Cartoon Saturday

Cheer up! It's almost February ... time for a heaping dish of Cartoon Saturday!

Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta announced a series of major cuts to the defense budget this week, including a plan to downsize the Pentagon and rename it the Trapezoid; actress Demi Moore was taken to a Los Angeles hospital after a friend called 911 and said Moore was "convulsing" and "burning up" after "smoking something"; a collector of cars in Colorado (alliterative!!) has purchased the hearse in which President John F. Kennedy's body was carried for $176,000 (leading one to ask whether, if his wife also buys such a vehicle, the license plates would read "His" and "Hearse"); inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency are preparing for a new visit to Iran, where they will investigate reports that Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, not known for being very bright, actually glows in the dark; and the remaining GOP presidential wannabees continued to batter each other savagely as they moved their accusatory roadshow from South Carolina to Florida.

Cheer up ... one way or another, in less than ten months, the campaign will all be just a bad - and very expensive - memory.

For now, on with the cartoons!

Let's lead off with the terrible cartoon pun of the week, dedicated to Fiona ...

I've been to parties like this one ...

High-tech moves to the animal kingdom ...

And ...

The Winter 2012 DC Restaurant Week is over, and I enjoyed two nice lunches with Agnes and one with my daughter ... and got a chance to see how wait staffs really operate ...

Agnes bought me a copy of the movie "Cowboys and Aliens" for Christmas, and it was a real hoot ... but modern-day cowboys are dealing with some high-tech dangers as well ...

Which brings up the issue of how much high-tech wizardry has changed the things we've come to know and love over the years ...

And ...

Agnes is getting ready for her trip back to Germany next month to visit her parents, giving us a chance to experience yet again the joys of dealing with the airlines ...

And finally, as the country lurches from crisis to crisis, it's always good to know that we have thoughtful and dedicated public servants in Congress to guide the ship of state through these difficult times ...

And so another week swirls down the drain of history. Sit back, take off your shoes, and relax for a while ... you've earned it. There are still a lot of weeks to survive before the election, but your ol' uncle Bilbo will be here to help you get through them.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

A Sign(ature) of the Times

We're going to take a day off from our tour of the Constitution because I've been distracted by another intellectual shiny object - the disappearance of the signature.

I stumbled on this fascinating article in The Atlantic magazine yesterday: "Signing Off: The Slow Death of the Signature in a PIN-Code World." The bottom line of the article is that something that used to be one of the defining elements of our identity - our signature - is going the way of the dodo, the Edsel, and a useful and functioning Congress.

There was a time not so long ago when signing your name on the proverbial dotted line was a big deal. It meant that you had committed yourself to something, agreed with a position, took on a debt, acknowledged receipt of an item. The ink you put on paper was a visible and indelible (well, pretty much) symbol of your honor and commitment.

It's different now.

Today, when the UPS or FedEx guy shows up at the door and needs a signature, he hands you an electronic pad, on which you make a few odd marks with a stylus. When you use your credit card in most stores, you "sign" an electronic capture window ... and your "signature" usually looks absolutely nothing at all like your real signature. In many cases, you don't even need an electronic signature - you "sign" by entering a PIN (personal identification number) that transfers your digital credentials to the correct spot on a computer-generated form.

Somehow, I just don't think this is right. Call me a luddite, but I think there's something vital and important about a real, as opposed to a digital signature. Would the Declaration of Independence have been as impressive and meaningful without the bold statement made by John Hancock?

Indeed, even today we speak of "putting your John Hancock" on a document. "Putting my PIN on the line" doesn't have the same ring to it.

I have other problems with the spread of digital signing technology, too. I have a problem with the fact that my signature has been digitally captured (if poorly) and stored in zillions of different places. The possibility exists that someone could steal that digital copy and use it to sign other things in my name. Not everyone agrees with me, though. Consider this excerpt from the Atlantic article:

"Fraud rates on credit or debit cards that are signature-based are much higher than on cards with PIN protection," notes Chris Hawkins in his book A History of Signatures: From Cave Paintings to Robo-Signings. In 2005, a consulting firm found that signature-based debit card fraud rates were 15 times higher than PIN-based fraud rates.

