Good Omens: The Beginning (why yes, I might be doing this for a bit. you'll live.)

IT WAS A NICE DAY.

All the days had been nice. There had been rather more than seven of them so far, and rain hadn't been invented yet. But clouds massing east of Eden suggested that the first thunderstorm was on its way, and it was going to be a big one.

The angel of the Eastern Gate put his wings over his head to shield himself from the first drops.

"I'm sorry," he said politely. "What was it you were saying?"

"I said, that one went down like a lead balloon," said the serpent.

"Oh. Yes," said the angel, whose name was Aziraphale.

"I think it was a bit of an overreaction, to be honest," said the serpent. "I mean, first offense and everything. I can't see what's so bad about knowing the difference between good and evil, anyway."

"It must be bad," reasoned Aziraphale, in the slightly concerned tones of one who can't see it either, and is worrying about it, "otherwise you wouldn't have been involved."

"They just said, Get up there and make some trouble," said the serpent, whose name was Crawly, although he was thinking of changing it now. Crawly, he'd decided, was not him.

"Yes, but you're a demon. I'm not sure if it's actually possible for you to do good," said Aziraphale. "It's down to your basic, you know, nature. Nothing personal, you understand."

"You've got to admit it's a bit of a pantomime, though," said Crawly. "I mean, pointing out the Tree and saying 'Don't Touch' in big letters. Not very subtle, is it? I mean, why not put it on top of a high mountain or a long way off? Makes you wonder what He's really planning."

"Best not to speculate, really," said Aziraphale. "You can't second-guess ineffability, I always say. There's Right, and there's Wrong. If you do Wrong when you're told to do Right, you deserve to be punished. Er."

They sat in embarrassed silence, watching the raindrops bruise the first flowers.

Eventually Crawly said, "Didn't you have a flaming sword?"

"Er," said the angel. A guilty expression passed across his face, and then came back and camped there.

"You did, didn't you?" said Crawly. "It flamed like anything."

"Er, well—"

"It looked very impressive, I thought."

"Yes, but, well—"

"Lost it, have you?"

"Oh no! No, not exactly lost, more—"

"Well?"

Aziraphale looked wretched. "If you must know," he said, a trifle testily, "I gave it away."

Crawly stared up at him.

"Well, I had to," said the angel, rubbing his hands distractedly. "They looked so cold, poor things, and she's expecting already, and what with the vicious animals out there and the storm coming up I thought, well, where's the harm, so I just said, look, if you come back there's going to be an almighty row, but you might be needing this sword, so here it is, don't bother to thank me, just do everyone a big favor and don't let the sun go down on you here."

He gave Crawly a worried grin.

"That was the best course, wasn't it?"

"I'm not sure it's actually possible for you to do evil," said Crawly sarcastically. Aziraphale didn't notice the tone.

"Oh, I do hope so," he said. "I really do hope so. Its been worrying me all afternoon."

They watched the rain for a while.

"Funny thing is," said Crawly, "I keep wondering whether the apple thing wasn't the right thing to do, as well. A demon can get into real trouble, doing the right thing." He nudged the angel. "Funny if we both got it wrong, eh? Funny if I did the good thing and you did the bad one, eh?"

"Not really," said Aziraphale.

Crawly looked at the rain.

"No," he said, sobering up. "I suppose not."

Slate-black curtains tumbled over Eden. Thunder growled among the hills. The animals, freshly named, cowered from the storm.

Far away, in the dripping woods, something bright and fiery flickered among the trees.

It was going to be a dark and stormy night.

-Neil Gaiman, Good Omens, p. 3-5

I Present, The 'Big Damn Brains' Conversation aka An Angel and A Demon Walk Into a Back Room

from Good Omens, because I'm reading it for the millionth time, and I want to!

AND NOW IT WAS THREE O'CLOCK. The Antichrist had been on Earth for fifteen hours, and one angel and one demon had been drinking solidly for three of them.

They sat opposite one another in the back room of Aziraphale's dingy old bookshop in Soho.

Most bookshops in Soho have back rooms, and most of the back rooms are filled with rare, or at least very expensive, books. But Aziraphale's books didn't have illustrations. They had old brown covers and crackling pages. Occasionally, if he had no alternative, he'd sell one.

