Nuke the Rain Forest

Posted on 2 March 2011 by Larry Russwurm

Is there a dangerous cure for global warming? The following article says there might be: A Small Nuclear War Would Stall Global Warming. They specifically say that 100 Hiroshima sized bombs would result in fires where mega tons of carbon would reach the upper troposphere. From there, it would heat up and rise to heights where it wouldn’t easily come down. In the shade of this carbon barrier, the Earth would cool.

The astute of you are wondering, now, if setting off a hundred nuclear bombs could do this without killing anyone. Since the first atomic bomb, 2000 nuclear bombs have been tested. And guess what? Global warming still happened.

I’m guessing that the majority of tests took place in deserts where little fire would result. But still, to get fires from nukes, wouldn’t it be possible to set off 100 nukes in forests to get the same results without killing anyone? Could nuking the rain forest help in controlling global warming?

But cities and forests are not the same thing at all. Perhaps nuking all those cities is necessary to stall global warming. I see one resource that uninhabited forests wouldn’t have: human virgins.

You see, according to demographics, cities should have many people young enough to be virgins. And wouldn’t it only be proper that a mega virgin sacrifice offered to the gods of climate would appease – er- stall global warming. We’ve come a long way.

Of course if we overdo it by a few bombs, the gods of radiation and habitability might kill the Earth. That’s the chance you take in this mega virgin sacrifice. There must be enough virgin sacrifices to appease, not enough to anger.

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Cousin Opie

Posted on 27 February 2011 by Larry Russwurm

A few years ago I did some cartoons for the Barn Dance Opera Journal.

The CKNX Barn Dance was a radio show aired every week from the Wingham station in southwestern Ontario. The actual show travelled from town to town, really arena to arena (which Country Music people meant when they said barn). It started in the mid 20th century and continues in stripped down form today – it’s no longer aired and it occurs less frequently than weekly. For more visit thebarndance.ca .

The show created some notable Country entertainers including Earl Heywood, Al Cherny and Larry Mercey ( of Mercey Brothers fame).

Just a few years ago, Cousin Opie would perform a comic routine at some of the shows. Really Lloyd Otterbein dressed outrageously hillbilly, it was thought that a comic strip featuring this character could be put into the Barn Dance Opera Journal. That’s where I came in.

Here are 5 of the comics I drew and wrote. The comic strip halted as I started to dry up in ideas from the Cousin Opie perspective. Remember he’s not my creation. Still we had some laughs and below are some of them.

Update: With the resolution it can be hard to read the cartoons. Click on each image to enlarge.

 

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What Would Happen if the Tea Party Becomes a Real Political Party

Posted on 23 February 2011 by Larry Russwurm

I know there seems to be more animosity between the Tea Partiers and the leftish Republicans. It’s only a matter of time before Tea Partiers join with the Democrats to outvote the normal Republicans. So it would seem inevitable that Tea Partiers will form a new party.

Firstly the new Tea Party wouldn’t just draw voters from the Republican Party. Some voters might go “Ooh, shiny and new,” and come over from the fold of the Democrats. But that’s great, right wingers would say, more conservative voters.

But what they wouldn’t expect is the Canadian experience. Canada has 3 main parties (and the Bloc which only operates in Quebec and doesn’t necessarily support right or left objectives). Of the three main parties, 2 are leftish and one is right wing. Combined the 2 leftish parties get more votes than the right wing. But the right wing gets more total votes than any of the other two parties. So in our three party system, the right wing gets to form the government.

I predict the same thing will happen in the United States if the Tea Party becomes the third party. Only in the case of the U.S., the two right wing parties will lose to the left wing Democrats in the first past the post system.

So what will this lead to? I’ve gotten out my crystal ball to look far into the future. I see the left winning election after election in the United States. In about 100 years, the left will have almost run out of other left wing things to try and will resort to anarchy, the abolition of all government.

Meanwhile in Canada, the right wing will have won election after election and will have almost run out of things to try. So fascism will triumph. With a strong fascist army, Canada will invade the defenceless U.S.

But in order to retain its hold on the U.S., Canada will have to hold free elections. With three right wing parties and three left wing parties and the Bloc the vote could go either way. So past this political singularity, I cannot see any further into the future. Oh to be there in 2111, those will be heady times.

Or maybe Canada and the U.S. will abandon their first past the post political systems. Still that seems less likely than the 2111 political singularity. Imagine, bowing to the will of the people…

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It’s True That Men Can’t Give Birth

Posted on 19 February 2011 by Larry Russwurm

It is true that men can’t give birth. It’s been the topic of whiny self examination before and I expect it to rear it’s head in the future, too. Women tell us we just can’t understand. We men nod our heads, obediently hiding our true thoughts.

