le parcours

My brain's been empty since I wrote that gay marriage post. Haven't felt like doing much of anything, and this damn rain isn't helping my mood. Meanwhile, NK is celebrating its birthday today... I don't know whether this involves a nuke test. Haven't felt any tremors, so hey-- maybe they're not testing. Here's hoping the power doesn't go out again.

I have to quote this excerpt from The Onion:

Hog Executed Farmland Style

GRUNDY CENTER, IA—Police are investigating the vicious farmland slaying of a prize hog whose methodically gutted corpse was discovered Tuesday in the barn of local livestock farmer Lyle Whitman. "It appears the hit was done with a large butcher knife or some similar cutting implement," said Grundy County Deputy Keith Angrim at a press conference Tuesday. "The hog was hung by its feet with its belly sliced open and its head removed. In addition, all the blood had been drained from the animal's body, and its internal organs were missing." Given the meticulous but brutal nature of the killing, Angrim said he believes the hog was "taken out by a professional."

I love The Onion.

Here's the kind of news that always gives me a chuckle.

Kofi Annan seizes the moment. Are you as thrilled as I am?

Iraq will have a seat in the Arab League. I'm not sure whether this is good or bad.

Rummy on WMDs: blessed silence...

NK moves from the unfortunately-named Nodong Missile to the Big Dong Missile. And Guam trembles.

Korea's experiment with specialization.

Comrade Queef to the Press: "Yes, I am an asshole."

Korean xenophobia in microcosm: this article is about an art show coming to Seoul form Canada. Note the article's title.

Not only is Korean labor doing all it can to bring the economy to a grinding halt, but the government machine itself may have a couple monkey wrenches in it.

Haven't visited The Scotsman in a bit. Here's something: Sean Connery gets pissed off about bad microphones!

A Scottish meditation on whisky and other things.

At L'Express, an interesting article with excerpts from a book called La France qui tombe ("France falling") which blames most of France's current problems on the French president and prime minister. The book is "a major essay on the current French crisis" by a rightist author.

A quick Do Deok Gyeong (Tao Te Ching) fix for you, Chapter 18 in its entirety:

When the great Tao is forgotten, kindness and morality arise.
When wisdom and intelligence are born, the great pretence begins.
When there is no peace within the family, filial piety and devotion arise.
When the country is confused and in chaos, loyal ministers appear.

It was suggested by one of my profs that the TTC might not actually have been a philosophical treatise (or collection of wisdom sayings), but rather a manual of statecraft for small kingdoms surrounded by larger ones. When you read the above with that in mind, it's positively Machiavellian.

Tacitus writes broadly and deeply on North Korea.

Kevin at IA ruminates about the meaning of Wesley Clark. He also continues his campaign to disprove the laughable notion that South Koreans don't resort to violence to solve problems.

The Marmot on jackboots and goose-stepping.

Big Dong... or No Dong again?

It appears we're going to make our money look more like Swiss francs now. WHY?

My buddy Steve doCarmo's Fall 2003 English Comp syllabus. Just for kicks. Of note: Bucks apparently subscribes to Bloom's Taxonomy and behavioral-cognitive objectives. I've never seen Steve list these on his syllabi in years past. I think it's a stupid departmental policy to have to list these objectives so explicitly; a basic syllabus is all a student really needs to see.

OK... brain remains empty. Signing off.
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