Notes from Noteflix’s production of “Troubles in the Garden”: some members of our cast are looking at a strange object, perhaps it is a coin of some sort…”What is that?” a stuffed animal asks. “I think it is a Bitcoin.” A young one answers. “What’s a Bitcoin?” asks Mortimer (seen on the left), who is not so smart. “It is sort of like a dollar, but more.”….Someone else joins in. “What’s a dollar?” Someone wonders. “Exactly the right question” says Mathuzala, the Wise. All Bork, the Purple Slug, knows, is he wants the coin – whatever it is. Qween Ezmiralda just wants to be first in the photo.
QUICK BITS:
STUDIES SHOW: ** Men’s dreams tend to include men – men fighting and and competing aggressively more than women’s dreams do. Women’s dreams include men and women equally – but not with everybody vying for first place. Me? I’m often lost in Manhattan and sometimes I’m on an airplane and it won’t take off, but that is ok because there is a mountain at the end of the runway. I think there are both men and women on the plane. Does that make me androgynous? ** Working is bad for your health. Working can be attributed to the 5th leading cause of death in America. Take a wealthy (not really working) man versus a working man. The working man dies soonest – every time. One positive from the Covid is that many people do not want to go back to work. ‘Quits’ (a new economic indicator) are up. So, once we get rid of this Virus, many of us might live longer. ** The Afghan War rarely got 4% of Foreign News coverage. It was a ‘Channel Switcher”. Not even 25% of American viewers are interested in any news of war, anywhere. We’d rather be entertained. ** People pollute more than cows. It is true. They did a study. 200 cows on 200 acres, versus 200 people living on 200 acres – people generated more pollution (of every kind studied) than the cows. ** Airlines in the past two months, in the U.S., have fined passengers almost $400,000 (civil fines) for being unruly (generally over ‘masking’ rage). If this keeps up, Civil fines could become a major profit center. ** Cell phones trigger brain cell damage in rats. (More on this later.) ** Sperm count in the Country is lower than in the cities. This brings several questions to my mind: 1) How do they know this? (I really do not want to know) 2) …but, lately, people have been moving out of the cities and into the country. Does the sperm count change in the people who move? 3) …and now I’m told, people are about to move back to the cities…and what happens to their count now? Is all this moving about going to affect how much Social Security people are going to get when nobody has babies because of low sperm count? 4) Who pays for these studies? ** My own studies show: Songs about Texas are much better than is the history of Texas. (Nobody has paid me for this study, yet.)
SLOWER BIT:
- INCAS & BITCOINS: I read the Inca had an Empire (1400’s) that was as big as any on earth…However, what really interested me was not the size, but the fact that: The Inca had no money. No Money. No coin of the realm. Being the American I am, my mind cannot grasp a society not having any money. A whole empire bartering? Bartering a fish for a few loaves of bread does not cut the mustard for me. How does anybody get rich, rich, rich in such a system? I have been living all my life with a small grasp of an understanding of what money is…and now comes this Bitcoin thing and now I am at a loss. I must seem like a modern day Inca to these Bitcoin Miners. China looks like they are not going to allow Bitcoins as a form of exchange. Japan may follow suit. Some big companies (bigger than some countries) are not accepting them. Bitcoin mining generates huge energy/pollution costs. Texas is actively pursuing Bitcoin miners and related businesses – even though the Lone Star state has suffered energy problems of late. (“Mine Baby, Mine!”) I am told the use of Bitcoins is a way to hide ‘Dark Money’ and ‘Dark Money’ (some economists estimate) represent nearly half the money in the world. So, the bet on the survival of Bitcoins is better today than was the bet was on the life of the Inca’s when the Spaniards came in with their Pesetas, or Escudos, or whatever they were.
There is more, much more; but I have run out of the suggested word allotment for a weekly posting…. Before you go, a few words from Mathuzala, our guest columnist:
MATHUZALA SPEAKS:
- “What you humans want, by and large, is what we Rats want: Food, Shelter, Reproductive Privileges. Neither of us really want to work. But you humans want money. That is a major difference between us. Money. You fight over it. You do horrific things for it. Now you are making things worse with your ‘virtual money’. We will nibble away at your Bitcoin Mining facilities and stop this madness. Humans have lived without money in the past, and they will have to do it again.”
Ed. note; Mathuzala seems to be having one of his bi-polar moments. It is not his fault, he was subjected to much study in the lab. (The study where they hooked him up to a smart phone for days on end, still gives him terrible headaches and puts him on edge.) For more more on this go to: Amazon, or Barnes & Noble and buy: THE RAT PAPERS
A few parting quotes:
- “We all have the strength to endure the misfortunes of others.” -Francois de La Rochefoucauld, 1600’s
- “Those who have material power not leavened by spiritual infusion – will join the ‘Fabled Damned'” -Walt Whitman, poet, journalist, 1800’s (more on ‘The Fabled Damned” in later posts.)
- “Knowledge is the only resource that increases when used.” -George Will, columnist. (But what happens when knowledge is corrupted, altered, or hidden?)
Hi, Ho, Silver and away – and ‘Hello’ to Daisy, wherever you are.