Those true thoughts are of large, dense fecal forms which we sometimes pass when we are on the throne. Women have naysayed such a comparison, explaining that they have passed those same fecal forms and it is nothing like giving birth.

Do women truly know what they speak of? It could just be a play to make us have more sympathy for women.

Some of the men agreeing with me have gone through Lamaze classes and coached, supported and been beside their wives through the whole birth process.

And when these men were passing that rare massive turd, I have reason to believe they were thinking about those Lamaze classes. How to breath and other pain lessening approaches aided them in their own time of need.

Even though defecating is considered the ultimate private activity, I think great need creates great exception. Those husbands wouldn’t mind having their wives by their side, coaching and supporting them just as they coached their wives through child birth. .

And finally, after safe passage has occurred, do not all men turn around and look at their creation? Society (and cleanliness) prevents us from admiring and, say, measuring our creations.

It is with a heavy heart that we reach for the flush lever. All the while thinking of that old joke: “What’s the difference between the leader and a toilet full of $#!+”? The answer of course is, “the toilet”.

Our creation had so much potential, we men think as we flush the toilet. Finally all traces of our creation are gone. Except for maybe a lingering smell. The only thing allowing us men to get on with our day is knowing that tomorrow we will make another creation.

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Repurposing Some Racist Jokes

Posted on 17 February 2011 by Larry Russwurm

I am not saying for one minute that all racist jokes should be repurposed. I don’t think that it’s even possible for some jokes. The ones that I’m talking about are the straight up insults. The ones that have nothing to do with actual differences in peoples or even stereotypes of said peoples.

The first inkling that something could be done started with someone I know bemoaning the loss of culture with the onset of political correctness. I know for sure that this person knew a boatload of racist jokes that were even then no longer tolerated by society. My first instinct was ‘tough, deal with this loss and don’t come crying to me’. But many years later I realized that the straight up insult jokes could easily be repurposed.

But wait, you might say, insult jokes mean someone has to still be the butt of the joke. That’s right. Having spent some time doing political cartoons, the choice of the new butt of the jokes was easy for me. How about ‘the leader’?

So now we can ask, “What’s the difference between Stephen Harper and a pail of excrement?” If someone were to answer “The pail!” we would have no choice but to agree.

Or maybe for over the internet when everyone is not sure who everyone else’s leader is (Stephen Harper is Canada’s prime minister), we can just straight up say ‘the leader’.

“A plane is flying over the Atlantic but unfortunately the fuel is leaking and it can’t make it to shore with all aboard. On board are a French man, an American, a Canadian and the Canadian leader. Suddenly the Frenchman goes to the door and says “I do this for my country!” and jumps out the door.

“The others are relieved temporarily but with some recalculation they figure the plane is still too heavy. So the American (perhaps inspired by the French man) goes to the door and says “I do this for my country!” and jumps out.

“Recalculation says that one more person needs to jump to lighten the load. So the Canadian says “I do this for my country!” and pushes out the Canadian leader.”

Now some may question my timing, especially in the United States, because the leader of that country is black, so it might look like I’m trying to sully his name with insult humour that was formerly only associated with racists.

But Barack Obama is half white. In fact he is part of an unbroken string of white men that have ruled the United States since George Washington.

That’s right. We might eventually be in for “the first black president part II”. Just saying. It’s still a victory to get someone of mixed race into the highest offices of power.

Hate my repurposing of jokes? Approve of making ‘the leader’ the butt of jokes? Discuss.

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The Longest Street in the World

Posted on 15 February 2011 by Larry Russwurm

When I was very young, a kid really, the city of Toronto had a bit of an inferiority complex. It was only the second biggest city in Canada and didn’t have as many things to draw people from far away. In fact it was world class in only one way that I knew about – it had the billing of containing the longest street in the world, it’s main street, Yonge Street.

Now I grew up a 100 kilometres away so I didn’t really know Toronto all that well as a kid. So I took this as a straight fact and never challenged anything about this record. And in fact, others didn’t either and for some years the billing of longest street in the world was contained in the Guinness book of World Records.

But Toronto grew from this one thing of note. Toronto built the CN Tower which was for many years the largest free standing structure in the world. This put Toronto on the world stage. It also gave Toronto an iconic skyline as seen from Lake Ontario.

Then a decade and a half later Toronto became home to the first retractable roof stadium, the Sky Dome. I refuse to use it’s modern name because the stadium was sold to a telecommunications behemoth for a price that I think should only give the company naming rights – not the whole stadium.

And Toronto got rid of its ‘second city’ title. An English rights backlash in French speaking Montreal made many people move from that larger city to Toronto. So Toronto eventually surpassed Montreal and to this very day is the largest city in Canada.

