Shannon Larratt is Zentastic

Nefarious and I rode the subway/bus out to the airport to pick up Rachel's mother who's visiting for a couple days… I don't know why I never just took transit in the past, given that it's faster and significantly cheaper than driving! We also drove it back, which is where I had a great encounter.

The woman who sat down next to us was in her late forties or fifties; an elegant and polite Air Canada stewardess. She chatted with Nefarious and Rachel's mother, and after a while asked me why I had taken out my lobe jewelry (I told her they got too cold when I went snowmobiling). The amazing thing was that she was asking because she was stretching her lobes and wanted to know what would happen when she took them out — hers were probably about 2ga, and she was wearing very pretty carved wood claws.

It's really something how diverse this “sub”-culture is…

I wish I'd brought my camera because not only would I have loved to take this woman's pictures, but I also chatted and saw about a dozen people with familial facial cuttings (which are very common in Toronto and I see daily because of the large African immigrant community).

One of the things that's always fascinated me is indigenous medicine and how it's sourced. Out of the millions of plants in the rain forest, how do people know which ones to seek out for specific medical conditions, especially when so many others would be toxic or at best ineffective? I certainly don't buy the “we know because the gods told us” explanation, but at the same time, humans haven't been around long enough to figure it out through a process of elimination.

The real answer of course is that we learned by observing animals, eating the same things they eat when they get sick… Animal cultures have indigenous medicine as well. When animals get sick, they seek out specific plants, sometimes traveling great distances to get the right ones for the illness they have (because we — the animals of the planet — co-evolved with these medicinal plants in a chicken and egg fashion). It's really quite amazing. Anyway, I was reading about this in Riddled with Life (by Marlene Zuk), a book that makes a case for the symbiotic need for disease, and it quoted a funny little bit by the World Health Organization titled “The History of Medicine”

2000 B.C.   Here, eat this root.

1000 A.D.   That root is heathen. Here, say this prayer.

1850 A.D.   That prayer is superstition. Here, drink this potion.

1920 A.D.   That potion is snake oil. Here, swallow this pill.

1945 A.D.   That pill is ineffective. Here, take this penicillin.

1955 A.D.   Oops … bugs mutated. Here, take this tetracycline.

1960-1999   39 more “oops.” Here, take this more powerful antibiotic.

2000 A.D.   The bugs have won! Here, eat this root.

That said, I've quit taking the Lyrica (neuropathic pain meds). Its pain control was minimal at best (I really prefer just taking the hillbilly heroin on rough days when it comes down to it), the side effects were unpleasant (mood issues, mental clumsiness, and peripheral vision hallucinations), and almost everyone who wrote me with personal experiences had quite negative things to say about what had happened to them or a family member. Like I said before, I'd really rather have a clear head and be in pain than have a muddied sense of reality — so yeah, pain it is…

…but…

……it does make a good t-shirt!

I was watching Bush at the North American unification summit (in conspiracy-talk, negotiations to collapse the Canada, Mexico, and US governments and run them as a non-democratic corporation), and was really blown away by Bush flat-out saying that the Northwest Passage is “international territory”. I hope he's talking about a passage that runs north of Greenland and north of Ellesmere Island, because traditionally the passage runs smack through long-established Canadian territory (through the heart of Nunavut — once again the original inhabitants get their land taken away by those who seek to exploit it — and the Northwest Territories).

I mean, isn't declaring another country's territory as yours to do with as you please in effect a declaration of war? Or at a minimum, a threat thereof? Not that Bush doesn't thrive on threatening everyone…

Of course, if it runs north of Canada, then it's in Russian or Danish territory. Denmark can't really do a damn thing about it, but Russia can most certainly defend against the US Navy because during the Cold War they realized that they didn't have the money to build the big iron that the US has, and focussed on anti-ship technology instead. So while the US Navy outpowers the Russian Navy, the Russian military in general can sink the entire US military in a couple hours should they choose.

Nature is a vast killing field. No bug, plant, or animal including humans can live unless other bugs, plants, or animals die. All we do is trade corporeal forms around the gaming table of existential matter.

Wild animals live with one eye over their shoulders watching for predators, and the other eye looking ahead for prey. I listen to a redwinged blackbird, warbling his sweet song from a bush above the creek. How contented the sounds. In reality, orinthologists believe that the translation of that sweet song goes something like this: “This is my territory and if I catch another redwing trying to move in here, I will peck his beady little eyes out.” And that may be as close to contentment as a songbird ever comes.

Other than that, I started doing the legwork to put a small structure on my property out east to run power and communications into. I haven't decided to do it yet (I prefer Ontario to be honest, but that property is big, on the road system, and totally paid off — and you can't go wrong with $78 a year in tax load), but I want to keep it open as an option and it's been years since I've thought about it.

Anyway, time to have a shower and go to the bookstore for a Dr. Seuss book or two and one of those “how to draw” books because Nefarious really enjoys them… I used to love them as a kid as well. Experience update later today as well. I have some other BME things to do, but I am trying to stall them until school starts because then I have more time to dedicate to them properly.