An American Lion

This is where Norman Rogers practices the manly art of curation.

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The Frisky Mole Boy of Groton

Norman Rogers recounts the summer he spent hiding from the stern love of his father and living as the world-famous “frisky mole boy” in the Groton, Connecticut sewer system. The Frisky Mole Boy of Groton seduced the women of the town and solved crimes, all while subsisting on a steady diet of depravity and confusion.

Rampage of the Innocents is my unfinished but brilliant Historical Romance Novel (now, with more sex and violence for my teenaged readers)

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    An American Lion

    Entries in Animals (36)

    Tuesday
    Jul202010

    Never Let the Spiders Take Over the Bridge

    The Bridge of Der Admiral HassenpfefferI know exactly what this is like:

    Authorities in the U.S. territory of Guam have turned away a ship after thousands of spiders overflowed from its cargo.

    The Guam Department of Agriculture says hundreds of large spiders and thousands of smaller ones were seen when stevedores began offloading insulation and beams for housing units from the ship, the M.V. Altavia.

    The cargo was returned to the ship, and the Agriculture Department on Friday ordered that the ship not be allowed to dock. It was last ported in South Korea.

    Agriculture officials say they don't know what type of spiders were on the ship, but said it's a type that isn't normally found on the island. They said there was concern the spiders could damage Guam's environment.

    The ship was carrying housing units and accessories for a work force village expected to house up to 18,000 temporary workers.

    Spiders? Well, that's better than rats or beavers, I guess. I've fought infestations of both.

    The rat infestation of the Admiral Hassenpfeffer was fairly well understood to be a problem with the lower decks. The rats used the areas below the waterline to create their own miniature society, and they elected their own parliament. That allowed them to tax their rat constituents and build an armed assault force which attacked us on the night of April 18, 2009. I fought them off, spectacularly, of course, but they were able to seize the bridge for a few hours. We were isolated in the forward turret, unable to breathe in the closed confines, when, suddenly, I had an idea.

    My best ideas are snap decisions made under moderate duress. I sprang into action, grabbing a shotgun, a fishing net, and twenty feet of coiled rope. Peej followed me because I'm a leader, and Peej needs to be led, otherwise he comes up with ridiculous ideas like calling for help and using cheese to lure the rats away from the ship's controls.

    I had Miranda find some of the hairspray that Babs Worthington usually leaves on board--Aqua Net, of course. Once Miranda was able to fashion a flamethrower from the Aqua Net by practicing on the side of the lifeboat, we were ready for a counterattack.

    I kicked open the door to the bridge and saw rats teeming over everything. Resisting my first urge to blast them, because that would have blasted out the windows and the controls to the ship, I howled at them to get their attention and threw the net into their midst. They sat there, dumb little animals that they are, and some even started gnawing at the net. I laugh and yanked it back, pulling confused rats along with it. Once we had the net pulled back out onto the rear deck, Miranda doused it with flames and Peej kicked burning rats into the water.

    "One more time," I said, and everyone watched as I bravely bounded back up the stairs to the deck and threw the still-smoldering net onto the rats. I dragged a few dozen of them back down the stairs and we repeated our macabre dance with the evil bastards. One of them had gnawed on my laptop, creating several weeks of limited or no blogging, which at that time didn't really matter because I haven't ever even really started to blog yet. I sensed a general feeling of indignation from the rats, as if they were entitled to take over the vessel and do whatever they wished with it. We were vulnerable, after all. Miranda and Peej and I were the skeleton crew and we should never have ventured out of St. Thomas without more help on board, besides the men who worked in the engine room who usually just ignore us.

    I remember being excited and disgusted at the same time. It was hilarious fun to set rats on fire, but getting them out of my pantleg wasn't so much fun. They were crazy with fear, but managed to maintain unit discipline. Even with my net and my shattered nerves and my fierce kicking, it could very easily have gone the other way. In battle, you are always a moment away from the irresistible tide of defeat before the gnashing teeth of a primitive enemy.

    It didn't go their way because of the net, and this tactic seemed to be working. We dragged rats down to the main deck and set them on fire and then kicked them into the water. The wake of the vessel, which was traveling south-southwest at seven knots, was littered with little burning rats in the water. Inhumane? Absolutely. I do not care a fig for militant rats who have been charged with taking over my vessel.

