Sex Week

Alright yes, perhaps the title should be "Relationship Week" but why scare away readers by using the "R" word. Sex sells! I would also offer that the picture above will be the most inappropriate of the week, but I really liked the curves of the chair. Did you know that tongue in cheek makes it difficult to speak but has no effect whatsoever on using the keyboard.

I have had several posts on the subject of sex rumbling around in my brain and other organs for awhile now, as I mentioned last week I was finally prompted to get them all out by the writing of a friend who has found love online. OK, so she hasn't yet used the "L" word in public, but she has changed her facebook status to "in a relationship" - the one true sign of commitment in the 21st century.

While we are fencing with the "R" word, I would note that I have not made the standard remarks about only boyz being the ones afraid of it. Nay, one of my observations from my forays into the world of online dating is that the girlz are a bit more quiet about their big "R" fears but they seem to have a fair level of relational angst hidden beneath any come hither speech; they just don't flaunt it with zeal as do some of my fellow Y-chromosome creatures.

So, my preliminary online dating observations in bullet point presentation:

• when I use the word 'intelligent' and blatantly flash my Ph.D. I am trying to convey a message, so why do women who contact me based on my profile then find me too cerebral?

• age matters, take a look at any reunion photograph from the 50s, 60s, or 70s; ever wonder how those people could possibly be the same age? this goes for not just for external looks, but also spirit, energy and worldview; just because we are the same chronological age does not mean we see the world the same or interact with it alike.

• liberal and conservative do not mix in a couple, at least not in my world; opposites do not attract, if you are a republican we have zero possibilities, if you are a democrat - well maybe, but you can't be card carrying.

• you are not going to change me, but more importantly how have you gotten to our age and not figured this one out for yourself?

Now I know that so far these initial observations have a bit of a negative spin; I just needed to get some of the basic power points out of the way up front. The rest of the week will be reflections on the state of "R", "C" & even "L" in my world. In the final post of the week, I will disclose my new plan of action forged in the tepid fires of online coffee dates.

Never Miss a Scintillating Blog Post Again

SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION WARNING

I know how hard it can be to wait by your computer for yet another literary eruption from this here corner of the blogosphere. Heaven forbid you should miss the story of little timmy and his pet manatee lost in the wilds of mid-twentieth century michigan. 

Fear not! You can now get an email notice when a fresh and refreshing post appears on this - your source for all things not so significant. No need to endlessly send your browser seeking for updates on Keeping Your Head in (All) the Game(s). Now the internet will call you!

Over there on the right is a brand new widget, just enter your email eddress and the ever and always on-duty silicon gremlins of blogger will let you know when I post new and exciting bon mots of great import or otherwise.

See! There it is!!  ------------------------------------------>

Sign up now!!!

Tomorrow we return you to our regular non-commercial programming.

Saturation Saturday: Clear

transparent butterfly wing

I searched 'clear' and got a lot of hits for 'transparent'

I searched 'see-through'

got a lot of nipples

and one boat

does watched bread toast?

clear goby fish

see through guitar

transparent piano

and a good clear chair

With the clarity of clear and the transparency of see-through we come to the end of Saturation Saturdays. I have sufficiently cleared out my back-up picture logs. For my next artistic meander we move onto some other things that have caught my visual attention lately.

Medical Marijuana (5): The Patients

Today's report was prompted by an article which suggests that the typical medical marijuana patient is "white, educated and employed." Ignoring the insipient racism in that conclusion, I would say that my experience partially supports those findings. Although I found in integrated neighborhoods the clientele at the co-ops were also more mixed; the same was true of my initial physician visit in downtown Oakland, a very integrated city.

The "whiteness" of the users might have more to do with who has access to the entire medical system and also a lot less fear of "the man" in the form of DEA door-kickers. Educated makes sense. The willingness to do some personal research for those unfamiliar with the use of cannabis is a big step in trying medical marijuana. The employed label may only indicate the financial ability to cough up fifteen bucks for a gram of high quality weed.

What is more interesting in the aforementioned study is that patients tend to substitute medical marijuana for prescription medication and/or alcohol. In many ways a potentially safer alternative to NSAIDs, narcotics and booze. In my own case, it was the ineffectiveness of oxycodone that led me to try the pot path.

Next week, my first experimental anomaly.

PRODUCT REPORT: Hash w/ high CBD content

Last week I reported on the CBD measurement and how higher levels might well lower the pot buzz. To that end I purchased a gram of hash with a CBD of 9%, which is more than 4X higher than any other product I have found. Unfortunately, lowering the 'buzz-factor' of hash appears to be about as effective as lowering blue agave tequila from 90 proof to only 80. It still packs a wallop.

Previous posts in this series:

Medical Marijuana (4): Botanical Chemistry

Medical Marijuana (3): Human Experimentation

Medical Marijuana (2): The Dispensary

Medical Marijuana (1): An Inquiry

A Glitch in the Internet

You probably have noticed that the ads you see on the right hand side of many browser pages will change based on where you've been surfin'. Particularly if you are hitting a lot of retail sites doing some comparison shopping. Well last month some nano-byte got jumbled on the interwebs and for about a week I was flooded with advertising for:

Engagement rings
Honeymoon vacations
Martha Stewart wedding guides

and yes, these pictures come from a couple of those ads.