And, occasionally, serious men in dark suits would come calling and suggest, very politely, that perhaps he'd like to sell the shop itself so that it could be turned into the kind of retail outlet more suited to the area. Sometimes they'd offer cash, in large rolls of grubby fifty-pound notes. Or, sometimes, while they were talking, other men in dark glasses would wander around the shop shaking their heads and saying how flammable paper was, and what a firetrap he had here.

And Aziraphale would nod and smile and say that he'd think about it. And then they'd go away. And they'd never come back.

Just because you're an angel doesn't mean you have to be a fool.

The table in front of the two of them was covered with bottles.

"The point is," Crowley said, "the point is. The point is." He tried to focus on Aziraphale.

"The point is," he said, and tried to think of a point.

"The point I'm trying to make," he said, brightening, "is the dolphins. That's my point."

"Kind of fish," said Aziraphale.

"Nononono," said Crowley, shaking a finger. "'S mammal. Your actual mammal. Difference is-" Crowley waded through the swamp of his mind and tried to remember the difference. "Difference is, they-"

"Mate out of water?" volunteered Aziraphale.

Crowley's brow furrowed. "Don't think so. Pretty sure that's not it. Something about their young. Whatever." He pulled himself together. "The point is. The point is. Their brains."

He reached for a bottle.

"What about the brains?" said the angel.

"Big brains. That's my point. Size of. Size of. Size of damn big brains. And then there's the whales. Brain city, take it from me. Whole damn sea full of brains."

"Kraken," said Aziraphale, staring moodily into his glass.

Crowley gave him the long cool look of someone who has just had a girder dropped in front of his train of thought.

"Uh?"

"Great big bugger," said Aziraphale. "Sleepeth beneath the thunders of the upper deep. Under loads of huge and unnumbered polupol- polipo- bloody great seaweeds, you know. Supposed to rise to the surface right at the end, when the sea boils."

"Yeah?"

"Fact."

"There you are, then," said Crowley, sitting back. "Whole sea bubbling, poor old dolphins so much seafood gumbo, no one giving a damn. Same with gorillas. Whoops, they say, sky gone all red, stars crashing to the ground, what they putting in the bananas these days? And then-"

"They make nests, you know, gorillas," said the angel, pouring another drink and managing to hit the glass on the third go.

"Nah."

"God's truth. Saw a film. Nests."

"That's birds," said Crowley.

"Nests," insisted Aziraphale.

Crowley decided not to argue the point.

"There you are then," he said. "All creatures great and smoke. I mean small. Great and small. Lot of them with brains. And then, bazamm."

"But you're part of it," said Aziraphale. "You tempt people. You're good at it."

Crowley thumped his glass on the table. "That's different. They don't have to say yes. That's the ineffable bit, right? Your side made it up. You've got to keep testing people. But not to destruction."

"All right. All right. I don't like it any more than you, but I told you, I can't disod- disoy- not do what I'm told. 'M a'nangel."

"There's no theaters in Heaven," said Crowley. "And very few films."

"Don't you try to tempt me," said Aziraphale wretchedly. "I know you, you old serpent."

"Just you think about it," said Crowley relentlessly, "You know what eternity is? You know what eternity is? I mean, d'you know what eternity is? There's this big mountain, see, a mile high at the end of the universe, and once every thousand years there's this little bird-"

"What little bird?" said Aziraphale suspiciously.

"This little bird I'm talking about. And every thousand years-"

"The same bird every thousand years?"

Crowley hesitated. "Yeah," he said.

"Bloody ancient bird, then."

"Okay. And every thousand years this bird flies-"

"-limps-"

"-flies all the way to this mountain and sharpens its beak-"

"Hold on. You can't do that. Between here and the end of the universe there's loads of-" The angel waved a hand expansively, if a little unsteadily. "Loads of buggerall, dear boy."

"But it gets there anyway," Crowley persevered.

"How?"

"It doesn't matter!"

"It could use a spaceship," said the angel.

