The Notebook

One would think that having children would focus one's attention on the world, if only because one's children will grow up in it and, we hope, live longer than ourselves. In reality however, day-to-day functions tend to take one's eyes off the big ball and instead see only the issues that affect the cozy cocoon of home. I actually must force myself to follow the news of the world, despite its generally depressing outlook for me and mine. Thus, my notebook of little things of note and not.

Laurie Anderson - Yesterday's post about the Boy's musical choices of late had me seeking the vids to link. I was grateful to get the full one of O Superman but didn't watch it in its entirety until this morning. I hadn't seen it for many years. It's stunning. What I remember thinking was incredibly pretentious nearly 30 years ago is now extraordinary, and yes, legitimate art. Simple and beautiful. I'm glad I found it again and happier still to have wizened enough to get it.
Cause when love is gone,
There's always justice.
And when justice is gone,
there's always force.
And when force is gone,
there's always mom.
Hi, mom.

Hillary Clinton - The candidate who won't let us forget that she will be able to govern "from Day One" has yet to prove anything of the kind. Just this week she said that she had no idea how complicated the Texas primary was with its combination of polls and caucuses. What? Just figured that out, did you? It isn't as if Texas created this system a couple of weeks back. What have you or your staff been doing, anyway? While Obama has four offices in Vermont, where they are also holding a primary this Tuesday, Hillary has none, zero, zilch. Admittedly, Vermont is not delegate rich like TX and OH, but to not even open an office smacks of incompetence (correction: Clinton did open an office in Vermont - five days ago - which makes it seem even more incompetent, "Uh, me? I thought YOU were in charge of Vermont."). And then there is Pennsylvania, where, after being granted one extension for delegate work, the Clinton campaign has still not completed its delegate slate. I wonder if you get to ask for extensions on that whole "Day One" thing. Her campaign can't find a clear message or image and stick with it, drifting from one day to the next; a portrait of schizophrenia. Meanwhile, her husband keeps wandering off the reservation to make pronouncements that must either be clarified or from which they must distance themselves. If she can't keep him in check now, what's she planning on doing come "Day One". Their excuse is that the media is picking on them. Even if you give them that, which I don't, are they saying that the 16 years of media bashing they claim to have suffered didn't prep them for this? How much time you need, girl? If you've had several years to work out the kinks for this run and in the final lap you still can't seem to nail it down, that whole "I'll be ready" business starts smelling like crap.

Agua - If you think that OPEC has the world by the short curlies, you are living in the last century, my friend. The real coming power is water. When the world starts singing Marty Robbins, the folks to whom we'll plead are up north. More than half of the world's available fresh water is locked up in Canada - more than half. It's one thing if you have to ride your bike to work, it's quite another when you're friggin parched and your tap is tapped. Find yourself a nice toque, eh and start brown-nosing a canuck. Or acquire a taste for your own pee.

Roberto Vacca - In my early teen years Mr. Vacca's book, The Coming Dark Age, predisposed me to pessimism. In 1971 (English translation, 1973), the Italian mathematician, published this discourse on chaos and the collapse of increasingly complex technological systems. Using mathematical models he argued that the layers of systems we use to control our environments - from power to transportation to banking to defense, and everything in between - have become so interdependent and interwoven, the smallest of glitches can turn everything upside down and create a cataclysmic meltdown from which we will not emerge for many years; a new dark age. When he wrote the book there was nothing even remotely resembling the internet, and the layers of systems have become deeper than most would ever have imagined forty years ago. Just this week Florida suffered a grid crash that included the shutdown of two nuclear reactors, the result of one small error. I'm no survivalist and we may never see anything approaching his disastrous predictions, but Mr. Vacca's book and theories deserve more attention. My copy has had its dust blown off of late.

La Fin du Monde - If the Rapture folks can hold out long enough they may have the last laugh. News this week predicts that in a billion years or so, the Earth will be nothing but a cinder. The sun, like all stars of its type, will expand and ultimately burn out in another 7.6 billion years, but long before that our little planet will have been burned to a crisp by the expansion. There had been some argument as to whether our home would expand its orbit and slip outside the hot zone, but that appears to have been resolved and the Earth ain't getting away. The oceans will boil, the atmosphere burn off, and every living thing will stop, well, living. Eventually, long after that, the Earth will be consumed by the sun, used as fuel for its own last gasps. The odds are humans will have long disappeared from the planet by the time the cook-off begins - hell, the dinosaurs only got 160 million years or so, and after a mere 10,000 we seem to be screwing up mightily. Still, despite the great time betwixt now and then, there is something sad about the finiteness of a world we consider to be a constant. I just don't like the idea. If however, you do, try the nerdishly cool, Top Ten Ways To Destroy The Earth.