No I have no idea how, what, when, where or why not. I even checked my browser cache but I did not black out and visit Brides R Us or anything like that. What I found most curious was that over about ten days to two weeks, the ads transitioned to home furnishings and real estate directed at 'first time buyers.' I am anticipating a flood of solicitations from divorce lawyers about this time next year. I know, I know, way too cynical.

So let me offer a teaser for next week. A woman I know through a one-time coffee date, which actually was a walk along the Bay - anyway, this woman is a wonderful writer. She has written several blog pieces on her adventures in online dating and recently her success at the same. I have several times consider writing a response from the other side of the aisle and now with her relational vindication, I have decided the time is now. My response to her Annals of Online Dating begins next week, along with a few other offerings on the general theme of: Online Dating, Relationships, Sex, Life the World and Everything.

Thinking Outside Several Boxes

“We should stay on the lookout for marginalized people — people whom we still instinctively think of as ‘they’ rather than ‘us.’” Indeed, we should “keep trying to expand our sense of ‘us’ as far as we can.” -Richard Rorty 


The quote above comes from a New York Times article by Stanley Fish. NYT readers already know Dr. Fish and others may wish (or not) to read the article. I warn only that he is an academic and tends to write about as clearly as academics can, which means semi-dense.


The point of the Rorty quote is obvious, we should strive to include more people in the "us" that we consider our us, our family, our race, creed, humankind. But his article starts not with a conflict between human and human but with Dorothy picking an apple off an Ozian tree.


The tree protests: "Well how would you like for someone to come along a pick something off of you?"


And therein yet another opportunity to overuse the line: "We're not in Kansas anymore."


The point is, OK one of the points is, that we think in categories and those boxes, those segments of reality are constructed by our society, by the way we was raised up. On the nature/nurture scale, this one is way over on the nurture side. Momma done taught us how to think. Sure we can grow and change but big swings in our view of reality are few and far between. As Fish says: 


"Wholesale conversions like Paul's on the road to Damascus do occur, but more often a change will affect only a small corner of one's conceptual universe."


So don't expect a lightening strike to change your olde friend's views on women or politics anytime soon. Which brings me to point number two for today. I have a friend who is in lock-step with everything the republicans are doing over the debt ceiling right now. In fact, he thinks they are being too lenient. His is 104% anti-Obama and would let the country default, if that's what it takes to get rid of Barack.


I, as you may remember, do not agree with the republicans; on the other hand, I completely disagree with the democrats as well. I don't think all politicians are crooks or evil; I simply think they are politicians. We have a ridiculous system that requires allegiance to a political party before and ahead of doing what is best for the country, the nation and the citizens. Stupid system.


But I was talking about my friend. I have come to realize that he is not an idealogue. He has a long held belief system that aligns with the right wing of American politics. He does not think social welfare in any form is the business of a constitutionally derived government. He is not a mean, heartless person; in fact, he is a highly principled individual. His principles are based on certain beliefs and observations that I disagree with, that I feel are exclusive of the larger "us" in Rorty's thinking.


But my friend is not a bigot or a racist, he is a principled individualist. In fact, it troubles him that many of those who agree with his political views are indeed, as he puts it, "those nut jobs with cabins in Montana stocked with freeze dried weasel brains." 


We agree to disagree about nearly everything political but secretly we both are hoping for a random lightening strike. Rorty would point out that we probably are hoping those bolts of conversion will impact those we still have in the "they" box.

Back in the Spring

Back in April someone reminded me about the 'Falcon Cam' on the PG&E building in San Francisco. So for about three weeks I had my small side monitor open to the 'NestCam' and watched as the falcon chicks grew and both mom & dad brought them breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks. I must say the avian population around a falcon nest really decreases when there are kids to be fed.

These cameras are part of the Santa Cruz Predatory Bird Research Group, just one of many such video arrangements to be found all around the world; on the internet of course. You might try one out next spring. It was interesting to watch the progress of the chicks from eggs to fledging. But I found I became much more interested in the people who were watching the falcons.

You see at some point you have questions. When will they fledge? Why do the cameras shift? What are they eating? So I joined the Falcon Forum and discovered rather quickly that there were some really dedicated conservationists involved. I got early notice of the day they were being banded and watched a really interesting inter-species reality show. I also was reminded that human beings can be addicted to nearly anything, including falcon babies. 

Then I remembered that you can gain a lot of knowledge hanging out with borderline fanatics. I went to Antarctica in 1980, somewhat before there was actual eco-tourism. My shipmates were either very old and somewhat jaded world travelers or birders. I discovered very quickly that making zodiac landings with the birders meant more information, more adventuresome hikers but lots of overly detailed conversation about he mating habits of plovers. It was a reasonable trade-off, besides the big warm hats filtered out a lot of the conversation.

Note to self - I need to scan that picture I have of me in the penguin colony for the blog.

To-Do List - Go through increasingly large pile of notes to self.