You'll pardon me if I don't find that comforting.

Electronic signatures may be the way of the future, but I still prefer my beloved dipping pens ...

and the beautiful turned-wood pen and pencil set Agnes made for me a few years ago ...

To me, ink on paper is just more ... real. And in a time when things that are real are few and far between, that's a comforting thing.

Have a good day. Be here tomorrow for Cartoon Saturday.

More thoughts then.

Bilbo

The Constitution: The State of the Union

One of the annual high points of political theater here in Disneyland-on-the-Potomac is the President's State of the Union address (the SOTU, delivered by the POTUS, as insiders call it) to a joint session of Congress.

As I discussed in my post on Article II of the Constitution, which enumerates the powers of the Executive Branch of the government, the Constitution really doesn't give the President the authority to do much of anything without the "advice and consent" of Congress. One of the few actually enumerated duties of the President is this one, spelled out in Section 3 of Article II:

"He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient..."

For many years, the President communicated this information to Congress in writing. Indeed, Thomas Jefferson didn't want to appear before Congress in person because he believed it was too much like the British king's addresses to opening sessions of Parliament in which he (the king) delivered instructions and mandates, rather than providing information and seeking support for his measures. It's only in the fairly recent era that presidents have appeared in person to deliver a live address (not like they'd deliver dead ones). You can read a brief history of the State of the Union address here, and read every single State of the Union address ever presented here.

State of the Union speeches tend to be more political theater than informative discourse. In an era of non-stop, 24/7 news delivery, leaks of information to the press (either deliberately by the administration or maliciously by various insiders), and an unbridled and raucous free press, there's no element of surprise ... no news, as it were ... in a SOTU. The draft of the SOTU is circulated widely throughout the government for review and comment weeks ahead of time, and so - by the time the President stands at the rostrum to start talking - everyone already knows what he is going to say, and whether they'll jump up and applaud wildly at the right places (this year, like the Democrats) or sit on their hands and glower angrily (this year, like the Republicans). Indeed, well before President Obama delivered his SOTU this past Tuesday, House Speaker John Boehner had already described it as "pathetic."

Has the SOTU outlived its usefulness in the all-information-all-the-time era? I believe it has, at least as we've grown used to it. All it does is give Presidents a chance to look presidential, opposition parties to growl out their "response" to the president's message with bile and false sincerity, and piss off television audiences who see their favorite shows displaced. I think that regular communication between the President and the Congress, perhaps in the form of something like a written monthly or quarterly activity report, would accomplish more and reduce the level of useless theatricality.

It won't happen, though, because there's too much opportunity for all that political theater. Presidents love to be on television, Congress loves the opportunity to mug for the cameras, and we've all come to expect the annual ritual.

But I still like my idea better.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

The Bill of Rights: Articles VII and VIII

Before we get started on our discussion of the Seventh and Eighth Amendments to the Constitution, we should note a recent US district court decision that has great interest to our discussion of the Fourth (no unreasonable searches) and Fifth (no self-incrimination) Amendments.

In his decision in the case of US v. Fricosu (Criminal Case No. 10-cr-00509-REB-02), a Colorado District Court judge ordered defendant Ramona Fricosu to provide the government an unencrypted copy of the hard drive of her laptop computer as part of an investigation of a financial fraud case. The case, summarized in this article, is interesting because it concerns several of the rights we've been talking about over the past few days. Take a few minutes to read the article and the decision (particularly part 2, "Conclusions of Law," beginning on page 5), and we'll come back and revisit the story in a few days.

Today, we look at the Seventh and Eighth Amendments:

Amendment VII: In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

and,

Amendment VIII: Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

The Seventh Amendment amplifies the Sixth, guaranteeing the right to a jury trial in ordinary lawsuits involving sums above $20 - which isn't much now, but was quite a respectable sum in the Founders' day. It also provides some basic insurance against nuisance lawsuits being filed repeatedly, other than in accordance with prevailing law.

