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Alternative flora
Spartina alterniflora, a plant native to America's east coast, has invaded America's Pacific Northwest coast, and nearly everybody says that's bad.
And so Washington state and the U.S. government have spent millions to eradicate it. Not everyone's happy about the method, however: poison.
But how likely would manual labor eradicate the grass? Anti-establishment environmentalist notions, such as appear in The Seattle Press, don't strike me as much more than risible.
The Ad Hoc Coalition still practices and promotes non-chemical Spartina control. Purchasing Spartina art and craft work supports grassroots efforts to keep pesticides out of Willapa Bay.
Spartina art and craft selling as a solution?!? Well, perhaps paying Wetbacks to get wet and muddy in Willapa Bay would make more sense than spraying. I don't know. The scientists in charge of the current spraying program seem to be pretty confident. But time will tell.
For more links, see my poem about spartina on Instead of a Blog.
Designations | August 4, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala
Lapp harp?
I am very fond of the Finnish versions of the psaltery, known as the kantele. The instrument has strings stretched over a wooden box. They are plucked, which is what distinguishes psalteries from dulcimers. You'll find them in many shapes and sizes, ranging from pentatonic five and six-stringed instruments to complex chromatic ones.
Most musicians play the psaltery on a table, or — even more rustically — on one's legs, when sitting, hence the alternative name of lap harp. Though fans of the Finnish version might confuse this with Lapp harp, there seems to be no warrant for the confusion, other than a decidedly unwelcome pun.
In my neck of the woods, Wilho Saari and his family are the musicians to hear. His son-in-law, Greg, has built and sold quite a few of the smaller kanteles, and these are quite lovely to play. (Alas, he has no Web page. Yet.)
Now, I've this idea to improve the design of the kantele, making it easier to play chords (though demanding a completely different style of playing melody). I haven't built my superior design yet, but I hope to soon.
So I'm on the lookout for all things psalterian. Imagine my surprise when I found a cheap lap harp available from First Act! I bought the thing for under $20, tuned it to the acoustic scale, and have been playing decidedly non-Finnish music for the past several days. The thing doesn't have beauty of sound. And it doesn't stay in tune well. So, if you are looking for a good kantele, look elsewhere. But hey: under $20 is a pretty good price for a wooden psaltery. And the online help (and the cards-for-musical-illiterates) are first rate.
Designations | August 5, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala
Doofi
By political, if not Hollywood, standards, John Kerry and John Edwards are handsome men. So why, on their website's splash page, do they come off as doofuses? Doofi?
Edwards is grinning like a sunburnt idiot. Kerry is lamely imitating . . . Richard Nixon? A man less comfortable with relating to the people with standard, cheerleading moves can hardly be imagined. He looks as comfortable as George W. Bush does when having to speak a written sentence longer than two clauses.
Well, maybe the picture is there to make us not-so-good-looking folks more at ease.
If that's the case, Edwards has nearly succeeded. But Kerry? He just shouldn't be made to pose in those ways. You know, normal ways. He's obviously more comfortable with pomposity.
Designations | August 7, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala
Economics IQ?
For the second time I followed a link to an online IQ test. And, since it was hot in my office, and I could barely think to do creative work, I took the test.
The last time I took it the service called me a Visual Logician. This time I was labelled with something more understandable:
Your Intellectual Type is Visionary Philosopher. This means you are highly intelligent and have a powerful mix of skills and insight that can be applied in a variety of different ways. Like Plato, your exceptional math and verbal skills make you very adept at explaining things to others — and at anticipating and predicting patterns.
Well, let me just say that anyone who says I have exceptional math skills has another thin' coming . . .
But mostly I noticed how so many of the puzzles rested on unspecified assumptions. Consider question 21:
Ten people can paint 60 houses in 120 days, so five people can paint 30 houses in:
15 days
30 days
60 days
120 days
This is a simple math problem. But as an economics problem, it is unduly vague. If ten people working separately on different houses can paint a total of 60 houses . . . that's how it should read. For if the people are working together, increasing or diminishing returns, and the Ricardo Effect, and numerous other factors can take this simple problem and make it much more difficult to answer.
There were no economics questions on the IQ test. This is no surprise, for the writers of the test seem unaware that how people work — in cooperation or separately — can make a difference, and change the answers dramatically.
Oh, and as for my IQ number? I'm not telling, but it is disappointingly under 200. But I'll just say I would have finished the test a lot quicker 25 years ago, and been just as accurate. And today I might have finished it quicker, too, were my office 25 degrees cooler.
