True-Lie: Archaic Spelling of Truly

One Unit of Horsepower

Don't Even Think It!

Don't change horses in midst ream.

We're talking 500 sheets of copier paper per ream, not some vulgar meaning. A copier is sometimes called a 'horse' because it runs on just one unit of horsepower, a throwback to the Middle Ages, when copy machines ran on the energy provided by real horses!

Anyway, the advice is to finish the entire ream before changing to a different copy machine.

The Triune Katzheit: Klein and Klug and Klaue

A Trinity of Katz

One Katty Essence

Three Katty Persons

I don't know who said this first, but cats must look at people and say, "They feed us. They give us shelter. They take care of our every need. We must be gods!"

Dogs have a different opinion . . .

Wise Words?

It doth suffice.

Man 1: A word to the wise is "enough."

Man 2: Some say "sufficient" is also the wise word.

Man 1: You mean, "sufficient" is "enough"? Absurd!

Man 2: No, I mean either "sufficient" or "enough" is adequate.

Man 1: You just go from bad to worse! Enough already!

Party Animal: Too Young to Plan Ahead

Born Yesterday

Ignoramus et Ignorabimus?

A fish out of water is all wet!

Moral: Dry Up and Think Ahead

(Order more bottled water next time . . .)

Whose Right? Who's Right?

Doggerel and Caterwaul

I've just penned a bit of doggerel - as you'll too soon see - so sing it like a caterwaul:

Might Make Right

The customer is right.
The boss is always right.
I guess they'll have to fight,
To prove who's really right!

Who's the winner? Doggerel? Or Caterwaul? Results vary.

To Beg for Your Boobs?

Boobies

I believe that this 'saying' was a misconstrual of "too big for your boots," which meant the same as "too big for your britches," which meant that one was acting "self-important."

The putative 'saying' thus really had nothing to do with anything.

Chip off the old block on your shoulder?

Follow Sequence:

Find Chips Off An Old Block.

Select One, Place on Shoulder.

Await Consequences.

The Bland Leading the Bland

Trouble Maker

I think that this would make a great title for a novel: The Bland Leading the Bland. Taking to heart Paglia's provocative characterization of American universities, I should give the novel a college setting, as has often been done but can perhaps be bettered if given the old college try.

Living Daylights?

Hey, Bud, Got a Light?

Have you ever wanted to "beat the living daylights out of someone"? Apparently, it means to beat someone unconscious, such that his eyes - the "living daylights" - are blinded, if only temporarily. I haven't heard of 'nightlights' with respect to the eyes, perhaps because our eyes do not see anything on a moonless night.

But this is all dependent upon an ancient, outmoded theory of an inner light . . .

As easy as pi . . .

pi

Let us now establish the precise value of pi. We know that this will be easy to accomplish because our wise saying for this day is "as easy as pi," so pi itself should be easy, as the brief sequence of figures below will show:

Hmm . . . this looks a bit longer and more involved than expected. We'll have to get back to you when we've established the precise value. After all, it's supposed to be easy as pi.

Queen: A Bit Like Bob Dylan?

Queen Elizabeth II

I came upon this photo of Queen Elizabeth II being used as a back page advertisement in the Korea JoongAng Daily (January 19, 2018) by the English Speaking Union of Korea for their 15th ESU Korea Public Speaking Competition, and I was struck by her majesty's resemblance to Bob Dylan. Here's a photo of Bob for comparing:

Mister Bob Dylan

Not the best of Bob for a comparison, but I know I've seen photos of Dylan that would make the resemblance uncanny. I have little time to search very long for them, however, so I leave that job to others who might bring this blog entry to completion.

The Law is Toothless?

Lex Talionis

"An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth."

"Bwimey!"

Eyeless

(Or vice-versa?)

All that glitters is not gold?

Gold

Nonsense! Some of what glitters is gold! Gold itself always glitters! Just look at this photo, and trust your own eyes!

But why does gold glitter, and why so beautifully? Here's why.

Hwang Sa . . .

