and my consciousness was raised by these  writers.

I recently re-read NOTEBOOKS 1935-1942 by Camus.

It is from this book that I have found a few examples of absurdity.

I'm also reading NOTEBOOKS 1951-1959.

Not too much is funny or absurd in this work, nor does it have as much poetic description as NOTEBOOKS 1935-1942.

Here are selections from NOTEBOOKS 1935-1942:

At the hospital. The tubercular patient who is told by the doctor that he has five days to live. He anticipates and cuts his throat with a razor. Obviously, he can't wait five days.

One of the male nurses tells the journalists:

“Don't mention it in your papers. He's suffered enough already.”

The other reservist, whose stomach has been X-rayed:

“They made me drink about six pints of chalk. Before I shat black. Now, I shit white. That's war.”

The little old man who throws scraps of paper from the balcony to attract the cats. Then spits on them. When he hits one, the old man laughs.

Death of Flaubert's friend, Le Poittevin:

“Close the window. It's too beautiful.”

Laxatives are only a temporary remedy. The roots of constipation remain untouched.

An artist who goes to Port-Cros in order to paint. And everything is so beautiful that he buys a house, puts his paintings away, and never touches them again.

On a door: “Come in. I have hanged myself.” They go in and find it is true. (He says “I”, but there isn't an “I” any more.)

IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES AND ABSURDITY

CHIMERAS

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-7310325/Spanish-scientist-claims-grown-worlds-human-monkey-hybrid.html

"It is not as if, 'Oh my God, all of a sudden we are doing something that is crazy.'”

Samuel Packer, chief of medical ethics at Northwell Health in New York.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/afp/article-3724786/US-fund-research-create-mixed-human-animal-embryos.html

Do we really want animals with human brains, or humans with the brains of animals, even if it might help find cures for various maladies and diseases?

Let's listen to what two dogs have to say:

Butch:

Well, have you heard?

Daisy:

Heard what?

Butch:

About the research that mixes human cells into animal embryos.

Daisy:

You've got to be kidding?

Butch:

Nope. Listen to what Stuart Newman, a researcher at New York Medical College, has said:

"Let's say that we have pigs with human brains and they are wondering why we are doing experiments on them."

"And then, what if we had human bodies with animal brains, and then you say, 'Well they are not really humans, we can do experiments on them and harvest organs from them.'"

Daisy:

But we're dogs, not pigs.

Butch:

We're in the same boat as the pigs; and we have about the same intelligence.

Daisy:

I like who I am.

I like who you are.

I sure don't want your brain or mine harvested. Maybe they can just use pigs, since they eat them.

Butch:

But if we get human brains, we could watch TV and play Pokemon go.

Daisy:

Yeah!

P.S.

Here are two older posts on the same subject:

http://madplatonews.blogspot.com/2010/07/synthetic-life-forms.html

IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES AND CHIMERAS

GAMMA RAYS DONALD TRUMP AND NUCLEAR WEAPONS

"If we have them [nuclear weapons], why can't we use them?"

Donald Trump

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3721353/Death-SPACE-Bursts-energy-distant-black-holes-wipe-life-Earth-without-warning.html

*

Last night my dreammare (it wasn't too nightmarish so I'm calling it dreammare) was about me and my immediate social circle (I don't really know who the other people were).

We were being rounded up by strangers.

They didn't seem to be human.

I woke up before I got any more details.

Maybe it will be a to be continued dream.

*

But back to the real (unreal) world.

It's not enough that you and I have to be worried that Donald Trump could be the next president of the United States.

Now we have to be concerned about being zapped and killed by Gamma rays spewing out of a black hole in our galaxy.

Good grief!

Isn't Donald Trump enough of a threat?

IT'S ABOUT DONALD TRUMP GAMMA RAYS AND RENEWABLE RESOURCES!

SOME OF MY OWN MR. BEAN MOMENTS

Today I bought some groceries, and on my way out of the store I decided to grab a couple of anti-bacterial wipes, and so I did, and then I started pushing (what I thought was my basket cart of groceries).

I was now outside, still pushing the basket cart, and I looked down and saw an empty basket.

I rushed back inside the store, pushing the empty basket, and there was the one that I had left.

DUH.

*

One day while teaching an English class, I needed to go to the office.

