Yesterday I subscribed to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, a media organization, publishing a free-access website and a bimonthly magazine. Topics include nuclear risk, climate change, and disruptive technologies, including developments in biotechnology. They still believe that “because humans created them, we can control them.”  It will be nice if they also concern themselves with “unwise decisions”, or “If I had to do it over again.”

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UNEDUCATED – Several posts ago I was surprised at my lack of knowledge of world religions.  Today I am surprised that I never knew most if not all bull dogs have to be born caesarian due to their large heads.  I asked, and my daughter knew it.  Where have I been all my life!  At least I can read cursive handwriting.

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NOT ALL DARK AND DREARY – I guess I qualify as a dark alarmist blogger.  I’m working on that. For example, after reading Lois Eisden’s post on early memories, I do remember sitting at the head of the table at the farm with scads of unfamiliar children wishing me a happy two-year old birthday.  I think I remember the occasion because of how embarrassed I was.  Not a good feeling.  Recently I came across a photo which must have been the occasion.  (I’m the youngest one to the right on the front row.)  I recognize less than half the faces–the others I just wonder where they came from.  Thankfully I don’t remember the spanking I got at age one in Martinsville, Va. for wandering from my front yard into traffic.  I’ve been told I was so angry I went into the other room, slammed the door and held my breath until I fainted.  Not having luck with posting photos today, so just imagine it.

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P.S. When feeling down, just say “Be-Bop-a-LuLu…”  (?)

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THANKS FOR STOPPING BY –  It’s my fault for not being chummier.  My next post will be about that.

QUOTE OF THE DAY –  Lewis Thomas on Death:  “….there is still that permanent vanishing of consciousness to be accounted for. Are we to be stuck forever with this problem?  Where on earth does it go?  Is it simply stopped dead in its tracks, lost in humus, wasted?  Considering the tendency of nature to find uses for complex and  intricate mechanisms, this seems to me unnatural.  I prefer to think of it as somehow separated off at the filaments of its attachment, and then drawn like an easy breath back into the membrane of its origin,  a fresh memory for a biospherical nervous system, but I have no data on the matter.”   –Thomas, The Lives of a Cell–Notes of a Biology Watcher