Seoul on  this Especially Dusty Day

Seoul's annual "Yellow Dust" was thicker than usual yesterday . . .

Cheap Skates?

Cheap Skate

"A penny for your thoughts."

"Cheapskate. Now, where's my penny?"

Rhyme Scheme

A Norange

They reckoned no rhyme for "an orange,"
But reckoned they not with "a norange"!

A Night in Shining Amour

"More Light"

There is none.

Bloody Hell and Holy Water?

Blood in Water

I long ago puzzled over this saying:

"Blood is thicker than water."

I knew it meant that your blood relatives were closer to you than all the rest of humanity, and thus deserved your loyalty, but why should "water" stand for everyone else?

I went into a deep thunk about it, and the solution eventually came to me: "baptism."

Baptism brought one into the family of God, such that people all the world over, potentially all of us, were relatives.

Relatives by water, of course, and thus not so thick, not so close as blood relatives, but relatives all the same . . .

(I'm not claiming, of course, that this is Christian doctrine . . .)

Penny Money

Penny

(And somebody's been saving this one since 1864!)

"A penny saved is a penny earned, but what's the opportunity cost?"

Google's Answer: "the loss of potential gain from other alternatives when one alternative is chosen."

Therefore: a penny saved is a penny lost!

Fossilized Turn of a Phrase Concerning a Prehistoric Measuring Stick

Sticks

"More than you can shake a stick at!"

The purpose of such a stick was to measure what was beyond one's capacity.

For example, two or three wolves might be held off with a stick, but more than three was "a lot" of wolves, and you knew it because the wolves weren't cowed by your stick, no matter how hard you shook that stick at them.

In which case, run!

Ancient Wisdom

Bagged Cat Contemplating Its Great Escape

The cat's out of the bag and drinking the spilled milk it's too late to cry over.

Procrastinators!

Sterling Advice

"But don't put off until tomorrow what you can do tonight!"

(You might not be up to it tomorrow . . .)

Words of Wit-Dumb

One Dollar Bill

Another day, another dollar isn't worth another day . . .

A Lobster Loose in Here?

Gérard de Nerval

A leopard cannot change its spots, for it is not an octopus, nor doth it know the secrets of the deep.

I think of Gérard de Nerval, my inspiration, who walked a lobster - on a blue ribbon as leash - in the Tuileries Garden. (Or was it along the Palais-Royal in Paris?) When asked why, he replied, "It does not bark, and it knows the secrets of the deep."

Straw Dog

Goddog the Straw Dog

"A drowning man will clutch at a straw dog."

Blending In . . .

Loyalty?

"A man is known by the company he keeps working for!"

(I might have said this before.)

A Countable Rhyme: Beyond One

Up to Eleven!

"Two's company, three's a crowd, four's a nation, but five's allowed . . .

Hallelujah

Leonard Cohen

Leonard Cohen died about a year ago, but he lives still . . . in the Tower of Song, singing "Hallelujah" . . .

Science Man: On the Universe

We see here many stars that have formed in a red-shifting area of the universe:

Note how these stars appear trapped within nebulae of red dust, but this dust's coloring is actually due to the immense gravitational forces pulling on the nebulae.

I enjoy knowing a bit of science because such knowledge allows me to explain stuff like this sort of thing in today's blog entry. I also enjoy knowing a bit of theology, for this enables me to make sense of the marchlands between science and theology.

I can thus tell you about this next photograph. We see here - on God's own workbench - the entire universe itself red-shifting due to its immense mass (and note the depression atop the universe, for this will eventually grow large enough to swallow the entirety):

I grant that it looks like an apple, but that's how things got started anyway, right? This also explains how the plucking of one apple could send the entire universe hurtling down through the throes of entropy as an ever-falling world.

No need to thank me. Glad to be of assistance.

As Brom Bones Might Say

The Headless Horseman Pursuing Ichabod Crane

John Quidor (1858)

"Two heads are better than none."

Seasonings Greetings

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

2018

FROM

GYPSY SCHOLAR