    Now, common sense should tell you that we had to stop using the net once it burned up. We had a spare fishing net, but it was being used to hold stuffed animals over Miranda's bunk--stuffed animals dressed like members of the Cure, of course.

    I changed our tactics--I am a great leader, after all, and switching to balls of duct tape was practically the work of a genius. I would make a ball of duct tape on the end of a broom handle, grab up a few rats, and then Miranda would set them on fire while Peej looked on in horror.

    This went on for days until we cleared the ship. I've also fought off a small beaver infestation, but that was because we were tied up in fresh water for a while and I neglected to put out traps. That one was on me, not the beavers.

    Sunday
    Jun272010

    It's a Great Idea to Clean Up the Animals, But...

    Here's what I don't get.

    You find an animal--a wild animal--covered in oil, and you scrub it and clean it and save it.

    Wonderful. Kudos to you for braving the claws and the feathers and teeth and the fear of the animal.

    Then you have to let it go, preferably in an area where there isn't any oil.

    So, after you've gone through the trouble to clean one bird, or one turtle, or one duck--what's to stop the animal from getting all covered in oil again? It's not like the animal knows how to avoid the oil in the first place, right? Otherwise, why would you be cleaning it? The BP oil spill isn't a localized thing. It's everywhere. It's ongoing. Oil will continue to pump out of that hole for months, apparently. Months. So, even if you scrub up ducky and his pals, aren't they just going to get all gunked up with oil when they flit away and go somewhere a mile away and start trying to do whatever it is they do?

    I applaud the effort. I just wonder if it makes sense.

    Sunday
    Jun202010

    Goats Can Kill People, You Know

    My horns and fangs can kill!Even though my able assistant Peej is coming up empty today, with regards to finding me clear examples of how domestic goats have killed people, I'm certain that we will have a chance to prove this fact before too long.

    Why, you ask? Crazy stuff like this keeps coming up:

    A Study by University of Northern British Columbia professor Annie Booth, tracked the effectiveness and eating habits of a herd of goats over the span of two years in Prince George British Columbia.

    Turns out that goats are incredibly effective in clearing weeds;

    “As soon as we unloaded them, they turned around and started eating dandelions,” Booth said. “They do their job — which is clear up and clean out the weeds here.”

    “We were very pleased to discover that goats do provide a very effective form of weed control, particularly for some tricky weeds that are difficult to eradicate even with the use of herbicides.”

    While any farmer could have told you that this was the case, Booth’s study is the first that actually quantifies the lawn management skills of a heard of goats. Another important effect is the lessened environmental impact of the goats on the (munched) environment, unlike weed whackers and herbicides the surrounding area had very little in the way environmental impact. The only detrimental effect would be the fertiliser deposits that goats leave behind.  More a danger to shoes though, then the actual environment.

    Booth suggests that municipalities could save themselves some money, and manage their green spaces by leasing herds of goats during the summer months.

    Of course Booth isn’t the only one to have this idea, the University of Washington State has also had a heard of Goats running around its campus, In August of 2007 the University’s Integrated Pest Management program hired a herd of goats as an alternative to chemical processes.

    Yes, but are the herbicides actually dangerous? If so, then why aren't they banned?

    You see, "researchers" are always trying to find ways for us to stop using products that really aren't that dangerous. I hate to go all John Stossel on you, but, sometimes academic programs are funded by evil corporate interests that want to promote the use of goats and wipe out the herbicide industry (full disclosure, sure, some fellows from Monsanto came by and wrote me a check for $75 today--no big deal).

    Goats are a bad idea. Geese? You don't want those feathered poop machines anywhere near your property. News flash: shit goes right through them.

    Sheep? I can't really find a reason to complain about sheep because they are much safer than goats. Now, I don't want to alarm anyone, but animals that have horns tend to want to gore human beings. Hence, when you can employ an animal that doesn't have horns, run with that. When you travel through certain parts of Europe, you see herds of sheep used to reduce the amount of grass found near freeways and major highways. Cutting the grass with fuel-driven machines is expensive but sheep? Sheep herders will jump at that change to graze their animals on land that needs the vegetation reduced. How happy do you want the sheep herder lobby to be, though? Aren't they out to ruin America? Can we get Mr. Stossel to weigh in on that as well?

