My sister, for many many years, always had pets. At one point she had a pet skunk—deodorized.
Her oldest daughter—my niece, of course—also had a pet skunk until she was forced by zoning regulations to give it up.
So you see, we've had more than one skunk in the family.
Anyway, my sister insisted that skunks make wonderful pets. I'm not so sure.
One day I arrived at her house for a visit. As soon as I got there, she said "[Her husband] and I have to leave immediately, we're driving to Scranton for a funeral, [Husband]'s aunt died." I was given instructions on what to do about the skunk. I could give it dog biscuits. And, my sister said, "If you see a big ball under the covers of my bed, that's the skunk."
So I was left to skunk sit.
I didn't see anything of the skunk and at one point I was curious as to where it was. I went into my sister's bedroom and, as anticipated, there was the big ball on the bed but under the quilt.
I pulled back the covers and the skunk took off like a shot out of hell and zoomed into the bathroom. I threw some dog biscuits in after it.
I never saw it again. It never came out of the bathroom. And evidently the skunk would not take food from strangers, so when my sister got home, the skunk was half starved to death.
You may judge for yourself whether skunks make nice pets. I'd say they're not really domesticated animals because they seem to be less comfortable with unfamiliar humans than, say, dogs.
Copyright © 2011 by Richard Stein
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
A Word to Photographers: Get in Closer
A fault very common to amateur photographers, or "snapshooters" as we used to call them, is that they include much too much in the shot. Seems like they try to get practically the whole world in, sometimes. And then they leave the subject just a little dot in the middle of the photo. And if it's a person, he or she is so small that you can't see what he/she looks like. (Posters of your own personal photos on the Web, take particular note.)
Why does this happen? I think it's a matter of human perception, how our brains work in vision. Cameras can zoom, but our eyes do not. So, we tend to "see" that central object and mentally tune out everything else.
I've always felt I was well attuned to his fault and could avoid doing it myself. Yet, when I took a course in photography (more specifically, photographing a model) from a pro some years ago, he'd take our negatives (including mine) and, with an orange crayon, mark a rectangle showing just the part of the area on the negative that we should have included.
Notice professional photography, both still photos of people and camera shots on TV. Notice the framing (that's the technical term for what we're talking about here). They even cut off the tops of heads! Probably the people who appear on TV hate that because, now that lots of us have TVs with better detail, you can see the wrinkles on their faces!
Nowadays a majority of people own little digital cameras. I believe those cameras generally have a zoom function. So, use that "tele" button to zoom in closer. Remember what you want to focus on, and include only that—not the whole world!
Copyright © 2011 by Richard Stein
Why does this happen? I think it's a matter of human perception, how our brains work in vision. Cameras can zoom, but our eyes do not. So, we tend to "see" that central object and mentally tune out everything else.
I've always felt I was well attuned to his fault and could avoid doing it myself. Yet, when I took a course in photography (more specifically, photographing a model) from a pro some years ago, he'd take our negatives (including mine) and, with an orange crayon, mark a rectangle showing just the part of the area on the negative that we should have included.
Notice professional photography, both still photos of people and camera shots on TV. Notice the framing (that's the technical term for what we're talking about here). They even cut off the tops of heads! Probably the people who appear on TV hate that because, now that lots of us have TVs with better detail, you can see the wrinkles on their faces!
Nowadays a majority of people own little digital cameras. I believe those cameras generally have a zoom function. So, use that "tele" button to zoom in closer. Remember what you want to focus on, and include only that—not the whole world!
Copyright © 2011 by Richard Stein
Saturday, March 26, 2011
How to Deal with People Who Come Ringing Your Bell
It's election time here so I just had someone ring my bell on behalf of a political candidate. Got me thinking (see no. 2 below).
Copyright (c) 2011 by Richard Stein
- This one is particularly recommended for Jehovah's Witnesses and such types: "Look up. Do you realize you're standing under a wasps' nest?" Then of course they're in a hurry to get the Hell out of there. This might only work if you actually have a wasps' nest above your door. I did for a while--it was really great for that purpose!--but then I got rid of the nest.
- If it's someone canvassing for a political candidate, act totally crazy: "I'm voting for Pericles this year. He's what Athens really needs right now!"
- Proposition them sexually. Maybe not really recommended.
Copyright (c) 2011 by Richard Stein
Friday, March 25, 2011
We Must Take a Very Hard Look at Nuclear Power
After two weeks of the continuing saga of a dangerous situation at Japan's Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power station, and just after things began to look a tad more optimistic, today there is a sobering new development, that there may have been a breach of the reactor core with much greater release of radiation than anyone thought.
