Linkage

Here are some links collected while I was finishing the book.

Derb muses on consciousness and wonders if dogs have souls.

David Zincavage remembers a collector of armor and splendid mastiffs.

Also from David: a man in Pennsylvania is evicted for having too many books:

"Authorities in Wilkes-Barre, Pa., condemned John Puchniak’s apartment this year when a routine inspection raised concern the bookstore owner’s collection of nearly 3,000 texts could cause a fire, The (Wilkes-Barre) Times Leader reported Wednesday.

"Puchniak now resides in a local hotel, while attempting to limit the stacks upon stacks of books that decorate his condemned apartment.

I have more books than that. As the Second Amendment guys say, "Molon labe!"

HSUS raises funds by saying they will rescue Michael Vick's dogs, while meanwhile advising the government to destroy them. (HT Patrick. Their essential fraudulence grows ever- more apparent.

This one is for Peculiar: the U.S. now has more opera companies than Italy or Germany.

"The U.S. now has 125 opera companies. That’s more than Germany or Italy, and roughly as many Americans attend live opera performances as attend NFL football games."

A collar with a GPS! I'd buy one if they cost less than $599... (HT Annie P. H.)

A Lego Ceratopsian!

Eric at Classical values thinks Bambi, and what he calls "BambiNos", are responsible for the prevalence of Lyme disease. he also has some interesting things to say about the mindset of "activists".

"The public meetings of course tend to become public whinings. Which can then become dominated by whichever activists scream the loudest. While I know that if there is ever to be any hope of ever being allowed to cull the deer herds, "public input" has to occur, I do not envy the people who have to sit and hold these hearings, because I once sat on a city commission in Berkeley, and I know that public hearings are dominated by activists.

"And activists are sui generis -- a highly specialized, tiny and noisy subspecies in no way typifying that large mass of ordinary people we think of when we use the misleading expression "the public." "Irrational" and "emotional" don't begin to describe people who seem incapable of understanding the simple word "No" -- and who will resort to violence or threats of violence to get their way."

Exaggerated? Here's one speaking:

"Today, I am not asking you to stop killing the deer, I am TELLING you to stop killing deer. There will be no more deer-killings at our metro-parks. It is off limits to you and your hunting buddies. If the HCMA continues on its bloody path, then I will execute justice the way I see fit ... and that means constructing a rogue, independent, deer-police unit to protect them from you. KAPISH!"

RTWT, of course-- he also makes some interesting points re Lyme and Alzheimer's diagnosis.

(And BTW, WHY is the perfectly comprehensible Italian "capisce?"-- "understand?"-- now always rendered as above and without a question mark? I have seen it thus three times this month!)

Later: blogging on Things I (and others) have Photographed this month...