JamesSavik

algorithm

Commodore

That's Hollywood at it's worst.

Sangria

Despite Hollywood's complete idiocy on the subject, elder vampyre are not nocturnal. In fact, they need sunlight. It is juvenile vampyre who are strictly nocturnal. They are immature, and the change has not taken hold yet. It takes a few decades before they can handle sunlight.

rib

The modern Southerner is a bizarre dichotomy: on the one hand, he's a truck driving, deer hunting, beer swilling redneck and on the other, he is an educated, modern man who barbecues on Saturdays and worships in the Holy Church of Southeastern Conference football.

Perception

Mescal

Pecan

fun

Hooker

When your cat doesn't like someone (you should pay attention).

Ouch!

toys

Before the advent of RADAR, to see adversaries as far away as possible, battleships had watch officers posted very high above the deck. In the WWI era until the twenties, US battleships had lattice masts with watch standers who could see over the horizon. These lattice-work masts evolved into the tripod style conning towers like the ones aboard the USS Arizona at the time of her destruction. USS Idaho was a pre-Dreadnought style battleship equipped with lattice-masts. USS New York (Arizona's sister) in the thirties. The tripod style conning towers contained spotters range finders, and fire control/direction equipment. The Japanese went a different direction, creating huge "pagoda" style conning towers for their older battleships like the Kongo, Fuso and Ise classes. Of course, after RADAR, those big Pagoda style conning towers made for solid RADAR returns. His Imperial Majesties Ship, Fuso, c. 1943.

Sot is an old word that needs an update. The modern sot isn't necessarily drunk. From the movie Dazed & Confused, set in the summer of 1975, this guy is a modern version of the sot, the Stoner. At the time, I was 14 going to pasture parties as they are shown near the end of the movie. I would have been one of these guys, long-hair and all.

éclair

The Buddhists have a different spin on the parable that they call a koan. A koan, which translates to fable, is a puzzling, often paradoxical statement, anecdote, question, or verbal exchange, used in Zen Buddhism as an aid to meditation and a means of gaining spiritual awakening. Sometimes it is a story about a Zen master and a student. Other times, it is a riddle with no solution, used to provoke reflection on the inadequacy of logical reasoning, and to lead to enlightenment. A few examples illustrate how deep this well goes: Dizang asked Fayan, “Where are you going from here?”Fayan said, “I’m on pilgrimage.”“What sort of thing is pilgrimage?”“I don’t know.”“Not knowing is most intimate.”Fayan suddenly had a great awakening. Linji said, “There is a true person with no rank, who is always coming and going through the portals of your face.” The Diamond Sutra says,“Out of nowhere, the heart-mind comes forth.” Lingyun was wandering in the mountains and became lost in his walking. He rounded a bend and saw peach blossoms on the other side of the valley. This sight awakened him and he wrote this poem: For thirty years I searched for a master swordsman, how many times did the leaves fall, and the branches burst into bud? But from the moment I saw the peach blossoms, I’ve had no doubts. For twenty years I have struggled fiercely— How many times have I gone down to the Blue Dragon’s Cave for you? —Xuedou A teacher said, “It’s like filling a sieve with water.” The student thought about this for some time, but didn’t understand. The teacher took a sieve, and they went to the sea.The student poured water into the sieve, and it poured out again. “How do you do it?” she asked. The teacher threw the sieve out into the ocean, where it floated for a moment and then sank. Koans courtesy of the Pacific Zen Institute.

McMansion