So I feel it's time to comment on nuclear power. In an era when we hear, ad nauseam, about "reducing America's dependence on foreign oil," and when we also have grown less tolerant of the problems with burning fossil fuels like coal to generate electricity, nuclear power has, to some minds, been a power source that should not be overlooked.
However, a lot of people are afraid of nuclear power. The world has seen some chilling instances of what can happen to atomic power plants, in Chernobyl and Three Mile Island (Pennsylvania).
At one point it was argued that a standardized reactor design, such as they use in France, would simplify the design of new nuclear reactors and thus make them safer. So to speak, we would be building a "perfected" nuclear plant.
However, even barring earthquakes—and how foolish does it now seem to build nuclear plants in an earthquake-prone country like Japan?—there will always be mechanical failures and operator errors.
To draw an analogy from flying: We've got very good and well-tested planes, these days. Occasionally a plane still crashes, because of some unforeseen equipment problem, pilot error, or both.
I recently revisited the story of what happened at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant, near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, in 1979. That plant had three lines of defense in the form of pumps for cooling water. Yet the operators did not believe the alarms that were going off—warning lights and sirens that signaled a loss of reactor cooling. Even worse and more incredible, they shut off the third line of backup pumps. (I wonder if anyone knows why they did that.)
So, you can build the most fail-safe, fool-proof, and idiot-proof reactor possible. You can train your operators to death. Yet there is no guarantee that they will do the right thing at all times. Human beings are always going to be the wild card, and human beings are fallible.
So you can reduce the statistical odds that something terrible will happen, but you can't get those odds down to zero. And the consequences of what can go wrong with a nuclear plant are very, very bad because radiation is very nasty stuff. It might be time to conclude that we don't want to take the risks.
Copyright © 2011 by Richard Stein
So I feel it's time to comment on nuclear power. In an era when we hear, ad nauseam, about "reducing America's dependence on foreign oil," and when we also have grown less tolerant of the problems with burning fossil fuels like coal to generate electricity, nuclear power has, to some minds, been a power source that should not be overlooked.
However, a lot of people are afraid of nuclear power. The world has seen some chilling instances of what can happen to atomic power plants, in Chernobyl and Three Mile Island (Pennsylvania).
At one point it was argued that a standardized reactor design, such as they use in France, would simplify the design of new nuclear reactors and thus make them safer. So to speak, we would be building a "perfected" nuclear plant.
However, even barring earthquakes—and how foolish does it now seem to build nuclear plants in an earthquake-prone country like Japan?—there will always be mechanical failures and operator errors.
To draw an analogy from flying: We've got very good and well-tested planes, these days. Occasionally a plane still crashes, because of some unforeseen equipment problem, pilot error, or both.
I recently revisited the story of what happened at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant, near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, in 1979. That plant had three lines of defense in the form of pumps for cooling water. Yet the operators did not believe the alarms that were going off—warning lights and sirens that signaled a loss of reactor cooling. Even worse and more incredible, they shut off the third line of backup pumps. (I wonder if anyone knows why they did that.)
So, you can build the most fail-safe, fool-proof, and idiot-proof reactor possible. You can train your operators to death. Yet there is no guarantee that they will do the right thing at all times. Human beings are always going to be the wild card, and human beings are fallible.
So you can reduce the statistical odds that something terrible will happen, but you can't get those odds down to zero. And the consequences of what can go wrong with a nuclear plant are very, very bad because radiation is very nasty stuff. It might be time to conclude that we don't want to take the risks.
Copyright © 2011 by Richard Stein
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Three Flavors of Grace
I happened to be remembering a stint I served as a summer camp counselor during my college years. At this camp, every meal was preceded by a little sung grace. It varied according to morning, noon, and evening, but they all ended with "Thanks be to God, who gives us bread."
My mischievous mind proposes some variants on that. The grace for citizens of communist countries: "Thanks be to the government, who gives us bread."
Or the humanist grace: "Thanks be to the farmer, who gives us bread."
Now, that one would make better sense to me. Farmers are under-recognized for what they do.
Copyright (c) 2011 by Richard Stein
My mischievous mind proposes some variants on that. The grace for citizens of communist countries: "Thanks be to the government, who gives us bread."
Or the humanist grace: "Thanks be to the farmer, who gives us bread."
Now, that one would make better sense to me. Farmers are under-recognized for what they do.