When I returned to the classroom I looked for my chalk.

I asked my students if they had seen my chalk.

They said, “You still have it in your hand!”

*

I returned home with some groceries.

I put away the groceries.

Instead of the freezer I had put a steak in the pantry (food closet).

*

NOTE: I don't even know if I should count this as a Mr. Bean moment. It's not funny.

When I was fourteen I went on my first and only hunting trip.

I had killed a deer.

I wrote a poem about this experience.

The poem expresses my sorrow about what I had done.

The Mr. Bean moment came after I had yelled down to my grandpa that I had shot a deer. He was down at our campsite.

He yelled back:

“Cut his throat!”

“What?” I said.

“Cut his throat! Cut his throat!”

So I began cutting the head off of the deer.

It took awhile.

Grandpa kept yelling to cut the throat.

I kept cutting.

And finally, the head came off.

I put it in my backpack, and carried it back to camp.

I proudly opened the backpack and pulled the head out.

Grandpa:

“What the hell did you do?”

Me:

“I did what you said. Cut its head off.”

Grandpa:

“I said to cut his throat!”

Me:

“Oh.”

IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES

I AM YOUR VOICE

I am your voice.

Believe me.

I will tell you this.

I am a great businessman.

I make great deals.

I am your voice.

Believe me.

I will build a great wall.

Believe me.

I will be the law and order president.

I am your voice.

Believe me.

Believe me.

Believe me.

Believe me.

Believe me.

Believe me.

Believe me.

(Someone, please turn the off switch on my back.)

IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES

DON'T USE MY BRAIN TO GET HIGH

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2016/07/16/robbery-suspect-kept-stolen-brain-beneath-porch-and-used-it-to-get-high-police-say/

While authorities may have encountered formaldehyde-laced marijuana, using a dead person’s brain for drug purposes shocked some investigators.

In the heyday---or I should say Mary Jane's day (or grassday) of my pot-smoking life---the last thing that I wanted to do is to spray anything on the marijuana that I smoked.

The thought never crossed my mind.

In fact, very little crossed my mind when I was stoned.

I was aware that the government was spraying herbicides on marijuana fields, but again, I didn't think about that when I was getting high.

The peculiar news story above really got my attention.

Someone had been using a human brain to get high?

Wow!

How?

It was strange just that there was another person's brain in someone's house.

Forget that the brain was being used to get high.

Of course, as it turned out, it was other things in the brain that were being used to get high, not the brain itself.

“It (the brain) even had a name: 'Freddy'.”

I thought that my own mind would be blown away, or at least become high from this news story.

No such luck.

“The defendant related that he knew it was illegal to have the brain and that he and (another man) would spray the embalming fluid on ‘weed’ to get high,” Trooper John Boardman, an investigator involved in the case, wrote in court documents cited by the AP.

It made me a little sick.

One more thing that was kind of strange and amusing was the offense that was cited:

“...misdemeanor abuse of a corpse and conspiracy to commit abuse of a corpse.”

Wow!

Even our dead bodies have rights!

One more thing is I wish that the news story had been written like this:

“At this point now, we’re just trying to figure out where it came from,” Pennsylvania state trooper Bob Hicks said. 

“We’re hoping that if anyone feels like they’re missing their brain, bring it to our attention and maybe we could return it to the rightful owner.”

IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES

ZOROASTER AND THE CUTTING BOARD

One time I went to buy myself a cutting board. 

It wasn't easy like here in the U.S. where we just go to our local retail store.

Instead, I needed to visit a carpenter. 

When I found one, I used my "survival Farsi" and told a bearded carpenter what I wanted. 

I used strange (but I hoped understandable) gesticulations to describe what I wanted. 

I believe that my gestures said more than my use of the local language. 

The bearded carpenter acknowledged that he understood my request, and proceeded to cut and sand a block of wood.

 He was finished after about 10 minutes, told me the cost, and then asked me if I believed in Allah. 

I pointed to the sun and muttered, "Zoroaster".

 I knew immediately I should have just said "Yes" and left. 

The bearded carpenter slapped me gently on my cheek, shook his head, and wagged his finger at me. 

I paid him for my breadboard and left.

But his slap was as much a shock to me as the one that the bishop gave me at my Confirmation.