The Eighth Amendment is more interesting, and is much in the news lately. The issues often raised in conjunction with this amendment are usually based on its use of modifiers: how much bail or how large a fine is excessive? And, more important, what makes a punishment cruel and unusual (as opposed to kind and usual)?

When the Founders wrote the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, they'd had recent experience of a government that was able arbitrarily to impose cruel punishments of various kinds ... the sorts of things we today, in a more enlightened era, would consider under the general heading of torture. They wanted to ensure that the rights of the citizens of the United States to be free of such punishments (but not from legitimate, legally-imposed punishment per se) was maintained.

Today, of course, we have a more liberal view of what constitutes cruel and unusual in the imposition of punishments. Is waterboarding considered torture and, therefore, cruel and unusual? How about solitary confinement? Is it considered cruel and unusual to fail to provide a prisoner with meals consistent with the requirements of his (or her) religious faith?

Is the death penalty cruel and unusual? It wasn't in the Founders' time, unless it was applied in a particularly cruel method (such as the practice of drawing and quartering). According to many people today, though, it is ... no matter how it's applied.

So ...

The Seventh and Eighth Amendments, particularly the Eighth, provide key rights that we as citizens enjoy and need to understand and protect. Read them, think about them, and remember that there are those out there who would restrict them in the interest of an imagined greater good.

Don't let them.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

The Bill of Rights: Article VI

Before we start today's discussion of the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution, I should note yesterday's announcement of a landmark and (from my somewhat cynically jaded perspective) wholly unexpected Supreme Court decision in the case of United States v Jones (docket number 10-1259). In a unanimous verdict, the Court decided that law enforcement authorities need a search warrant in order to plant a GPS tracker on a suspect in order to follow him around the clock.

Coming from a profoundly conservative court which has come up with howlers like Citizens United v Federal Election Commission and Kelo v City of New London (both of which we've discussed before), this is an amazing decision which strikes a decisive blow for your rights under the Fourth Amendment (which we discussed last week in this post). While I suspect that my friends in the law enforcement community (of which I have many, and with whom I sympathize) will view this as a disaster, I think it was a righteous decision that could not have been rendered in any other way. The Founders never foresaw the power of GPS in an era when cutting-edge navigation technology was the sextant, but I'm sure they'd have had the same concerns most of us had about its use as a means of government control of citizens.

But we're here today to talk about the Sixth Amendment, which reads:

"In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence."

This is a very important right that we don't usually think about unless we find ourselves accused of a crime. It ensures that we have the right to a trial by a jury of our peers ...

and to be informed of the charges against us (you may recall Franz Kafka's classic novel The Trial, in which the unfortunate Josef K stands accused of a crime, but has no idea what that crime is, what the evidence against him is, who has accused him, or pretty much anything else about the allegations ... there wasn't a Sixth Amendment in Kafka's time).

The Sixth Amendment gives you the right to call witnesses in your own defense, to face your accusers, and to be represented by counsel for your defense.

Like many of our other rights, those guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment are periodically put into jeopardy.

In the time of the so-called "war on terror," we are told that many cases cannot be prosecuted in open court because of the "classified" nature of the evidence, or that prosecution witnesses cannot be produced because it would threaten their usefulness as sources of intelligence about other crimes. The famous Miranda Decision of 1966, which we all know from generations of warnings recited to miscreants on television police dramas, contains the guarantee that a lawyer will be provided for an accused person if he (or she) can't afford one. Of course, the court-appointed lawyer probably won't be from the sort of top-flight multi-partner legal firm that major corporations and the wealthy can afford, but it's something.

And that part about a "speedy" trial? Well, as we know, trials can drag on for years as both sides roll out reinforced divisions of lawyers and specialized witnesses, file endless motions for this or that, and generally try to keep the case going until the participants forget the original issue or die of old age. Charles Dickens knew what he was writing about when he wrote the story of the Jarndyce vs Jarndyce case in his great novel, Bleak House.