Designations | August 8, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala
Alien vs. Predator
Today on IMDb, this was the burning question:
Today's IMDb Poll Question Is:
In last week's poll regarding who would win in Alien Vs. Predator (opening this Friday), you said Predator would come out on top. That said, who would you like to see Predator take on next? (vote)
Well, I can't imagine a more pointless film than Alien vs. Predator, and have no intention of watching it. I don't care who would win. And IMDb's list of potential enemies for the dread and dreded Predator is utterly uninspired:
- Freddy
- Jason
- Wolverine
- Spider-Man
- Doc Ock
- The Scorpion King
- Van Helsing
- Lord Voldemort (shhh!)
- The Hulk
- Hellboy
- Neo
- Saruman
- The Bride from Kill Bill
- The Creeper from Jeepers Creepers
- Samara from The Ring
- Other
Here is my shorter offering:
- the auteur who wrote and directed the film
- the producers who produced it
- the studio suits who greenlighted the project
- the audience members who go to see it
Why not add the marketing department? Well, the film's tagline — usually, I'm told, the marketing department's work product — really puts the film in its place: Whoever wins . . . we lose. Exactly.
Designations | August 10, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala
Outed on Ordinal Sin
A gentleman outs himself, and I complain not about his corrupt administration, or his sexuality, but his math:
I do not believe that God tortures any person simply for its own sake. I believe that God enables all things to work for the greater good. And this, the 47th year of my life, is arguably too late to have this discussion. But it is here, and it is now. [emphasis added]
See the error? Here's the poop on soon-to-be-former Governor McGreevey:
Governor James E. McGreevey of New Jersey
Birth Date: August 6, 1957
Birth State: New Jersey
Family: married; two children
Spouse: Dina Matos McGreevey
Party: Democrat
He not only outs himself as gay, he reveals himself unable to do elementary math — or at least understand ordinals. If one turns 47, one embarks upon one's 48th (not 47th) year of life.
Perhaps this is nitpicky. But really, people should learn the logic of ordinals, especially since ordinals actually matter in axiology in economics and ethics, whereas cardinals are often a hindrance. And it's not as if we are utterly unfamiliar with ordinals. Children are usually pretty cognizant of pecking order, and can rattle off first, second, third . . . It may not be the first math people learn, but it is probably the first math people forget. First ordinals, then the quadratic equation!
Designations | August 12, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala
Not So Intelligent
In all of the recent talk about improving America's intelligence gathering and intelligence analysis, one issue rarely comes up: none of this talk has much to do with intelligence.
To refer to the information and misinformation and disinformation that governments gather as intelligence is to accept one in-group's short-hand term of art. What intelligence is to a spy is not intelligence to a psychologist or a teacher. Or pretty much anyone else.
It always amazes me how easy it is for people to get caught up in a trendy term. Intelligence is the trendy term of the day. In government's secretive information-gathering agencies this usage of the term is very old. It seems to be associated with an archaic meaning of the word intelligence, defining the word as — get this — news and information.
Why let the CIA and the NSA and all the rest keep alive this archaism? Nowadays, intelligence means smarts, a word of praise. And I see no reason to praise — even inadvertently — the CIA and the NSA et al., not after 9/11/01. They were proven, well, a bit stupid.
I suppose information gathering may have something to do with smarts, with the speed and processing power with which information is stored, retrieved, and made relevant to plans. But not a lot. No more than finding the perfect word (writer) or the perfect house (ReMax agent). There's no more justification for calling a CIA operative an intelligence agent than calling a RE/MAX agent an intelligence agent ? What the many government intelligence agencies handle is not intelligence, it's data. And not all of it is true or relevant data, not by a long shot.
Let's stick to the common definition of intelligence, making so-called intelligence people prove their smarts. How? Not only by providing accurate information, but also by providing a reasonable weighting to that information, a prioritization of information so that the most important stuff gets to where it needs to go.
This may seem nitpicky. I know. But consider: the current usage allows for such bizarre oxymorons as The George Bush Center for Intelligence. Were we to spread that lenience more broadly, other past presidents will be allowed special honors, and we could expect The Abraham Lincoln Center for Peaceful Secession, The FDR Institution for Strict Constitutional Construction, and The Bill Clinton Institute for The Bill Clinton Institute for Zipped-Up Pants.
Designations | August 15, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala | ThinkingMatters
Isn't She a Little Young?
Go to a bar in Virginia, and you're apt to see a special coaster: Isn't she a little young? Odd thing is, there's no picture on the coaster. Pictured here you will see a bartender holding up the coaster. No, she isn't young. Not by a longshot.
How effective could this anti-statutory rape campaign be? Without the pictures, it seems just weird. With pictures, it would seem like porn.
This reminds me, alas, of a joke a Virginian I once knew told me. What's the definition of a virgin in Virginia? A guy who can run faster than his sister.