    Anyway, I know people are cheap and want to feel good about being superior to others when it comes to environmental solutions that really don't pan out because no one seems to understand basic animal husbandry, but this really isn't practical. If we really want to use goats to clear land, then that will mean that we need to have more goats. More goats equals more breeding farms supplying us with goats. More goat breeding farms, more animal waste runoff. More animal waste runoff means polluted lakes and rivers. What you are trading for here isn't equitable. More goats, more dirty watersheds. I love how the article gets cute and tries to say that more animal waste is more of a detriment to footwear than the environment. Hee hee! That's a good one. Now, pull your head out of your ass and wake up, sir: animal fecal material kills people dead. It is a tremendous problem

    Am I being hard on the poor fellows who want the grass on the quad behind the building no one goes to class in to be cut so they can play hacky-sack? Yes, there's less grass when the goats are let loose but then there is less photosynthesis happening as well. The stress of having massive goat breeding farms to supply the necessary goats for hacky sack field clearing overwhelms an environment stripped of grass to feed these eating and defecating machines that look harmless but can kill people (Peej? I need some statistics here). Arid deserts and filthy streams and an army of starving goats--is that a tear in your eye, Kemosabe? What the blankety-blank did you do to the environment with your crazy goat idea? Next time, think before you get excited about using animals to strip the world clean of grassy lawns and drinkable water. Jackass!

    Sunday
    Jun062010

    Jimmy Buffett Has the Right Idea

    Polluted BeachScrew the reality of the situation--there's money to be made here:

    The timing might be a bit off for tourists hoping to waste away in Margaritaville. But that doesn't bother Jimmy Buffett.

    The singer — whose tunes are as much a part of life in this beach town as fried grouper sandwiches, Land Shark beer and the U.S. Navy's Blue Angels — is planning to open a 162-room Margaritaville Hotel in a week.

    As tar balls came ashore Saturday from an oil plume shooting out of the floor of the Gulf of Mexico, Buffett said he had no plans to delay the opening.

    "This will pass," he said as walked along the city's beachfront and fishing pier with Fla. Gov. Charlie Crist.

    Curious beachgoers mobbed the duo in a frenzy rarely seen on the normally laid-back beach, snapping cell phone pictures and laughing as Crist and Buffett spent about an hour doing interviews and talking.

    That's the spirit. Always assume something will just "go away" and laugh and make plans to build something that no one really needs, which is just one more resort hotel on the Florida coast. Buffett promises jobs and everyone feels good about things. When dead animals are washing ashore, there will always be a job for the poor sap who has to bag them and burn them somewhere. The problem is, oil will continue to leak out of that hole in the ocean floor until someone can sink a few relief wells down near it and draw off the pressure of the oil that is escaping through the badly-situated funnel cap and valves.

    It will take nature a good long while to recover. Until then, I hope Mr. Buffett's hotel has a nice swimming pool laid out.

    Sunday
    May232010

    The Sad Truth About Why I Had to Leave New Hampshire

    Attacked by a rabid fox? Been there, done that.

    Now, having been attacked at least seven times that we know of, and possibly four other times when we didn't know if the animal was a fox-badger hybrid, a goose wearing a child's faux fur coat with a padded hoodie, a big kitty cat, or a mangy dog, I can tell you that it's no picnic getting the shots. I've had the series about as many times as you can safely have them, and I had the series while being treated for ingesting antifreeze--what a weekend that was.

    I am a firm believer in the concept of 'just desserts' when it comes to people who tease wild animals. If you torment the poor creature, it has the right, given under the Geneva Conventions, to rip you to pieces and eat your arm right in front of you. I do not tease animals.

    Animals tease me. There, I said it. In virtually all of the times in my life that I have been attacked by animals, I was being teased. I was being batted around or poked with a horn or followed through the ladies underwear section of Wal-Mart. I'm still an animal lover; I just don't like being teased, alright? I don't go looking for trouble--trouble swoops down or crawls out of the swamp and finds me. I avoid zoos, where possible. I don't even like to go into pet stores. I have all of this Alpha Wolf DNA floating through me, and enough testosterone emitting from my glands to drive any animal with a highly developed sense of smell crazy. God, when I'm around Shetland ponies, I can't even sit down without one trying to get into my lap and play with my hair.

