Eternal Recurrence

I’ve decided when I am reincarnated, that I am going to come back as Edward R. Murrow.  I don’t CARE if he’s been dead a long time so just SHUT UP about that!

Go ask Friedrich.

Can’t you see the resemblance?

 

Me. TOBACCO ADDICT!

Edward R. Murrow – TOBACCO ADDICT! Coincidence? I think not . . .

alles Gute zum Geburtstag

Happy Birthday

to

Gryphon’s Aerie!

Today is the first birthday for Gryphon’s Aerie.

It is NOT the first birthday for Gryphon!

Gryphon himself is 463 years old (give or take a score).

THIS is a Baby Gryphon!

Gryph as a toddler.

(linked)

I only include it here because this is a first birthday and first birthdays are usually associated with babies, and besides….. well never mind.

This is actually the first birthday of the AERIE!  The place where Gryph hangs his hat.

THIS is the Aerie!

Gryphon's Aerie

If you want to give Gryph a nice present, then browse the Aerie, read a lot of posts (a few will do) and make some very pithy comments.

Although it hurts me to say this I will do it JUST this once for Gryph.

And We Thank You For Your Support!

(ugh)

Cornelius Eugene Spots, Ph.D.

(Natasha, if you are reading this, come back to me my Love!  I’m stuck in Yorba Linda and going INSANE!)

good night and good luck.

Aerie Stats

On the eve of the first birthday for the Aerie, I would like to present some of the statistics for the past year.

Here is a chart of the views broken down by month for the past twelve months

Table 1

Note that the first 4 months were very poor indeed for views.  November and December ‘08 only got a combined viewing of 81.  January and February of this year were not much better but I was greatly pleased over the increase from the previous two months.  Things really began to take off this past March.  Notice the large spike in May.  It steadied off during the summer and even took a slight dip but took off again two months ago in September.  Last month, October, saw a daily average of 1,311 views.  The views for November to date 11.10.09 are 12,603 which puts the Aerie on track for well over 1,000 views a day for the rest of the month.

There is a large dip showing in the last month, but remember that we are still in just the second week of November and on track for an even better month than October.

Here is a table showing monthly views and averages in non-graph form

Table 2

The best single day was just a couple of weeks ago.  Thursday, October 29th, the Aerie got 1,715 views and a monthly average of 1,311.  Over all for the past twelve months the daily average is 652, but this is skewed dramatically by the sparse first couple or three months.  With views now averaging well over 1,000 a day this overall monthly average is sure to rise.

As for views for individual posts, the Aerie has 375 posts.  On average over a year this comes to just a small fraction over 1 per day.  The majority of these came in the first half of the year when I was posting nearly every day and sometimes two or three times a day.  My pace has slackened off considerably the past six months.  As for average of views:posts it averages to 550 per post.  But, this is GROSSLY misleading.  You can see this just by going down to the recent post Top Fifteen.

Here I show with photo representation (and links) the total views for my top fifteen view getters.  Here by calculation we can see that only 4% of the total posts got over 50% of the total views!

Now by avocation I am a Social Scientist who LOATHES statistics for the ways in which they can be manipulated to the users wishes.  So let me try to make some sense of all these numbers.  First, let’s ask just how it is that I am getting so an impressive number of views and second why such a small percentage of posts is responsible for the majority of views.

I am slightly, but not completely, saddened to say that the views are by and large attributable to the images therein.

I would LOVE to say that the superlative quality of my writing and sharp sardonic wit is what is creating the drove of views.  But, I can’t.  A simple peace sign from google images inserted into Give War A Chance caused the most meteoric rise in views in any post to date.   Since it was posted on August 31, it has garnered 6,714 views–95 views per day average.  Many of those days, at least ten of which, were completely dead days with no views at all.

The reason I am not COMPLETELY saddened is because a lot of the posts that are getting hits for the images are also examples of what I consider some of my best work.  Give war A Chance is just one of these.  The Tet Offensive is another.  So while people may be coming for the images I comfort myself with the hopes that the main content will grab their attention.  Why would you come here looking for a Peace Sign if you were not interested in the culture that generated the symbol in the first place and once here you just might be grabbed by the irony of a peace sign in a post exhorting people to give WAR a chance.

Makes sense to me.

The Aerie has a lot of good writing.  Doc and I do a very good job.  We give a lot of good content and for the price you pay as a fraction of your Internet connection fees, we think it’s pretty damn good.  We try to keep it fresh.  We mix it up.  We use personal stories.  We are topical and we write to universal and timeless ideas.  And we are VERY humble–especially Doc.  In fact Doc believes himself to be the MOST humble writer on the World Wide Web, bar NONE!

And now I am rambling.  Tomorrow is the birthday.