Copyright (c) 2011 by Richard Stein
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Another War to Aggravate the U.S. Budget Deficit
After only a few days of U.S. involvement in Libya, it has already cost our country $225 million in Tomahawk missiles alone. Plus another mere $30 million for an F-15 fighter plane that crashed. If the U.N. more or less ordered the "no-fly zone" that the U.S. is helping to enforce, why doesn't the U.N. pay for it?
And I don't know, offhand, how much--many, many millions a day, I believe--it costs to maintain the efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq.
As you probably know, the U.S. federal budget is running a big deficit. And, with Republicans in control of one of chambers of Congress (the House), it is apparently politically impossible to raise taxes.
When, as has happened previously in wartime, the costs of war cause the country to spend more than it takes in in taxes, basically the government finances the war by printing money. At the very least this causes inflation. At worst--if some economists are correct--this deficit spending can destroy our economy.
But I would not want anyone to think that my objections to a war are simply, or even mainly, economic. A war always means some amount of civilian casualties; and I hate for my country to become a militaristic one, going to war anywhere and everywhere at the drop of a hat. There is already (to my mind) too much of a belief that our soldiers are heroes who are defending our country. They may deserve credit for bravery, or for their patriotism and willingness to serve what they see as a good; but I'm going to go so far as to say that it's a rather dubious proposition that they are defending our country--although I am sure they believe they are.
Copyright (c) 2011 by Richard Stein
And I don't know, offhand, how much--many, many millions a day, I believe--it costs to maintain the efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq.
As you probably know, the U.S. federal budget is running a big deficit. And, with Republicans in control of one of chambers of Congress (the House), it is apparently politically impossible to raise taxes.
When, as has happened previously in wartime, the costs of war cause the country to spend more than it takes in in taxes, basically the government finances the war by printing money. At the very least this causes inflation. At worst--if some economists are correct--this deficit spending can destroy our economy.
But I would not want anyone to think that my objections to a war are simply, or even mainly, economic. A war always means some amount of civilian casualties; and I hate for my country to become a militaristic one, going to war anywhere and everywhere at the drop of a hat. There is already (to my mind) too much of a belief that our soldiers are heroes who are defending our country. They may deserve credit for bravery, or for their patriotism and willingness to serve what they see as a good; but I'm going to go so far as to say that it's a rather dubious proposition that they are defending our country--although I am sure they believe they are.
Copyright (c) 2011 by Richard Stein
Predictions of the Future
In the comic strip "Dick Tracy," in my youth (the 1950s) and even earlier, the detective Dick wore a "two-way wrist radio." This, as well as the "communicator" used by the Enterprise crew on the TV show "Star Trek," was very similar to the cell phones we have today. Captain Kirk's communicator even flipped open like the cell phone that I carry.
However, later on Dick Tracy advanced to a "two-way wrist TV." This, I believe, we still don't have. Our cell phones and smart phones can send still pictures, and they can capture video; but I don't think they can send video.
And it was predicted long ago that one day we'd be able to see our caller on our telephone. Our ordinary phones don't do this (it requires too much bandwidth, plus it seems not many people want to be seen when they answer the phone wrapped in that just-out-of-the-shower towel). However, with Skype you can talk to and see your caller.
It was predicted long ago—again in my childhood--that one day you'd be able to hang your TV on the wall like a picture. Hey, we certainly have that, and TVs are hanging on the walls in millions of homes right now.
In a 1939 movie called "The Shape of Things to Come," the future (which I think was supposed to be in 50 years, hence 1989) showed everybody flying around in their own personal autogiro (the autogiro was, obviously, a dead-end invention which was sort of a cross between an airplane and a helicopter). That one seems kind of silly. How crowded the sky would be!
Copyright © 2011 by Richard Stein
However, later on Dick Tracy advanced to a "two-way wrist TV." This, I believe, we still don't have. Our cell phones and smart phones can send still pictures, and they can capture video; but I don't think they can send video.
And it was predicted long ago that one day we'd be able to see our caller on our telephone. Our ordinary phones don't do this (it requires too much bandwidth, plus it seems not many people want to be seen when they answer the phone wrapped in that just-out-of-the-shower towel). However, with Skype you can talk to and see your caller.
It was predicted long ago—again in my childhood--that one day you'd be able to hang your TV on the wall like a picture. Hey, we certainly have that, and TVs are hanging on the walls in millions of homes right now.
In a 1939 movie called "The Shape of Things to Come," the future (which I think was supposed to be in 50 years, hence 1989) showed everybody flying around in their own personal autogiro (the autogiro was, obviously, a dead-end invention which was sort of a cross between an airplane and a helicopter). That one seems kind of silly. How crowded the sky would be!
Copyright © 2011 by Richard Stein
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