    The State of New Hampshire, being covered with wild animals and irresponsible pet owners, turned out to be a place where I could not live. I couldn't go anywhere. I had to sleep in a hammock for a while, until we figured out that there was a hole in the foundation of the house. Maryland wasn't any better. At least, when we're on the water, the fish leave me alone.

    Let us never speak of this again.

    Friday
    Apr302010

    Dead Bodies Aren't the Same as Dead Birds

    I know that this will anger animal lovers out there, but I don't care.

    I'm an animal lover, but I happen to value people over animals. I know that makes me a monster, but there it is. If I was given a choice between running over a hippie, or running over a hippo, I'd run over the hippo and blame it on the hippie, who was probably on drugs anyway, the filthy bastard. I'm that kind of a humanitarian, you know.

    I think that animals are wonderful, but we have to value people more than animals, otherwise, what's the point? You can make this about ethics, religion, or whatever you've been believing lately in order to get cute girls to go home with you, but there is one aspect of this oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico that has been overlooked: the media does not understand the impact of the disaster, and our political discourse isn't helping, either.

    Oil is more important than animals. Yes, yes it is. 

    Did you spend any time outside in the Northeast over the past winter? It was harsh and unforgivable. Without oil, untold numbers of people would have been snowbound and starving for weeks; homes would have frozen over and we would have been looking at desperate anarchy. What did your dog do when the snow was piled a yard and a half high in front of your home? Did the dog shovel you out, drive to the supermarket, and get a bunch of juice boxes and DVDs for your howling, cabin-fever infected kids? The snowplow and the Hummer they all laughed at you for getting are what saved you, sir. Try running them on saltwater or rabbit pellets.

    You can survive with animals, especially pigs, chicken and horses, but you can't survive without oil because there aren't enough pigs, chicken and horses for every family. The media knows this, but they never tell you up front that these things should be put into perspective.

    To wit, you have this nonsense:

    Natural disasters provide great opportunities, or great peril, for presidents. President Bush’s slow response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005, magnified by his now-infamous “You’re doing a heck of a job, Brownie” praise of his FEMA director, Michael Brown, cemented an impression that his administration failed to act with enough urgency to address the suffering of tens of thousands of people.

    The widening environmental calamity in the gulf is the first time Mr. Obama has confronted a domestic disaster. Complicating the White House response is the fact that the spill occurred just a month after the president announced he was expanding offshore drilling.

    Officials note that a key difference between the spill and Hurricane Katrina is the pace of the onslaught of the disaster. While the hurricane hit the Gulf Coast in a fury, the oil has — literally — crept to the shores of the gulf. While the eventual harm from the leak could outstrip that of the Exxon Valdez accident in Alaska, that will not be known for weeks, if not months.

    To the people in the media, and, specifically, New York Times writer Helene Cooper, there really is no difference between thousands of drowned people and some dead birds, is there? I suppose we'll be treated to photos of animals carriers parked inside of a PetSmart store on the freeway outside of New Orleans now, won't we?

    You can criticize President Obama for a lot of things, but this is an environmental and economic disaster; thankfully, thousands of Americans haven't been abandoned to their fate and left to float in filthy water for days on end. Some perspective is needed here, and I am afraid we're not getting it from the media. What's the President--or any other politician--really supposed to do anyway? Shouldn't we focus on the incompetent culprits who work for the oil company (see my post below) and the lax laws regarding safety precautions now in effect?

    There are so many blind alleys to go down when it comes to this issue--be they race, economics, corporations versus people, that I believe it is time to evaluate priorities. First, stop the damage. Second, prevent it from happening elsewhere. Third, help the people who have had their livelihood affected by this disaster. At no point will the incessant coverage of the "horse race" over who looks bad or who died and what birds have oil deposits on their beaks solve anything. These are the same media people who, had this not happened, would be fussing about how the President isn't doing enough to promote offshore oil drilling.