If you are a regular reader here you can finish the rest of the last sentence.

And We . . . . .

Gryphon.

Just Two More Days

On November 11th (two days from this posting) the Aerie turns one year old.

I’ll try to have something special for that day.

Perhaps Doc will be ready with his first report from Yorba Linda, but don’t count on that.  But, something special nonetheless.

And We Thank You For Your Continuing Support.

Gryphon

p.s. Check out Phineas Q.

Phineas Q.

This is true story.  All the pictures except for the one with the groundhog with the bandelero and automatic rifle are photos that I have taken of the creature and location in question.

I have a foe.

His name is Phineas Quilorian Grundschwein, esq.

He didn’t tell me his name.  He has never spoken to me though I have spoken to him many times.  I named him.  I wasn’t going to, until he made it a personal issue.  Anyone with whom one has a personal history especially one of animosity should have a name.  And so after considerable deliberation I decided that my mortal enemy’s name would, from this time forward, be P.Q. Grundschwein, esq.

It fits.

It all began over three months ago on August 1st.  I moved into a new residence which I lease.  The house is located on the edge of a small woods about halfway up a hill.  The property surrounding it is about 4 acres and the property and the house belong to the organization where I perform ministry services.  My primary service I render is that of property manager for the ministry–which includes the house where I now live.  The woods are close enough to residential housing and a commercial district and major traffic arteries to be frequented by homeless people whom I have observed leaving the premises after spending the night in the woods.

The house was unoccupied for quite some time before my arrival and was in a medium state of dilapidation.  The windows were boarded up.  There was a basement entrance to the outside that was missing a door.  The house had been broken into at least once.  On the non-woods side is a large apartment complex that is the densest crime district in the city.

There is also, because of the woods, a LOT of wildlife.  I have observed squirrels, raccoon, an owl, snakes, deer, and groundhogs–grundschweinen.  Working on the property before taking up residency there I have many times seen groundhogs all over the four acres–one time three at once peacefully searching for grubs in the back lot behind one of the other houses on the property.  If I had any thoughts of them at all at that point is would have been along the lines of, “how quaint.”

Not anymore!

30 feet from my back door

My bedroom projects out slightly from the main body of the house.  I had noticed a groundhog hole going under the foundation and into the crawlspace directly outside the wall

where the head of my bed is.  Around the corner was a smaller hole.  This is the “backdoor” for the varmint.  Groundhogs and many other burrowing creature will always provide themselves with at least two points of access to their underground lairs.  I thought the hole was abandoned.  Why I thought this is unclear because there is ample evidence of many many groundhogs living on this property.  As I said I have seen more than one Grundschwein at one time taking their meals on the lawn.

Nevertheless, I thought nothing of it when I moved in.  And then one night, about three a.m., I heard a furious commotion from beneath the floor.  I thought I had a homeless person in the basement as the outside entrance to the basement was wide open.  The house had been previously unoccupied for a long time and there were no blinds in the window so it might be natural for a homeless person to assume that the house was vacant and that a wide open basement might be a good place to crash for the night.

Out in the woods as I am, I was not about to go down to the basement, which would involve going outside, to confront someone.  Instead, I stomped around the house and loudly opened and closed the front and back doors.  The noises stopped and I spent a very restless night.

Phineas Q. Grundschwein

A night or two later the noises resumed.  This time I pinpointed their location.  They were coming from directly below my bed, and there is no basement beneath my room–only crawlspace!  The noises were horrible.  Something was violently scratching and clawing at the wood floor beneath the bed as though intent on coming up into my room.

Boys and girls, I am a pretty tough cookie.  I have been through a hell of a lot in my 50 years and there is very little that frightens me, but let me tell you something–this spooked me pretty good.  I have a very vivid imagination and this sounded as though Satan himself had finally grown tired of me eluding him and had decided to come up through the floor to personally put an end to me.  This time, it was three a.m.  It was loud.  It was violent.

Of course it wasn’t Satan.  It was a groundhog.  A VERY excited one from the sound of it!  The prospect of a demon possessed groundhog coming up through the floor wasn’t much more appealing than the thought of it being the Father of Lies.  In some ways it was even more spooky.  I could always invoke God and His protection had it been spiritual evil.  I would actually have to physically handle a groundhog, and any creature that was capable of clawing and/or chewing it’s way through a floor wasn’t one that I wanted to encounter.

P.Q. Grundschwein

Don’t get me wrong.  I can do it.  This isn’t equatorial Africa and we are not talking about Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh MY!  But it was scary nonetheless in the beginning.

