muse-amusin'&still musin': What Birthday Presents!

In a message dated 2004:02:23 09:34:50 AM,
Joke-Of-The-Day@joke-of-the-day.com writes:

>The Birthday Present
>
> It was the second grade teacher's birthday. So every child in the
> class was giving her a special gift.
>
> Anna's mother owned a flower shop, so Anna gave the teacher some
> beautiful flowers.
>
> Robert's parents owned a candy shop. Robert gave the teacher a
> wonderful box of assorted candies.
>
> Then it was little Johnny's turn. Johnny's dad owned a liquor
> store! So Johnny brought a big box for his teacher.
>
> When little Johnny handed the box to his teacher, she noticed
> that the bottom of the box was wet. So she put her finger on it & >tasted.
>
> "Is it wine?" the teacher asked.
>
> "No, it's not wine!" Johnny replied.
>
> She tasted it again. "Hmmmmmm. Is it some sort of liquor?"
>
> "Nope, it's not liquor!" said Johnny.
>
> She tasted it again and was puzzled. "Well, Johnny, I give up.
> What is it?"
>
> Johnny was excited, and said with a big smile. "It's a puppy!"

In a message dated 2004:02:23 10:51:14 AM, the peeps @... write:

>We had rain!!! And rain it did - over 500mm in ten days. The first real
>rain we had for three years! Our local river (usually
>20 centimetres high) swell to 7.5 meters and our dam filled up! I love
>the wet season here, nature rejoices! Dozens of never
>seen insects, frogs galore - they hop along in pairs on top of each other,
>breeding birds - we were introduced to the honey
>eaters chicks and witnessed the first flight of the two sunbird chicks
>(find a few pics throughout this newsletter). And I
>even stepped on a snake for the first time. Luckily it did not bite me
>but made off as soon as it could.

http://www.didjshop.com

In a message dated 2004:02:23 01:57:36 PM, my dad - in TX, who has yet to
write of his nasty-but-hilarious clash with the SPCA & his bein' "adopted" by his
cat companion *thpt!*, writes (I am not the only one in my family who writes):

>[...] Last week and this i have been putting together a piece : "The place
>for the real macaws" -- trigered by
>the PBS documentary about ten days ago : "The Real Macaw". Shall send >my
first draft. Just last night PBS had two similar docus. of same sensitive
>nature ; on " chickens " and "cows". Entirely awaken appreciation of such
>living wonderful entities mankind has so long so cruely taken for granted;
>fed on and abused !

My dad bucks the general trend of older peeps goin' more conservative -
in fact, the older he gets the more radicalized he seems to get!
He is a living example of : "if you're not OUTRAGED, you have not been
payin' ATTENTION!" and "Loyalty Demands Dissent"

Besides impartin' a fierce love of animals - possibly 'cuz of just havin'
to be in Texas - the largest of the repulsive Cattle-n-Cotton States of
Amerika (ex-Confederate S.A.), my Dad gave me a college-level textbook titled
_Critiques of Capitalism_, an illustrated collection of socio-political,
socio-cultural and religio-spiritual criticisms of capitalism - both pro and con, for my
13th b-day when I was wantin' to be just another Materialistic toy-grabbin'
Americanized kid...
Dad headed me off at the pass so to speak...

Dad also sat me down & told me stories of how he made his own toys when a
kid growin' up in post-WWII British-Occupied Malay, i.e. a huge aircraft
carrier/toybox out of scrap wood and cardboard... a pivotal point in my creative
life, ya know: object lessons ;) in bein' a master of scraps and junk...
besides older things, made of older materials from when the earth was a bit younger
and tad more resilient, are more beautiful and longer-lasting...(the Chinese
Taoist-influenced Zen Buddhist Japanese even have words for this: _wabi_ - a
flaw that makes the whole perfect..._sabi_ - oldness and beautiful patina)

As the Dadas and esp'ly the Surrealists in France defined "object lesson
potentials": _objets mathématiques. objets naturels. objets sauvages. objets
trouvés. objets irrationnels. objets ready made. objets interprétés. objets
incorporés. objets mobiles._

In regards to an email I sent him on a Taoist-inspired invented language
called Toki Pona (<A
HREF="http://rowa.giso.de/languages/toki-pona/english/dictionary.php">conlang toki pona - This is a minimalistic language. Yo…</A>),
he responds somewhat cryptically (note: oddly poetic syntactical structuring
& excited mispellings left intact):

>i like it ; in the same direction i have been wanting to simpify, for

>myself at first person - thinking, manner of going about living,

>problem-solving ( that was why i simply switched from going into fine art

>painting when we were in London, to Industrial Design which ,on first

>encounter struck me as what i most needed to return to direct
>simplification in dealing with life's ongoing dilemmas. And out of it >aesthetics embeded.