Apparently, today's Virginia girls who become sexually active at an early age go after older men, not their brothers. Or perhaps their much-older brothers. (The statistics don't track this.) Grace Sparks, president of Planned Parenthood in Virgina, finds this shocking. I presume she means, by this, morally unsettling if only mildly surprising.
Designations | August 17, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala
Madman Muntz
I had neveer heard of Earl Madman Muntz until a few weeks ago, when I met the owners of a restored Muntz Jet at a freeway rest stop.
The Muntz Jet is, I think, the most beautiful car I've ever seen. At the very least, it's the most beautiful hotrod. This one, at the rest stop, was truly lovely to behold.
I don't know all that much about Muntz, the Muntz Jet's financial backer and prodcuer. I was pleased to learn that soon I'll be able to learn more: apparently there's a documentary being made about him. Oh, and here's a joke that mentions his name:
TV GUIDE HAS NAMED ANGIE DICKINSON, DAVID CASSIDY, LONI ANDERSON, DIANA RIGG AND FARAH FAWCETT AMONG THE HOTTEST TV STARS OF ALL TIME. Bringing up the rear at 364, 365 and 366 respectively were Chuck Barris, Mad Man Muntz and that Indian on the test pattern. (Bob Mills — FunnySideUp-subscribe@ListBot.com)
And I would be remiss not adding some links to this man who helped give us the 8-track tape player, cheap TVs, and the glorious Muntz Jet. After all, the man was something of a genius, an engineer who truly thought outside the box. (Read this and you'll agree: the cliché is justified.) He knew how to use tin snips, anyway.
Designations | August 19, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala
Art for My Sake
There's a fair amount of discussion, these days, of Highbrow vs. Middlebrow vs. Lowbrow culture — and of the new idea of nobrow culture. My take on this is personal. I don't support one brow over another. I support mybrow culture!
I always feel free to like what I like, dislike what I loathe. This attitude I've expressed in a motto, even: I may know a lot about art, but I still know what I like.
This summer I've seen some very interesting art, and even taken pictures of some of it. Here are a few samples; a few, if you click to a new window for the image, are much larger than appear on this page.
The wooden Indian statue on a private lawn overlooking Willapa Bay — that was quite exquisite, I thought.
Also quite wonderful, though nothing like the Indian, was the metalwork of Mylan Rakich. I saw this at an exhibit at the Butters Gallery in Portland, Oregon, and was very impressed. A friend accompanying me, my sister, and my aunt on this art jaunt thought his work looked like truck grills. Would that automotive art were as good as this!
Also at the Butters Gallery I saw this: a striking abstract, here in a snapshot from the side, making a trapezoid of the work. One of the pleasures of good abstract painting is that it pleases from many angles. I prefer to view representational art straight on. But abstracts? When worth it, this kind of art allows a critical reinterpretation at the very level of viewing itself. The artist's name is Stephanie Weber, and she manages to make some very elegant abstracts. This, Alluminaire Seres FF, was my favorite.
At the Quintana gallery down the street, the carvings of Aleut artist John Hoover were featured. This artist (or, more accurately, the gallery owner) wouldn't let me photograph his work, so I won't link to the gallery's site. (So there.) Still, I should say that I loved his carvings, and would like to own one of his birds — with the human face in the tummy.
Next door to the Quintana, at the Mark Woolley Gallery, I believe, was one stand-out painting, a painting of a face. Here's a cropped photo of it. I wish I knew the artist's name. (If you know, write me.)
Down the street, Portland itself offers art: public art. This is the kind of thing you expect: slabs of metal. I have no complaints. You can't have representations everywhere. Portlandia itself handles the city's requirement for great representational sculpture — more than handles it, since she's the world's second largest copper statue.
Designations | August 22, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala
Mugwumps, Ha!
Every Washington state voter I've talked to disapproves of their new primary system. For years they've had a blanket primary, and could vote for anyone they chose. For Senate, they could vote in the Republican primary; for President, Democratic. It substantially weakened the parties, of course. No wonder the parties objected.
Now Washington voters must choose a party in the primary, and vote the straight ticket:
You see the artwork that the state sent to voters, explaining the new system. Voters get to choose ballots from one of the major parties — and according to the rules, the Libertarian Party qualifies — or a non-partisan ballot (for those issues and races that have no party affiliation affixed to them).
I've known Democrats and Libertarians to vote in the Republican Party primary, choosing, say, Pat Robertson. As they figured, sticking the Republicans with a risible figure was a good. But it did tend to corrupt the primaries.
Even now this is possible. Washington Republicans can still vote for Democratic politicians in, say, the presidential race, out of spite or malign strategy, so long as they foreswear voting for Republicans in other races. But the new system does discourage this kind of thing, and might make the party pre-selection process a little less chaotic.