I took my duck head cane and beat it on the floor over the source of the commotion and shouted loudly.  I stomped on the floor and shouted some more.  The noise ceased.  I went to bed and to sleep.  Again, I didn’t get much rest.  It became a nightly event.  Phineas would act as though he was going to come through the floor and get me.  I would stomp and shout.  He would quiet down and I would sleep without actually resting much.  Something had to be done.

I don’t care if was living here before me.  I was here now.  I was paying rent.  I was evicting his ass!  It was time to make a plan.

I decided to plug the hole with concrete.  I told my landlord/supervisor that I wanted three bags of Quikcrete for that purpose.  There was some worry that I might actually seal both his holes while he was down there and he would die a horrible, cruel death of hunger.  There was the thought that while dying that he might begin to frantically continue to claw and chew on the floorboards.  There was also the thought that if he died under my bed that I would have the stinking corpse of a groundhog perfuming the locale.

Don’t get me wrong again.  I am the LAST person who would wish cruelty on any of God’s creatures, but THIS GRUNDSCHWEIN HAD TO GO!!!  There was no good way to verify that he was down there, so I determined to just go ahead and plug the holes and if he was down there at the time, then it would become HIS problem!

Groundhog Condominium

So one bright and sunshiney day I got a bag of quikcrete and a wheelbarrow and a shovel and a bucket of water and praying that I wasn’t sealing Phineas up down there with a Cask of Amontillado, I proceeded to seal the holes.  I took care of his smaller auxiliary hole first, and then I sealed the main hole up with thirty pounds of wet concrete–lime, sand, and large gravel.  I know it was thirty pound because the weight is on the bag and I know the proportion I used to go into the main hole.  Brothers and Sisters, I packed it good and tight!  I smacked it in hard and smoothed the outside with the flat of the shovel, and then I walked away convinced that, whether of not he was in there at the time of the deed, he wasn’t going to be going under my bed through that hole anymore.

I walked away and went on to do other work and came back about one hour later and, in passing, went to check on the drying status of the concrete.  As it turned out he HAD been under the house.  He DUG through THIRTY POUNDS OF WET CONCRETE and freed himself from the deathtrap that I had placed for him.

That is a very significant thing.  Let me repeat it.  HE DUG THROUGH THIRTY POUNDS OF WET CONCRETE!

This is one bad-ass Woodchuck!  It was at that point that he became Phineas Quilorean Grundschweine, esq.–a very worthy opponent . . .

I supplied him with the material and the initial labor for him to do his own Home Improvement.  Where, at one time,

Holding Cell for P.Q. Grundschwein

he had a very rough dirt hole going into his house, he NOW has a very smooth and very circular concrete tunnel.  I call it his Groundhog Condominium.

I conceded to him a major battle.  But I was NOT to be defeated.  The war was mine to win or lose.  I began looking into the possibility of getting a live animal trap to catch him.  The problem was what to do with him once caught.  I called the ASPCA.  They said I could catch him if I wanted and I could kill him if I wanted but I could NOT release him on anyone else’s property–public or private.  I could kill him because by law groundhogs are considered “varmints” and are open season all year long with no bag limit.  But, to release him onto someone else’s property would be to give someone else MY problem and that is a no-no.  *sigh*

So, I started asking around if anyone had a live animal trap and a coworker did.  And he gave it to me to use and return sans Grundschwein.  And that is where I am right now in my Groundhog Wars.  I’ll keep you updated.  Denouement will be shortly.

Gryphon

Tall Buildings (Video)

John Hartford

Tall Buildings

(video)

(Lyrics Below)

Long Hot Summer Day

More John Hartford



Tall Buildings

Oh someday my baby, when I am a man

And others have taught me the best that they can

They’ll sell me a suit and cut off my hair

And send me to work in tall buildings.

 

So it’s goodbye to the sunshine.

Goodbye to the dew.

Goodbye to the flowers.

And goodbye to you.

I’m off to the subway.

I must not be late.

I’m going to work in tall buildings

 

Well, When I’m retired.

My life is my own.

I’ve made all my payments.

It’s time to go home.

I wonder what happened

Betwixt and between

I went to work in tall buildings.

 

So it’s goodbye to the sunshine.

Goodbye to the dew.

Goodbye to the flowers.

And goodbye to you.

I’m off to the subway.

I must not be late.

I’m going to work in tall buildings.

 

So it’s goodbye to the sunshine.

John Hartford

Goodbye to the dew.

Goodbye to the flowers.

And goodbye to you.

I’m off to the subway.

I must not be late.

I’m going to work in tall buildings.

 

John Hartford

Coup Kaput!

Doc

There was some time taken off recently due to work demands and therefore no time left to keep you updated on the coup in the Aerie.  For news up to this point, please see Coup Archives.

Der Coup ist KAPUT! 