I even lived in Toronto for some years. Enough to know that streets are longer east to west in the official city of Toronto than the north and south of Yonge Street. Yonge St. continues through suburbs. It’s built up for many kilometres north of the city.

Suspecting a fake recently, I looked up how long the supposed longest street in the world is and found it is 1 896 kilometres. The build up north of Toronto is only a tiny fraction of that length. So the road becomes a between towns highway. Yes for 1 896 kilometres. Yet my Webster’s New World Dictionary defines a street as: a public road in a city or town, esp. a paved one.

So now I see that to get a World’s Record all one has to do is play fast and loose with official definitions. There are other word names for roads we can use. Kitchener-Waterloo’s (the city I live in) Conestoga Parkway could now be called the world’s biggest Crescent. Another Ontario highway, Highway 6 in the Bruce Peninsula could be called the world’s biggest Cul-de-sac . Some Quebec highway could be called the longest Rue in the world.

The rest of the country likes to take digs at Toronto. This time I feel it’s deserved. Perhaps we can rename the Trans Canada Highway into Trans Canada Street. It would be a much longer street than Yonge Street. And the best part? It doesn’t go near Toronto.

Nice lie you tried to spread to the world, Toronto. But it’s time to let this one go.

Posted in Geography, History, Politics, Wee Bit O' Humour | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Two Thoughts II

Posted on 12 February 2011 by Larry Russwurm

I’m sick to death with governmental misdirection in the recession.

In order to trumpet job creation, government leaders sometimes fail to mention that some jobs created are part time. They love to give the stat of how many total jobs they’ve created.

And, in Canada at least, many temporary employments were started in the construction industry. This was because it was decided to help employment by building infrastructure. So the one or two year jobs created are not differentiated from private sector jobs. It’s now quite well known that you can’t expect to work for an employer your whole life. Still 20 years is not out of line to expect from private sector jobs. Still the government equates the 20 year job with the one or two year construction gig.

And gig, I think, is the ultimate goal of government. As the son of country musicians I know that my dad would go looking for jobs every once in a while. Each playing date – lasting only so many hours – he called a job. So be suspicious next recession when the government talks about creating more jobs than the nation has people. They’re just gigs that are a few hours long.

In winter, the best hand covering is a mitten. However many of the more vain of us, or the more practical, who want to use their fingers in winter, use gloves.

The base of the hand has enough warmth to keep the whole hand warm in a mitten. In gloves, the base of the hand is separate, and the fingers cool much faster. The pinkies are the first to cool.

So what I’ve done with gloves is retracted my pinkies from the pinkie fingers of the gloves. There, my pinkies are rewarmed by the base of the hand.

So my hands are straight except for the curled up pinkie fingers. Now correct me if I’m wrong but isn’t this the opposite of curling up your fingers to grab a dainty cup while leaving your pinkie to remain straight.

Isn’t this dainty cup holding thing seen as being a bit effeminate? So wouldn’t that mean that what I do in my gloves is super masculine? Take that all you people in nicer climates. I may freeze this time of year but I am more masculine.

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Mmmm War

Posted on 10 February 2011 by Larry Russwurm

I’m still on my Amundsen kick. This time it’s the fascination with the way he made Antarctic expeditions more efficient by using sled dogs to pull the supplies and as the supplies were used, ate some of the sled dogs who no longer had sleds to pull.

Perhaps we could make another aspect of society more efficient. That’s right, I’m talking about war. Those with weak stomachs, do not continue reading this post.

Let’s say you’re a commander along the front lines. Those under your command have come at you with two problems. One said “The P.O.W.’s won’t talk.” The other warned, “Our supply lines have been cut.”

Perhaps both problems can be solved with – you guessed it – cannibalism. You now have food for your troops and a scary fate for those who refuse to talk.

Perhaps this efficient new way to war would cause more post traumatic stress. But then again the horrible ‘smell of charred flesh’ might become a positive instead of a negative. Perhaps it now becomes the signal of a soon to come meal.

But what about those pitched battles where there are more dead bodies than can be consumed? Well supply lines can work two ways. Why can’t the front feed the homeland? “Help the war effort and eat meat” could be a slogan.

So there you have it, it took 99 posts for this site to digress to rationalizing cannibalism. Who had 99 in the pool?

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A Dog’s Life and Lies We Tell Ourselves

Posted on 8 February 2011 by Larry Russwurm

In the news recently was a sled dog “cull”. It happened in B.C. after the Vancouver Olympics. There was supposed to be a boom in business for sled dog adventures after the Olympics, but of course there was none. So 100 sled dogs were shot or stabbed and then buried.