Crowley subsided a bit. "Yeah," he said. "If you like. Anyway, this bird-"

"Only it is the end of the universe we're talking about," said Aziraphale. "So it'd have to be one of those spaceships where your descendants are the ones who get out at the other end. You have to tell your descendants, you say, When you get to the Mountain, you've got to-" He hesitated. "What have they got to do?"

"Sharpen its beak on the mountain," said Crowley. "And then it flies back-"

"-in the spaceship-"

"And after a thousand years it goes and does it all again," said Crowley quickly.

There was a moment of drunken silence.

"Seems a lot of effort just to sharpen a beak," mused Aziraphale.

"Listen," said Crowley urgently, "the point is that when the bird has worn the mountain down to nothing, right, then-"

Aziraphale opened his mouth. Crowley just knew he was going to make some point about the relative hardness of birds' beaks and granite mountains, and plunged on quickly.

"-then you still won't have finished watching The Sound of Music."

Aziraphale froze.

"And you'll enjoy it," Crowley said relentlessly. "You really will."

"My dear boy-"

"You won't have a choice."

"Listen-"

"Heaven has no taste."

"Now-"

"And not one single sushi restaurant."

A look of pain crossed the angel's suddenly very serious face.

"I can't cope with this while 'm drunk," he said. "I'm going to sober up."

"Me too."

The both winced as the alcohol left their bloodstreams, and sat up a bit more neatly. Aziraphale straightened his tie.

"I can't interfere with divine plans," he croaked.

Crowley looked speculatively into his glass, then filled it again.

"What about diabolical ones?" he said.

"Pardon?"

"Well, it's got to be a diabolical plan, hasn't it? We're doing it. My side."

"Ah, but it's all part of the overall divine plan," said Aziraphale. "Your side can't do anything without it being part of the ineffable divine plan," he added, with a trace of smugness.

"You wish!"

"No, that's the-" Aziraphale snapped his fingers irritably. "The thing. What d'you call it in your colorful idiom? The line at the bottom."

"The bottom line."

"Yes. It's that."

"Well...if you're sure..." said Crowley.

"No doubt about it."

Crowley looked up slyly.

"Then you can't be certain, correct me if I'm wrong, you can't be certain that thwarting it isn't part of the divine plan too. I mean, you're supposed to thwart the wiles of the Evil One at every turn, aren't you?"

Aziraphale hesitated.

"There is that, yes."

"You see a wile, you thwart it. Am I right?"

"Broadly, broadly. Actually I encourage humans to do the actual thwarting. Because of ineffability, you understand."

"Right. Right. So all you've got to do is thwart. Because if I know anything," said Crowley urgently, "it's that the birth is just the start. It's the upbringing that's important. It's the Influence. Otherwise the child will never learn to use its powers." He hesitated. "At least, not necessarily as intended."

"Certainly our side won't mind me thwarting you," said Aziraphale thoughtfully. "They won't mind that at all."

"Right. It'd be a real feather in your wing." Crowley gave the angel an encouraging smile.

"What will happen to the child if it doesn't get a Satanic upbringing, though?" said Aziraphale.

"Probably nothing. It'll never know."

"But genetics-"

"Don't tell you from genetics. What've they got to do with it?" said Crowley. "Look at Satan. Created as an angel, grows up to be the Great Adversary. Hey, if you're going to go on about genetics, you might as well say the kid will grow up to be an angel. After all, his father was really big in Heaven in the old days. Saying he'll grow up to be a demon just because his dad became one is like saying a mouse with its tail cut off will give birth to tailless mice. No. Upbringing is everything. Take it from me."

"And without unopposed Satanic influences-"

"Well, at worst Hell will have to start all over again. And the Earth gets at least another eleven years. That's got to be worth something, hasn't it?"

Now Aziraphale was looking thoughtful again."

"You're saying the child isn't evil of itself?" he said slowly.

"Potentially evil. Potentially good, too, I suppose. Just this huge powerful potentiality, waiting to be shaped," said Crowley. He shrugged. "Anyway, why're we talking about this good and evil? They're just names for sides. We know that."

"I suppose it's got to be worth a try," said the angel. Crowley nodded encouragingly.

"Agreed?" said the demon, holding out his hand.

The angel shook it, cautiously.