-- from _Small is Beautiful_ by E.F. Schumacher, 1973:

"[The modern economist] is used to measuring the 'standard
of living' by the amount of annual consumption, assuming all the
time that a man who consumes more is 'better off' than a man
who consumes less.
"A Buddhist economist would consider this approach excessively
irrational: since consumption is merely a means to human well-
being, the aim should be to obtain the maximum of well-being
with the minimum of consumption."

"From an economic point of view, the central concept of wisdom
is permanence. We must study the economics of permanence.
Nothing makes economic sense unless its continuance for a long
time can be projected without running into absurdities.
"There can be 'growth' towards a limited objective, but there
cannot be unlimited, generalised growth."

-- from _The Pentagon of Power: The Myth of the Machine_,
Lewis Mumford, 1970:

"Western man not merely blighted in some degree every
culture that he touched, whether 'primitive' or advanced, but he also
robbed his own descendants of countless gifts of art and craftsmanship,
as well as precious knowledge passed on only by word of mouth
that disappeared with the dying languages of dying peoples...."

In a message dated 2004:02:23 10:51:14 AM, newsletter@... writes:
>-------------------------------------------
>Join the Worldwide Didgeridoo Circle on 21st of March 2004!
>-------------------------------------------
>(http://www.didjshop.com/shop1/didgeridoo_meditation.html)
>
>Please devote one hour of your time four times a year to the didgeridoo
>and its message.
>
>With tensions between people growing worldwide (see below story), >nature
and the earth being raped for greed and our climate
>already getting out of balance a call to the roots and for respect of the
>environment we depend on is what humanity needs.
>And the didj is the best instrument for the job! The didj is made by >nature
and people hearing the didj are instantly touched
>by its song.
>According to my experience and the words of thousands of people >sharing
their experiences in our surveys, the didj
>facilitates deep meditation, awareness, strength and yet relaxation and
>last not least a feeling of connectedness with nature
>and earth. The more people get in touch with those values, the better.
>
>My idea for the Worldwide Didgeridoo Meditation is as a small force of
>change as well as a chance for didj players all over
>the world to come together. It might be a crazy idea, but the didj is
>strong and if nothing else it is fun and good for all
>of us to spend an hour with our didjes.
>
>Almost all of you will agree that humanity has to change its attitude if
>we want our grand children to still have a world to
>live on. It is becoming increasingly clear that unless we (the human race)
>start to respect our environment and each other,
>our planet will become un-inhabitable to humans sooner rather than later.
>I just hear on the news that scientists expect 95%
>of the Great Barrier Reef to die by 2050. I myself can see more and more
>coral die due to bleaching every year and it would
>be nice if we could save Nemo and his mates...
>
>It is very encouraging to see that more and more people are becoming >aware
of the problem and are changing their ways, but we
>need to reach many more as soon as possible.
>
>I am convinced that the growing worldwide interest in the didj is very
>timely and auspicious. The didj conveys to people what
>humanity needs right now: respect for our environment and each other. >Which
is what allowed Aborigines to be one of the two
>oldest surviving human races (the other being the Inuit).
>
>Please help to spread that massage with your didj(es) four times this year
>- join this Worldwide Didgeridoo Circle at your
>local sunset on the equinoxes and solstices.
>
>Just imagine the waves of didgeridoo sound travelling around the world
>following the sunset on those days.
>
>And who knows, maybe when the hundredth didj player joins us, the rest
>of humanity will get the message :-)
>
>Our worldwide didgeridoo circle has been playing four times a year since
>June 2002 and probably about a thousand people have
>participated so far (you do not have to be able to play the didj to
>participate), which is more than I had hoped for in the
>beginning. but we probably never had more than a hundred didj players in
>one event yet also we did come very close a couple of times.
>
>Join this worldwide didj circle at your local sunset time on the 21st March