The Sixth Amendment is your friend when you're in trouble. While the other Amendments of the Bill of Rights deal generally with your rights as a law-abiding citizen, the Sixth protects you when you have been accused of a crime. You may never actually need your Sixth Amendment rights, but if you do ... you'll be glad they're there. They may be frustrating to the law enforcement community, and provide endless opportunities for lucrative reimbursement for legal professionals, but they're vital for your protection and a wonderfully far-sighted gift from the Founders.

Have a good day. Remember to invoke the right Miranda ...

More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

The Bill of Rights: Article V

It's one of those mornings here in Disneyland-on-the-Potomac that makes winter interesting ... the Federal Government (the largest employer in the region) has decreed that, because of freezing rain and resultant ice in locations around the National Capital Region, late reporting (up to 11:00 AM) for work is authorized. By afternoon, the temperature will have risen to near 50, and all that ice will have turned back into dirty water. Winter just ain't fun any more.

Nessa gave me a break and wrote yesterday's post (in the process, getting more comments than I get on my own posts), but now it's time to get back to normal and return to our discussion of the Bill of Rights - we've made our way through Amendments I through IV, so today we'll move on to a look at the Fifth Amendment:

"No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."

Although this may be what grammatical purists would call a run-on sentence, it nevertheless embodies in its run-on-ness several of the freedoms and rights upon which we Americans have come to rely. If most of us know anything about the Fifth Amendment, it probably comes from movies and TV shows that depict a suspect "taking the fifth" or saying something like "I refuse to answer on the grounds that it might tend to incriminate me." There's more to it than just that, though, if we look at everything it enumerates:

- No prosecution without a properly-presented indictment before a grand jury (except in the case of military personnel accused of crimes in time of war);

- No prosecution twice for the same offense ("double jeopardy");

- No enforced self-incrimination (why you can "take the fifth");

- No forfeiture of property without due process; and,

- Limits on the government's power of eminent domain (the seizure of private property for public use).

All of these rights have been limited to some degree over the years, and some are in particular danger today, particularly the power of protection against the power of eminent domain. The Supreme Court decision in the case of Kelo v City of New London (docket #04-108) interpreted the Fifth Amendment to allow the government to seize private property on behalf of a real estate developer, on the theory that the public benefits economically when a developer can replace private property with a commercial development that will, in theory, generate positive economic benefit. The government's power to seize personal assets is also growing, particularly as part of the war on drugs in which the authorities impound homes, cars, aircraft, and other assets of convicted drug dealers.

The Fifth Amendment isn't one of the articles of the Bill of Rights we think about very often, but it's very important, particularly when read in conjunction with the Sixth Amendment, which we'll discuss tomorrow. For now, though, I need to get ready to face the hibernal music and make my slippery way to work.

Have a good day. Know your rights, but also your responsibilities. Both are more important than ever as we draw farther and farther away in time from the world in which the Founders wrote the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Guest Post

Hi everybody! It's me again ... you know ... Nessa. I'm the dog that lives with Bilbo and Agnes. Bilbo is busy getting ready to go and visit his grandchildren later this morning, so I thought I'd give him a break and do today's post for him. I guess that makes me a service dog, huh?

Anyhow, I was surfing the net while Bilbo and Agnes were out yesterday and found this:

Oh, you don't know the half of it!

Bilbo is the one who usually takes me for walks, and he talks up a blue streak the whole way. I think he likes to use me as a sounding board for his ideas and frustrations. I know who he likes and who he doesn't. I know the names of everyone on the list of people he calls "bottled-in-bond, aged-in-wood, gold-plated, certified, documented, first-class, card-carrying, USDA-approved ass clowns" (sometimes he refers to some of them collectively as "Congress," but there are a lot of others on the list, too). I know the plots of the stories he'd like to write and the things he wants to write about in his blog. I know his complaints about the bus he rides to and from work (most of the drivers seem to be ass clowns who can't keep to the schedule, don't know the route, and sometimes leave him standing at the curb as they drive by, especially if it's cold and raining or snowing). I know all the cute things his grandchildren do (which is important because I don't get to see them very often). He wants my opinion of the things he'd like to buy for Agnes for special occasions, and asks me to remind him of things he has to remember.