"It'll certainly be more interesting than saints," he said.

"And it'll be for the child's own good, in the long run," said Crowley. "We'll be godfathers, sort of. Overseeing his religious upbringing, you might say."

Aziraphale beamed.

"You know, I'd never have thought of that," he said. "Godfathers. Well, I'll be damned."

"It's not too bad," said Crowley, "when you get used to it."

-Good Omens, p. 47-52, Neil Gaiman

Book: Close to Shore by Michael Capuzzo

"We're not just afraid of predators, we're transfixed by them, prone to weave stories and fables and chatter endlessly about them, because fascination creates preparedness, and preparedness, survival. In a deeply tribal sense, we love our monsters." - E.O. Wilson

"You're gonna need a bigger boat." - Chief Brody, Jaws

You guys are likely aware by now that the things that I love, I love *intensely*. I either care or I don't, there's not much of a half-way point for me, and I do tend to get obsessive. So, y'know, there ya go. That being said, I *love* sharks. In the rampant, obsessive sense of the term. Shark Week on the Discovery Channel is a VERY SPECIAL TIME for me.

It's all Jaws' fault, really. I saw the movie for the first time when I was probably 9 or 10 years old. And it officially, without a doubt, scared the living crap out of me. I was convinced that there were giant sharks lurking out there, waiting to eat people. I was *so* scared that I wouldn't go into a swimming pool if the water was not perfectly clear so I could *see* that there wasn't a shark in there. Being the obsessive little nugget that I am, even at that young age, I was determined to learn *everything* about sharks. I wanted to be Matt Hooper when I grew up.

What most people don't realize is that the book Jaws was based on a series of real life shark attacks in 1916. These attacks are considered the first 'official' attacks by a shark on man in U.S. history. At the time these attacks began, there was little debate in the scientific community and therefore the world at large that sharks had been unfairly maligned for centuries, and were, in fact, perfectly harmless. Men swam with (presumed) 'dangerous' species, and were left untouched, therefore all the ancient reports of man-eating sharks (as well as those from the primitive world and sailors) were exaggerations, misunderstandings, or mis-identifications of the fish involved.

The leading 'expert' on sharks had declared, unequivocably the year before that he did not believe sharks ever attacked anyone, that their jaws lacked the strength to do any damage and that any shark ever found with human remains in its stomach must have scavenged the body parts from a drowning victim. The year of 1916 saw the new fad of 'bathing' in the ocean reach new heights. More people travelled to the shore that summer to escape the pestilent air of their native cities than ever had before, or would again. They jumped in, believing themselves to be masters over all, confident that there was nothing in the sea that could threaten them. Many of them couldn't swim at all, in fact, but didn't let a little detail like that stop them, and while many of these unfortunates were saved by the 'surfmen' (lifeguards), many more drowned.

The first victim was a young man (25) named Charles E. Vansant. He and his family (mother, father, and two sisters) were at the shore from their native Philadelphia, having gone to the town of Beach Haven for their summer escape. Charles, being a typical young man of the time, went for a swim before dinner in a display of Victorian manliness. He went in and was followed, briefly, by a dog that had been playing on the beach. Eventually, the dog turned around and went back, but Vansant kept on, past the breakers and into deep water. He had turned around and was only three or four feet from the shore, in shallow waters, when the shark struck. Vansant screamed and struggled with the shark, and other men, bystanders and surfmen alike rushed into the water as it turned red with blood. They formed a human chain to try and wrestle him away from the shark, who followed his prey until the sharks belly scraped the sand, at which point it finally let go and thrashed its way back into the water and disappeared. As the rescuers pulled Vansant up onto the beach, it was revealed that his left leg had been ripped off.

His father (a doctor) and one of the surfmen (Alexander Ott), attempted to staunch the bleeding and tourniquet the massive wound, to little effect. Vansant was carried into the beach front hotel where his family was staying, and died lying on the hotel manager's desk a little before seven that night. Despite eyewitness testimony to the nature of the beast that had attacked him, and the fact that his cause of death was listed as 'shark attack', the 'experts' of the time denied that a shark could have been the culprit, and put forth their very learned opinions that it was far more likely that the animal that had ripped off Charles Vansant's leg was, in fact, a giant turtle.