Of course, having even more closed primaries with the parties paying for the ballot costs would be the better solution.
Designations | August 24, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala
No 'I' in 'Teemu'
I watched the opening pageantry of the Olympics, and have watched a few of the individual events. You know, events such as foot races and gymnastics. But I'm not interested in any team sport, and find the whole nationalistic pageantry of the modern Olympics a bit hard to take.
But, with a distant relative in the Olympics, my interest has sparked a bit above usual. Finland's Wild Man of the Javelin, Teemu Wirkkala, competes (or has competed) today. I'm working, so I'll miss it, alas. My interest in fellow Virkkalas is perhaps more a velleity than a preference.
I've always asked people why they should choose one team over another. Or one individual over another. The whole identification issue puzzles me, somewhat. Team allegiance especially appalls me, since traditional rivalries get ugly so quickly, and sporting events so readily leads to rioting. It is apparent that allegiance is Dionysian, not Apollonian. I always side with Apollo, and if one must trot out Dionysus on occasion, do so with a leash.
But now that a Virkkala/Wirkkala (Vs and Ws are the same, in Finland) is in the Olympics, my dormant ludic interests perk up. Ties of blood? Identification with a name, or place?
My father's family hails from Kaustinen. Teemu, I'm told, is from Toholampi. I've never set foot outside of North America. But I might find both places congenial: Kaustinen holds a well-known folk festival, and Toholampi hosts an Accordian Week. So far, though, I haven't found a map that shows Kaustinen, so don't know how long it would take to walk from one to another. Or travel by any less athletic means.
But why should I care about Teemu? There's no I in Teemu! No me. Well, I care in the same way I am interested in Finland and Finns in general: as a sort of lark. At least Teemu isn't a boring ol' American.
Designations | August 26, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala
A lapse
My sharpest regrets usually focus on things badly said. I hate looking like a blithering idiot. Perhaps one reason I'm critical of our current president is that I'm so often embarrassed by him, and even feel horribly sorry for him. He almost always talks like a dolt. I, who am acutely aware of doltishness within myself, thus do not wish to hear it in others. Of course, I rarely say things as idiotic as does America's president. But still I know enough not to go into a career in public speaking. Why didn't George W. Bush?
OK. Back to my situation. I am a writer. And with this fear of saying doltish or inelegant things so firmly embedded in my mind, you can easily guess that it also preys on my mind to write silly things, embarrassing things. And it does.
Now, normally I try to bury my bad writing, the prose with the worst lapses of taste or thought. But, in the spirit of public sharing, and in demonstration of fair play, I'll bring up a terrible bit of writing just to show you my humility. Today in an old email box I found the digital copy of a review I wrote years ago. Though the review contains some good stuff, and a few astute comments, it also contains a few corkers. Here's one:
But I confess, my pleasure in reading this book was not that of the awestruck acolyte; I did not feel that I had received the gospel truth. Indeed, as much of the book's value lies in its errors as in its successes, and disagreeing with Nelson is as much fun as agreeing with him.
So what's wrong with this paragraph? Well, it starts out fine, I guess: the awestruck acolyte bit fits nicely with the theme of the book under review. But the final sentence is badly written. It trivializes the subject and my attitude towards it. Really, fun is not the right word at all. It's a terrible word. The editor of this piece should have objected. Perhaps he did. Perhaps I convinced him to let me keep it in!
Scolding one's past self rarely satisfies. Revising one's past writings, on the other hand, is like slaking Hyksos thirst with the milk and honey of Palestine:
But I confess, my pleasure in reading this book was not that of the awestruck acolyte; I did not feel that I had received the gospel truth. Indeed, the book contains enough error to transform this reader into a rebel monk, erasing prose for a palimpsest, purloining quotes and scraps for some future treatise.
Then again, maybe some stylistic lapses should just stand (you can read the full review here). The basic point of the sentence was that aimed at by nearly every reviewer: trying to assert some dominance over the writer of the book under review. And in this instance I failed. Robert H. Nelson, author of Reaching for Heaven on Earth, came out of the ring wearing the gloves and raising his arms in triumph.
Designations | August 29, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala
Swear by this
I woke up in the middle of the night, wide awake. Brainstorm.
Well, no. Not based on the evidence of that storm: I decided that my new swear-phrase would be Omni-Perforated Ayatollah.
Why?
Omni equals all, I know: but think of it as wholly.
Perforated can be rendered holey.
And an Ayatollah is a holy man in what sect? Yes, you guessed it: Wholly Holey Holy Shiite, Batman!
Designations | August 30, 2004 | Wirkman Virkkala
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