There's lots of other stuff he tells me, too, but I'm Bilbo's dog through and through, and there are some things that just have to remain between us. I'm not one of those lick-and-tell dogs. A Jack Russell terrier would probably tell you everything he ever said ... but he'd shout it all out so fast you'd never understand it all, anyway.

We dogs have a lot of important jobs. We protect our families, play with their children, provide unconditional love, and generally help get them through what can be a tough life. And we don't ask for much ... keep the supper dish and the water bowl full, throw the frisbee or tennis ball a few times, take us for walks, and we're happy.

And you can talk to us any time. You can talk to one of those psychiatrist people, too, but they want a lot of money for what we give you for free. And we can lay on the couch with you and nobody will think you're weird.

So go ahead and talk to us. We're ready to listen.

And your secrets are safe with us.

Have a good day. Bilbo will be back tomorrow with more thoughts.

Woof!

Nessa

Cartoon Saturday

Off to the races ...

Legislative attempts to protect the interests of copyright holders from internet piracy have been placed on hold after massive protests against the proposed Stop Online Piracy Act, or SOPA, and the Protect IP Act, or PIPA ... leaving a real problem unresolved; an Ohio father has been arrested on charges of tying up his daughter with duct tape and locking her in a cage, after which his son posted pictures on Facebook; Republican presidential wannabe and professional windbag Newt Gingrich is blaming the media for asking about his personal moral and ethical shortcomings, which obviously have no place in presidential politics; Iranian movie star Golshifteh Farahani is at the center of a storm of controversy in Iran for the horrifying crime of baring her breasts in a photo shoot for a French magazine; and in California, police have identified as 66-year old man as the victim whose body parts were found strewn on a hillside below the famous "HOLLYWOOD" sign.

Embrace the weirdness.

I guess inventors have always had their problems turning good ideas into practical products ...

... which is why it's usually not a good idea to buy a new product right after its initial release ...

Truth in political advertising ... the ultimate oxymoron ...

I wonder if this app also works for those $#&@! political robocalls we'll be buried in more and more in the coming months ...

I've had one of these weeks, too. And it looks like the coming week isn't going to be much of an improvement ...

I got this cartoon from one of my friends who had posted it on his Facebook page. I think it's more brilliantly perceptive than actually funny ...

The American electorate speaks ...

Tired of listening to me bitterly complain enough about the Supreme Court decision in the Citizens United case that sold your government to those with the deepest pockets? I'm not the only one worried ...

Which one do you suppose is the more environmentally sound option? ...

And finally for this week, Agnes is getting ready to go back to Germany next month to visit her parents for a few weeks, which has given us the opportunity once again to enjoy the sheer delight of dealing with airline ticket pricing and the cascading number of new fees for just about everything but the air you breathe (and that's probably coming soon) ...

Looking out my study window, it seems that we had about a half-inch or so of snow overnight, which is supposed to change to sleet and freezing rain this morning ... just another wonderful winter's day here in Disneyland-on-the-Potomac. I think it's shaping up to be a good day to stay inside in front of the fire, watch movies, and catch up on reading.

These nasty winter days are good for something, after all!

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

The Bill of Rights: Articles III and IV

You may have thought, based on recent discussions of more interesting things like the G-Spot, that I've forgotten about our tour through the Constitution. But you'd be wrong. It's just that my brain works in a somewhat unguided manner, and I'm easily drawn off on tangents.

But let's get back to the Constitution; specifically, to our discussion of The Bill of Rights. We discussed the First and Second Amendments already, so today we'll move on to the Third and Fourth.

The Third Amendment is pretty straightforward, and isn't of much import today. It reads as follows:

"No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law."

At the time of the Revolutionary War, the Americans were pretty upset by the King's insistence that the people house and feed his soldiers, and they wanted to be sure that their new government didn't do the same thing. Today, we don't worry much about the government wanting us to serve as a Holiday Inn for the 82nd Airborne ... we worry a great deal more about the sort of rights spelled out in the Fourth Amendment:

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

Americans of the Founders' era had suffered the experience of the King's soldiers breaking into and searching their homes on questionable authority, and they weren't about to allow the new government they were devising to have such power. Thus, the Fourth Amendment found pride of place in the Bill of Rights, being one of the most invoked set of freedoms (along with the First and the Holy Second amendments). It's often cited as a right to privacy, although that isn't quite what it says.