>2004! Put it on your calendar, invite your
>friends, make a date with your local didj circle. If you want to organise
>a didj meeting in your town/area, please use our
>Events calendar to tell others about it.
>
>Please help spread the word and tell your friends about it! For more info
>see Worldwide Didgeridoo Meditation .
>
>-------------------------------------------
>Sydney Aboriginal Community Riots
>-------------------------------------------
>(http://www.didjshop.com.au/Aboriginal_news_comments.html)
>
>Last Sunday a tragedy with dire consequences occurred in Sydney's >Redfern
suburb: A 17 year old Aboriginal youth fled from
>police and fell off his bike. He died impaled on a metal fence spike.
>The Aboriginal community on the so-called 'block' believes that Thomas
>was chased by the police at the time and possibly even
>pushed. The police deny both charges. In any case this tragic death >sparked
riots in which 50 police officers were injured.
>
>It does not really matter whether Thomas was chased or not, what >matters is
that he was very scared of police as the result
>of years of mistreatment by white police of Aborigines which is not just
>the case in Redfern but almost everywhere in
>Australia. White police harass and strip search Aboriginal youth (girls
>and boys) in public and generally treat Aborigines
>with disdain. It is a shame and it is no wonder that normally peaceful
>Aborigines show their frustration at some point.
>
>Aborigines are much more likely to go to jail for petty crime while white
>people get a small fine or get away.
>Australian Aborigines will die 20 years earlier than white people!
>Aboriginal people are frequently harassed by police and white people. >Brad,
our best artist, lost his nephew: skinheads drove
>over the teenager and then did it once more to make sure he is dead. >They
got charged with dangerous driving but not murder
>and are free. If it would have been a white teenager being driven over
>by Aborigines, they would be in jail for life.
>
>It is this double standard and ingrained racism - condoned by our
>government - that is the real cause behind these recent
>riots. Most Aboriginal problems are a direct consequence of the disruption
>of Aboriginal culture by previous Australian
>governments and our present government still refuses to even just say >sorry
to the stolen generation.
>
>To add insult to injury, the police in Redfern charged some of Thomas'
>relatives over the riots and refused them bail,
>despite promising not to do so until after the funeral. This shows total
>ignorance of any cultural values to not allow these
>family members to partake in the funeral (Aborigines have to go to any
>family funeral) and can only further inflame the situation.
>
>It is high time that Aboriginal police are used in Aboriginal areas and
>that our government stops treating Aborigines like
>second rate citizens.
>
>As we said before by introducing legislation forcing manufactures and
>sellers of Aboriginal art and artefacts to declare who
>actually made and/or painted them would create a sizeable Aboriginal
>cottage industry and reduce Aboriginal un-employment as
>well as help Aborigines to re-connect with their culture. But I guess that
>this might reduce the profits of some white people
>and companies which probably donate to the governments election >funds...
>
>Sadly this Australian government seems to be more interested in >enforcing
their old colonial views than in reconciliation. I
>sincerely hope they realise that what happened in Redfern last week is
>a wake-up call...
>
>For more news on this story, see our Aboriginal Australia news web logs.

--- *DiDJiBuNgA!!* Hang Binary,baby...---

Hanuman "Stitch" Zhang, ManglaLanger (mangle + manga + lang)

Language[s] change[s]: vowels shift, phonologies crash-&-burn, grammars
leak, morpho-syntactics implode, lexico-semantics mutate, lexicons explode,
orthographies reform, typographies blip-&-beep, slang flashes, stylistics
warp... linguistic (R)evolutions mark each-&-every quantum leap...

...languages are "naturally evolved wild systems... So language does not
impose order on a chaotic universe, but reflects its own wildness back." - Gary
Snyder

"Some Languages Are Crushed to Powder but Rise Again as New Ones" -
a chapter on pidgins & creoles, John McWhorter,
_The Power of Babel: A Natural History of Language_

= ¡ gw'araa legooset caacaa !
¡ reez'arvaa. saalvaa. reecue. scoopaa-goomee en reezijcloo ! =
[Fight Linguistic Waste!
Save, Salvage, Recover, Scavenge and Recycle!]