It’s quite a gruesome story so I hesitate to link to one of the news articles. Here’s an abbreviated article that doesn’t get into details.

My last post was partly about the Amundsen expedition which successfully reached the South Pole. I found out the gruesome fact that one of the reasons for its success is that in order to have fewer supplies to pull, they ‘efficiently’ killed some of the sled dogs and ate them.

And of course there are stories about dogs being eaten in China. Apparently this is true and other Asian neighbours of China also eat dogs. As well Amundsen quite possibly got the idea of sledding with and eating dogs from Eskimos. These most northerly of people will eat dogs if necessary for survival.

So what does this say, besides the idea that a dog’s life is generally considered to be of low value?

With modern western ethics, I’m thinking that the cull of dogs is the least immoral of the three stories. Amundsen ate dogs that had served him. But Amundsen had the excuse of survival being at stake. The Asians that eat dogs largely live comfortable lives and could easily switch to more conventional meat animals.

So I’m of the mind that eating dogs is worse than just killing them.

But what do we tell ourselves about our usual meat animals?

We say that using all of the animal makes the death worthwhile. In other words it is more respectful to eat a cow after killing it. It is even more respectful to skin it and use it’s hide as leather. It is most respectful to use all its parts and not waste a thing.

Huh? It looks like the general morality of our culture reaches a contradiction. How long can we hide behind the “that’s a cow” and “that’s a dog” hypocrisy of our nice modern western ethics toward animals.

As well, there is the “fur is murder” tactics of some fringe groups, members of which might use leather. Maybe they’re thinking that at least they used the whole cow. Yet they don’t see that seal meat is eaten in parts of Canada, too, making the whole of that animal used.

I think it all comes down to cuteness. Dogs are generally considered cute, cows are not. Harp seals are getting to the status of being cute.

So as a modern day western ethicist, I say never eat the cute. In fact the cute might as well live a full life. Cows, pigs and chickens on the other hand…

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The Amundsen Observatory

Posted on 5 February 2011 by Larry Russwurm

We all know what lies at the North Pole. Just mentioning it probably brings up images of a red and white barber pole with a triangular banner bearing the words ‘North Pole’. And of course in the near vicinity lives Santa and his elf settlement at this distant outpost.

Perhaps in 50 plus years, global warming will thin the ice up there enough so water finally pokes through and the whole paradigm up there might need changing.

But there is a more solid pole. Even if you melted the snow and ice of the South Pole, you’d have ground to to firmly plant your feet on. Finally Roald Amundsen’s expedition arrived to the South Pole almost 100 years ago, on December 14, 1911.

All that was reported there was snow and ice. Amundsen left a tent and a letter there in case he never made it back to civilization.

So there isn’t a red and white barber pole saying South Pole on a triangular banner in Antarctica. In those harsh elements I bet the tent and letter are long gone. Perhaps modern man should leave a permanent plaque to this victory in exploration.

Still, a simple plaque is hardly going to increase interest for the South Pole. Perhaps we could make a station there, maybe Amundsen Station.

But I have a better idea. How about a science station, nay an observatory to peer at the heavens. You see, the South Pole has an advantage over every part of the world except the North Pole. And as discussed previously, the North Pole might be underwater in 50 years. So the South Pole is the place.

Below, in the foreground, is a picture of a Dobsonian mounted telescope (thank you KW Telescope). The mount is what allows the telescope to point anywhere. The Dobsonian mount is free to rotate at its bottom. Just above the keypad thing is the other rotator. This rotator allows the telescope to move from horizontal to pointing straight up and every position in between. With these two pivots, the telescope can point anywhere at all in the sky.

All the other telescopes in the background use the more complex German Equatorial Mount. It’s more complex and involves counterweights. Such mounts are way more bulky and usually have smaller actual telescopes. So why use equatorial mounts?

A simple motor that makes the telescope turn 360 degrees in one day can be set up on such a telescope mount. You need this to counter the Earth’s rotation which moves the stars. It takes two motors to set something similar up on a Dobsonian. And the motors have to be adjustable and complexly programmed to follow a star.

This happens everywhere – except the South Pole. At the South Pole a Dobsonian mounted telescope can be powered by one motor that turns the telescope 360 degrees in one day. Perhaps a more massive telescope could be set up at the South Pole because of the simplicity of the Dobsonian mount’s design.

Of course the Amundsen Observatory at the South Pole would be useless half of the year. But during the half of the year it did work, it could run 24 hours.

So when pondering a tribute to Amundsen, at least think of a Dobsonian mounted telescope.

Update March 29, 2014: Apparently the south pole is lousy with telescopes. It’s not just the simple mount but it’s good viewing as well. I don’t know how long these observatories have been down there but I expect for a few years so I was already out of date when I posted this.

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