At the height of the ordeal Doc was brutally going through all my files and alternately making gagging noises and laughing hysterically.  Natasha kept herself busy by eating all my cinnamon-raisin bagels when she wasn’t taunting me with mayonnaise.

It all came to an end one day when they left me locked in a closet so they could go to a rally of some sort.  Doc came back by himself and, crying uncontrollably, let me out of the closet.  Almost incoherently he related the afternoon’s events.

They had gone to a campaign rally for Republican Robert F. McDonnell in his run for governor in the

Naughty Natty

Commonwealth of Virginia.  The two of them were smoking El Presidente cigars and getting into the mood of the festivities.  Things were starting to heat up.  The crowd was being worked into a cheering mob by the candidate.

Natasha became over excited and climbed on Doc’s shoulders and began singing something in Russian.  She tore off her fatigue shirt and camouflaged brassiere and began waving a pocket flag of the former U.S.S.R..  Candidate McDonnell stopped in mid sentence and stared.  Soon all eyes were on the singing, bare-breasted, cigar-smoking, flag-waving Natasha.  Doc tried to get her off but she clamped her muscular thighs that much tighter around his neck, cutting off his wind.  He fainted and the two of them fell into the packed throng.

By this time, private security was well on the way.  Three Men in Black fell on the duo and wrestled them apart.  Natasha became blood lusted and starting fighting in tried and true hand-to-hand combat moves learned in the Russian Army.  Two of them went down incapacitated and she was moving in on the weeping third, when the crowd became involved.  Two Republican men in blue suits and one woman with close-cropped hair and sensible shoes descended on Natasha.  Doc, meanwhile, was crawling though the crowd on his hands and knees.

Natasha made quick work of G.O.P.ers but was overwhelmed by sensible shoes.  The weeping Man in Black reclaimed authority and Doc was hauled by his ankles after Natasha who was being hustled roughly through the crowd screaming obscenities in her native Slavic tongue.

They were separated and Doc did not see her again.

Eventually they released Doc after he convinced them that he did not know Natasha before meeting her at the rally and only agreed to hang out with her because she had promised him that after the rally that they would “do it like Ukrainians.”  I was afraid to ask what that meant.

The final injury toll was 4 broken bones among the three Men in Black, 1 dislocated shoulder on one of the Republican

bankers, and a broken heart on sensible shoes.  Doc suffered severe fatigue pants burns on his neck and grass stains on his hands and knees.  Natasha came away with a lightly lacerated Gluteus Maximus when she fell on a pint bottle of vodka in her hip pocket.

Robert McDonnell’s reputation wasn’t enhanced.  Or, maybe it was.  All that is politics and more in Doc’s line of work to tell.

Well, Doc was sincerely repentant of his takeover of the Aerie.  He promised that he would turn control back to me.  He had begun to have feelings for “Natty”  (he called her “Naughty Natty”) and didn’t feel like he could continue his life without her.  I soothed his damaged ego as best I could but told him that there would have to be some form of punishment for what he and Natasha had done.

All this happened last week.  Doc sent Natasha, who was in INS detention, the last of his Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups which is truly touching considering his obsessive fondness for the sweet treat himself.  We found out yesterday that Natasha has been deported back to her native home of Belorussia.  She will be missed by exactly half of us.

Tricky Dick

Doc, for his role in the coup has been kept on as a news writer for the Aerie but has been named Foreign Correspondent and stationed in Yorba Linda, California.  The contradiction between title and station is driving him crazy but not done for that purpose.  I can think of very few places quite as foreign as California where even the governor doesn’t speak English.

His first assignment is to do a sentimental retrospective on the life of Richard Milhous Nixon.

It may kill him.

I am back in charge of the Aerie. I promise good things to come.

And We Thank You For Your Support.

Gryphon

The election in Virginia is this coming Tuesday.

Vote Early.

Vote Often.

The Red Carpet

Secretary of State Clinton and Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza

Wasn’t it lovely for Peshawar to roll out the Red Carpet for U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton when she arrived in Islamabad, Pakistan?  Too bad that the red dye used for the carpet was from the blood of more than 101 Pakistanis killed in a bombing perhaps coincidentally timed to her arrival.  Perhaps not . . .

According to the New York Times,

The bomb tore through a congested area of narrow alleys and crowded stalls in Peshawar’s old city, killing as many as 101 people, most of them women, and wounding about 160.

I’m sure it had the speech writers scurrying around.

But then again maybe not.  By this time I am sure that there are MANY stock responses to atrocities of this sort.  Ya think?  How sad . . .

See the story here:

Deadly Blast in Pakistan Casts Shadow Over Clinton’s Visit

All we are saaaaaaaying

Is give War a Chance.………

(Well, New York Times?)

doc