    These are the same media people, in point of fact, who fail to understand that someone dead in the water is a far greater implication than some dead birds or fish. The reason why Hurricane Katrina looms so large in our consciousness is specifically because of the dead bodies floating in the water. This oil spill has nothing on that--nothing.

    I will say this--had the President stayed with his convictions, and had he done nothing to promote or expand offshore oil drilling, he'd be sitting pretty right now. Yes, the media wouldn't give him credit, but when do they ever celebrate a politician who does something so much smarter than they can comprehend?

    This is a President who can't resist the opportunity to offend or abandon his base. He's smart enough to know that he doesn't really need them to get re-elected. He's also smart enough to know that offshore drilling is never going to produce enough oil to help us get off foreign oil. If anything, it's a procedure that should be well-regulated and used to supplement existing supplies. I don't mean to say that we should ban it altogether; I mean to say that it is never going to be as big as people make it out to be. 

    This is what happens when you don't dance with them what brung you; the New York Times sends out a hack to get everyone talking about the wrong thing.

    Saturday
    Mar062010

    An Idea Whose Time Has Come

    Your honor, my client pleads guilty to being an alpine Ibex…

    If I were taking the bar exam next week, I’d probably pass (even though I have absolutely no law training whatsoever) and I’d probably become the nation’s foremost attorney for pets:

    Swiss voters will go to the polls on Sunday to decide on a proposal to appoint state-funded lawyers across the country to represent animals in court.

    Supporters of the initiative say such lawyers would help deter cases of animal cruelty and neglect, by making sure that those who did abuse or neglect animals would be properly punished.

    Opponents however claim that Switzerland, which already has strict animal protection laws, does not need any more legislation.

    The canton of Zurich has in fact had its own animal lawyer for a number of years; the current incumbent, Antoine Goetschel, is the only state-funded lawyer in Switzerland who goes to court to speak on behalf of animals.

    America is the home of zany animal advocacy antics. We need animal lawyers now in the worst way, since we already put the needs of animals above those of kids and other human beings in many situations. Attorneys who are out of work, too incompetent to do anything difficult, or have been fired because their client forgot to show up for court could thrive as animal lawyers. I smell the makings of a show on NBC here. As far as I know, Kelsey Grammer is still desperately looking for work.

    Saturday
    Mar062010

    Keep Your Fingers to Yourself

    This poor lady either has the makings of a fabulous lawsuit or the infamy only someone who has no common sense deserves:

    Police say a bear bit off a woman’s fingers at a Wisconsin zoo after she ignored barriers and warning signs to try to feed the animal.

    The Lincoln Park Zoo in Manitowoc closed after the incident Friday morning. Police say the 47-year-old woman lost a thumb and a forefinger, and two other fingers were partially severed.

    The woman’s boyfriend was bitten as he tried to pry the bear’s mouth off her hand, but he didn’t lose any fingers. Her 3-year-old granddaughter wasn’t injured.

    If you ignore barriers, you tend to forfeit the possibility of getting a settlement. I have no doubt in my mind that the woman might still try to sue; common sense means that if someone sets up a barrier to keep you from doing something dangerous, you should probably respect that barrier. And yet, every year, America is the home of a form of social Darwinism that demonstrates that the last words of quite a few of our countrymen is “…watch this!”

    I also think it’s important to point out that our public schools are a terrible failure. Literacy in America seems to be dropping every year. People seem to be getting dumber and dumber every day. If the woman can show that her inability to read contributed to her inability to know that sticking her fingers in front of a hungry bear, she might have a case. I suspect that any lawyer taking her case is going to go after the makers of the hot dogs she might have stuffed in her face (and had on her hands) when she lost her fingers or the makers of the cage that failed to make the cage strong enough or small enough to keep some idiot from sticking their hands through them.

    Wednesday
    Feb242010

    This is Why We Don't Live in Maryland Anymore

    Once Byron is able to safely transport the last of the mink habitat inhabitants down here to St. Thomas, we will no longer have a presence in the State of Maryland. When I made the decision to pull up stakes and leave, there was forty inches of snow on the ground and the Howard County Snow plow driver was throwing bottles of urine at us as he pushed snow into our cul de sac, blocking us in. I shall probably live in New Hampshire once again, but the middling part of the Mid-Atlantic is no where I shall ever live again.