Another time I went to buy some toilet paper, but before I could buy the TP I had to answer a question: "Was I Russian?" 

I think I was just getting teased, but this shopkeeper had a serious demeanor when he asked his question, and so I took it seriously. 

I was able to buy the TP once the shopkeeper realized that I was not Russian.

Touryalai told me "Russia steals our gas and food." 

Later, of course, they would to try to steal his entire country.

IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES

THE FIRST DAY OF WINTER

Another Bakery Anecdote.

 I had on my straw hat, my duck-down gloves, a coat over my beaver fur vest, and of course, my Italian hiking boots. 

I was riding my Chinese bicycle on my way home, and the rain was turning to sleet, and then came snowflakes, and it was getting colder by the minute, but I needed to buy my hot, delicious naan. 

I got off of my bike, but instead of standing at the bakery window to order, I walked bravely up the wooden steps to the door entrance of the oven-pit, to get warmer, and to get a closer look at the bakers. 

One Afghan gently grabbed my arm, grinning a devilish smile, and started pulling me inside.

 He pointed at the fiery pit and then at me. 

I was a bit scared, until he started laughing, and the other bakers started to laugh, and so I knew that I wouldn't be tossed into the fiery pit.

I got my naan, hopped back on my bicycle, and rode off to my house.

 My bike was slipping and sliding, and I was having problems navigating, and I looked forward to arriving at my house where I knew I would soon have a roaring fire going in my faithful little oven. 

My straw hat fell off, but I didn't care, and I didn't want to stop in this freezing weather to pick it up, and so I kept riding, knowing that tomorrow a goat or sheep would discover a tasty treat.

This was the first beautiful night of winter.

In Kabul the weather turned off and and on like a light switch.

 I remember only one time that it rained, and as it rained, I thought, "It's spring today.”

IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES

Odds & Ends

“THEY FOUND NO DIGITAL EVIDENCE ON HIS HARD DRIVE.”

“HE WAS GETTING PRESSURE FROM THE RIGHT SIDE OF HIS CAUCUS.”

“HOW COULD YOU NOT NOTICE A MAN PUTTING A BANANA IN YOUR TAILPIPE?”

When Donald Trump spews and pontificates, his mouth reminds me of a Parrot fish. Well, actually, more like a Puffer fish.

Are you just as tired of that Trivago guy as I am?

Or of people who keep asking 'What's in your wallet?'

Or those Mesothelioma warnings that have been on T.V. for a million years?

IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES

SHOESTRING IN THE NAAN

One evening Jon and I ate dinner over at Michael's house.

 I remember that Michael was playing JETLINER and FLY LIKE AN EAGLE by the Steve Miller band..."Time keeps on slipping into the future.”

These songs seemed to be about our adventure in Afghanistan.

As Jon was applying some butter to his naan,

 he remarked how we would all be"lucky to get out of OUT OF AFHANISTAN alive"; and then just as he took the first bite of his bread, he said, 

"I'll be *###*! What in the hell is this?"

It turned out to be a shoestring embedded in his nan. 

Michael chuckled, but I laughed loudly.

 All Jon could say was, "What's next?" 

The extra ingredient was not a mistake. 

The naan bakery-stand probably wanted to play a joke on Jon, since they knew him as one of their steady khareji [foreigner] customers.

I always looked forward to the ritual of buying my nan each day. 

I spoiled myself, and I would wait a little longer for a hot slice fresh-out-of-the-oven pit.  

Nan is shaped like a snowshoe.

 It is made from flour and water (and sometimes some charcoal pieces that slip in from the ovenpit).

 I never had a shoestring in my naan.

IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE 

RESOURCES AND NAAN

THE PIGEONS

I loved to watch the pigeons fly. 

A man kept dozens of pigeons on the roof of his building. 

He opened the door to their "pigeon house", and then...swoosh!

 They all took off and flew in formation all over the city.

 And as if by magic, they reappeared when their owner waved a towel (or blanket...maybe it was his turban!) in a circular motion.

 One big swirling mass returned to the cage.

 This occurred once per day about sunset. 

I guess this Afghan raised and sold pigeons.

 I wondered whether pigeons still delivered air mail messages.

 There was something poetic and beautiful about pigeons flying.

 IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES AND PIGEONS