Today, there is probably no set of rights enumerated under the Constitution that is more endangered than those guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment. When the Founders wrote this amendment, the cutting edge of surveillance technology was the spyglass, and a search warrant was the battering ram the King's agents could use to break down your door in search of whatever they hoped to find. The Founders drafting our basic rights in 1787 could never have foreseen electronic surveillance technology, GPS tracking, the tapping of telephones (or, in fact, telephones themselves), or computers and the ability of evil persons (not only the government) to hack into those computers and steal our personal information. A man's home may be his castle, but nowadays there are a lot of people who know how to lower the drawbridge and invite themselves in.

The Supreme Court is wading its way through the issue of the constitutionality of GPS tracking, and may impose limits on the ability of law enforcement to track you and I 24 hours per day using this technology. But this is the same Supreme Court that, through its incredible decision in Citizens United v Federal Election Commission, has allowed Super PACs to purchase our government as if it were a package on a Wal-Mart shelf. If I were you, I'd worry about those Fourth Amendment rights. It's too bad we don't have an all-rights/no-responsibilities organization like the NRA to protect them.

Insist on all your rights guaranteed by the Constitution ... and remember that they are guaranteed to the people whose political opinions and lifestyle you don't like, too.

We'll get funny again tomorrow with Cartoon Saturday, and move on to the rest of the Bill of Rights next week. Be here.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

G Whiz

Today's post is brought to you - in true Sesame Street fashion - by the letter G.

Following up on the success of my post on The Degree of Gasp, which began with this reference to the gradual disappearance of the g-string (not that there's a great deal to disappear), I call your attention to yet another reference to the hard-working letter G: this interesting article on the unsuccessful 60-year effort to identify and precisely locate the G-Spot.

The so-called G-Spot is named for German gynecologist Dr Ernst Graefenberg, who postulated its existence in 1950 during his study of stimulation of the urethra (don't ask). The G-Spot was said to be a particularly sensitive 1- to 2-centimeter spot on the wall of the vagina which, when properly stimulated, could provide ... um ... intense pleasure to the happy lady so stimulated. His curiosity about the existence of the spot which now bears his name may have been piqued by references to such an anatomical location in the 11th-century Indian Kamasastra and Jayamangala texts.

The G-Spot was popularized in a 1982 book titled The G-Spot and Other Recent Discoveries About Human Sexuality, by Alice Kahn Ladas, Beverly Whipple, and John D. Perry. The book became a New York Times best-seller in 1982, proving that people will read just about anything related to sex.

Now, unfortunately, it seems that 60 years of dedicated (and, no doubt, exciting) study using scans, surveys, and biopsies and a thorough review of 96 published studies (!) have failed to scientifically document the existence of the G-Spot. Dr. Amichai Kilchevsky, a urology resident at Yale-New Haven Hospital in Connecticut and lead author of the review, stated in an article published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine, "Without a doubt, a discreet anatomic entity called the G-spot does not exist." He conceded, however, that the work is not "1,000 percent conclusive," and that other scientists could one day find something his team missed ... although this would require "new technology" (concerning which I will decline to speculate).

I will never look at the letter G in the same way again.

Attempting to claw my way back up to higher intellectual ground, I note that my friend and co-worker Brenda yesterday introduced me to this very interesting blog: The Inky Fool, dedicated to "words, phrases, grammar, rhetoric, and prose." In the blog, I found an exposition on the word bellibone, defined as "A woman excelling in both beauty and goodness. A word now out of use."

One hopes that it is merely the wonderfully mellifluous word bellibone that is out of use, and not the existence of women excelling in both beauty and goodness.

Well, Gee, it's time to get ready to go to work. I must get dressed, take Nessa for a walk, and kiss my bellibone good-bye as she sleeps.

Have a good day. More thoughts, hopefully less prurient, tomorrow.

Bilbo