    Go straight to hell, Mid-Atlantic. You are uninhabitable for decent people. You are a butt sandwich I’m not going to accept anymore.

    That’s why I smirked when I read this:

    A major nor’easter is expected to bring blizzard conditions to interior New England and heavy rain and near-hurricane-force wind gusts to Northeastern coastal areas Wednesday through Friday.

    Little, if any, snow will fall in Boston, Massachusetts, while Washington, New York and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, could see as much as 5 inches of snow with locally higher amounts, CNN meteorologist Sean Morris said.

    Record snowfall totals of 30 inches or more will be possible across upstate New York, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine, Morris said. Very strong winds will combine with the heavy snow to produce dangerous white-out conditions and widespread power outages.

    You can do thirty or forty inches of snow in New Hampshire; they have plows there. They have a snow removal system there. You cannot do that same amount of snow in states like Maryland, which have spent all of their money on schools that don’t teach and government programs that ensure that the poor are always poor and cannot read and write. You cannot do that in a state where the people who own snow removal equipment can jack up their prices and collect blood money from the Federal government while you and yours sit snowbound in a development run by an incompetent homeowner’s association that forgot to bribe the equipment-starved county to plow them out first.

    You would think all of this snow would have saved a company like Hummer; alas, it did not:

    General Motors’ deal to sell its Hummer brand to a Chinese automaker fell through Wednesday and the company said it now plans to shut down the brand.

    GM did not give any details about why the agreement to sell Hummer to Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machines Co. Ltd. could not be completed, saying only that it was disappointed it was unable to close the deal.

    One of the things that I did notice about the snowstorms we received in Maryland earlier this month was that they revealed that the Hummer did fairly well in the snow; hospitals were forced to use them to get sick people into emergency rooms. The military version of the Humvee is preferable; that thing they call a Hummer is a fraud, but it did look like a pretty good runner in the snow. The military version went through the snow like shit through a skinny goose. I dumped the Suburban because, well, why not? I’d rather get a Mercedes and leave it at that.

    On the site where Scuddy’s Bar stands, we will construct a mink habitat for Byron and extend our property holdings out and down the narrow lane that brings a single car up to the property. If you were to ask me about hurricanes, I would say that, at least when a hurricane comes and destroys everything, you don’t have to wait for a snowplow to come and save you.

    Sunday
    Feb212010

    Environmentalism Meets the Needs of the Military

    3rd US Infantry Division patch, Fort Stewart, Georgia

    This must be a rather difficult series of choices:

    Under crystalline winter skies, a light infantry unit headed for Iraq was practicing precision long-range shooting through a pall of smoke. But the fire generating the haze had nothing to do with the training exercise.

    Staff members at the Army base had set the blaze on behalf of the red-cockaded woodpecker, an imperiled eight-inch-long bird that requires frequent conflagrations to preserve its pine habitat.

    Even as it conducts round-the-clock exercises to support two wars, Fort Stewart spends as much as $3 million a year on wildlife management, diligently grooming its 279,000 acres to accommodate five endangered species that live here.

    Last year, the wildlife staff even built about 100 artificial cavities and installed them 25 feet high in large pines so the woodpeckers did not have to toil for six months carving the nests themselves.

    The military has not always been so enthusiastic about saving endangered plants and animals. In the early years of the administration of President George W. Bush, the Pentagon often argued that protecting endangered species would hinder its battle preparedness; in 2003, the military lobbied Congress for limited exemptions from federal protection rules.

    But base commanders have gradually realized that working to help species rebound is in their best interest, if only because the more the endangered plants and animals thrive, the fewer restrictions are put on training exercises to avoid destroying habitat.

    Today, herculean efforts to save threatened species are unfolding at dozens of military sites across the nation, from Eglin, Fla., where the Air Force has restored and reconnected streams for the Okaloosa darter, to San Clemente Island, Calif., where the Navy has helped bring the loggerhead shrike back from the brink of extinction.

    Good God, we almost lost the loggerhead shrike? Thank the Creator that the Navy was there to save it, whatever it is.

    Somehow, I don’t think the treehuggers of a generation ago thought they would find common cause with the modern military.