O Says it Elegantly

"He was evil laughing."

I'm Not Fat

My belly is an oven

And I'm cooking cancer pie

Blackening my organs

From the in- to the outside.

The crust is rising steadily

And pressing against my abs

The pie soon will be finished

According to my labs.

My strength is ebbing daily

My vision's blurry, too,

Before too long I do believe

I shall be turning blue.

And when my lungs stop moving

And I'm resting on a slab

A knife hovering above me

As the coroner blabs

My soul it will be sailing

Way up above the clouds

And when I knock on heaven's door

I'll be knocking very loud.

When the pie is opened

And my guts begin to sing

I'll be grating on the ass

Of heaven's all gracious king.'

Saint Lucy (by Q)

Q's new best friend is St. Lucy, the Patron Saint of Eyesight   . . . which is why she is carrying a bucket of eyeballs (complete with eyelashes) in her left hand. The cactus in her right hand is just some kind of sprig-ish thing. 
I am particularly impressed by the fact that St. Lucy's head floats above her body . . . and also by the fact that, as a saint, she apparently has no need of feet.  As the spirit rises, the body begins to dissipate.  I'm sure that this would make Plato very happy.

 Oddly enough, Q's love for St. Lucy has not mitigated her hatred for former best friend Helen Keller, who is now a "mean, stupid, ugly little blind girl." Wow. Q is a straight shooter, you've got to give her that. Apparently at some point Helen K. became a hitwoman, as she seems to have gunned down a few folks . . . and I think at one point she was going for Little Bo Peep (or Peepie as I call her--when I want to get a rise out of Q). Ah, such a rich and wonderful world Atlantis is . . . way down below the ocean.

Lesson 39 of 100 Lessons--and a Plea for Audio Studio for the Reading Impaired

"People's ideas about God are the clearest projection in the world of the inside of their own heads and hearts.  When I hear somebody describe what they think God's like, I know what they think everything's like.  Visions of God come straight out of our deepest selves.  I'm an optimistic person, so I figure God's good, and that there must be some sort of plan that will explain all this.  I don't know what it is.  But not knowing the plan doesn't matter to me.  I don't need to know.  I trust Him.  I sure don't think I'm a pawn in some sort of game.  While you live, you try to be the best person you can, do the best you can for everybody around you, and when you die, you go back to wherever you were before you were born.  And it's not a burning fiery place with monsters breathing on your neck."

Heart in the Right Place

by Carolyn Jourdan

P.S.  This was the last book I read for this year's stint with Audio Studio for the Reading Impaired (P.O. Box 23043, 11403 Park Road , Anchorage, KY 40223).  Alas, it might be the last time I read for them, since they are having some serious funding problems.  It kills me, because the operating budget is only about $70,000 a year.  Not a sum to be sneezed at, obviously, but on a metro level it's sofa change.  Or, for that matter, to some of the rich folks in Louisville.  Aren't there any rich blind folks out there who would be willing to shake out the sofa for Audio Studio?  (Or 70,000 regular folk who could spare a dollar each?  Or 35,000 folk with two dollars?  17,500 with four?  8.750 with eight?  4,375 with sixteen?  2,187 1/2 with thirty-two?  1,093 3/4 with sixty-four?  546 with one-hundred and twenty-eight and one with one-hundred and twelve?  How about joining the 546 and parting with $128 for the blind and otherwise reading impaired?  That's like 36 cents a day . . . and best of all, you won't get a shit load of mail urging you to give again (which discourages me, in that it's obvious that my donation went to xeroxing papers and buying stamps).

Brother K in the Recording Booth

Lesson 34 of 100 Lessons

"When you're a child people's cruelty makes you cry.  When you're an adult it's their kindness."

Glen Duncan

A Day and a Night and a Day

I went on a field trip to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C.,  a decade or so ago.  It was a shattering experience.  As I worked my way through the top floor (where the tour starts) I felt claustrophobic, and I slowed down to let the crowd of students move past me.  Horror piled upon horror.  The German who sat on his porch with a rifle and shot Jewish prisoners randomly.  The piles of shoes and hair.   I can't remember what order the displays were in, but I do remember that the last thing I saw on that floor was a picture of a little girl, naked and screaming, and the caption said something about how the Nazis didn't start by executing Jews, but with mentally retarded children.  I looked at that little girl and saw Q, and I was so filled with revulsion that I had to leave the museum.  I found a staircase and went outside and walked the streets for fifteen minutes.  Then I went back.  I worked my way through the rest of the museum, feeling dulled by all of the horrors, feeling them bore holes into me until all I could think was that human beings are detestable creatures, and that God's biggest mistake was that he had let Noah and his family build that ark (so to speak--since I am neither a Biblical literalist nor, for that matter, a Believer in any accepted sense of the word).  I finally made it to the bottom floor, and there was a wall bisecting the room.  A wall covered with names of people who had risked or sacrificed their lives to hide Jews or to help them to escape.  And for the first time during that visit, I didn't feel anger or hatred or revulsion or hopelessness.  And for the first time that day I cried.

Addendum 8/15/11
I'm almost finished reading my second Glen Duncan book, which is The Last Werewolf (highly recommended), and in Chapter 56 (of 61) I ran upon this:
"I read somewhere that when you're a kid it's people's cruelty that makes you cry, then when you're an adult it's their kindness."
Which could mean that Lula reads Glen Duncan, which is kind of cute, but I'm going to suppose that it means that this idea is central to Glen Duncan's thoughts.  In fact, in a way that's what The Last Werewolf is about:  the corruption of innocence, the struggle to maintain or rediscover innocence . . . and, maybe, the idea that innocence can be reclaimed.  Depends on how you see the love affair with Lula . . . and, of course, depends on what happens in the next five chapters.  I'll have to get back to you on that.