Due to the common knowledge that sharks didn't attack people, and the fact that in 1916 communication was not as quick nor as thorough as it would later become, very few people outside of those in the immediate vicinity even knew about young Mr. Vansant's death, and those that did, who were wise to the ways of nature and the sea, thought that the reports of it being death by a shark were hysteria and exaggeration.

Five days later, on July 6th, 45 miles north of Beach Haven, in another resort town (Spring Lake), Charles Bruder (27) was attacked 130 yards from the shore. Known as a strong long distance swimmer, Mr. Bruder was a bellhop for the New Essex and Sussex Hotel, and had convinced some of the other young men who worked at the hotel to come take a swim with him before they had to start the evening service at the hotel. He was struck in the abdomen and both legs were severed. One witness thought that 'the man in the red canoe' had been upset in the water (we have to assume that she wasn't watching Mr. Bruder swim, and only caught sight after the attack had begun). Two surfmen rowed out to where Bruder was fighting with the shark and pulled him from the water. He died en route to the beach. His attack was blamed, by the experts, on a *killer whale*. These people were *very* invested in anything but a shark being the killer.

Here's where the story gets *really* interesting. The next three attacks took place on July 12th, 30 miles north of Spring Lake, and approximately 16 miles *inland*. The shark swam up Matawan Creek in New Jersey. Why's that so interesting? Well, sharks typically only live in salt water. They need high levels of saline to survive. A shark swimming from the ocean into fresh water won't last long at all. The only exception to that rule is the Bull shark, which can go from salt to fresh water. Okay, you say, so maybe the attacking shark was a Bull shark. Problem solved. And that is a possibility. However, the commonly accepted culprit for these attacks is a juvenile Great White shark. Either way, the behavior is very odd.

Around 2 pm, the local boys were let out of their jobs at various factories to go for a short swim break in the creek. This was typical behaviour of the time and place. The bosses let the boys burn off some steam, and then they returned to their jobs. Four or five boys were swimming in an area called Wyckoff dock, when they noticed an 'old, weather-beaten log'. It was only when the log submerged (and they noticed the dorsal fin) that they realized something was wrong. They were swimming to the shore and the last boy in line, Lester Stillwell (12), was suddenly yanked under. The other boys (stark naked), ran into town for help. The adults of the town didn't believe the boys when they claimed that Lester had been attacked. They thought that the boy had more likely had an epileptic seizure and drowned, and the other boys, in their panic, had imagined seeing the shark. Men went down in boats to search of Lester's body, sounding the creek with long poles.

A local man, Stanley Fisher (24) and others were diving in the creek, searching for the body. He and a close friend had been at it the longest, and were giving up, heading back to shore when Fisher decided to make one more dive. And then one more. On the second dive, he came back up, yelling "I've got him!" and began to swim back with Lester Stillwell's body. The sad relief that was felt on shore turned to fresh fear when Fisher suddenly bobbed under the water and resurfaced, screaming "He's got me!" Fisher, an incredibly strong young man, fought off the shark, keeping hold of the body, again and again, swimming to shore as fast as he could. Almost to shore Fisher was forced to let go of Stillwell's body in order to try and save himself.

He was pulled from the creek, still conscious, and able to tell the people there that he had dove down that last time and seen the shark devouring young Lester Stillwell's body. He had then wrestled the corpse away from the shark and attempted to swim to shore with it. The shark, understandably, took this interruption of his meal poorly, and attacked Fisher. Fisher was severely wounded in his right thigh, and though he survived the initial attack and the hour and a half train ride to the nearest hospital, he bled to death at about 5:30 that afternoon. Stillwell's body was eventually recovered about 150 feet upstream from where the attacks had occurred.

The last attack took place about a half a mile south (heading back out to sea) from where the Stillwell/Fisher attacks occurred. A young man named Joseph Dunn (14) was swimming in the creek when a retired sea captain came up in a boat, having taken to motoring up and down the creek to try and warn people out of the water since the attack. The boys were heeding the warning and climbing out on the dock when the shark came up and grabbed Mr. Dunn by the left leg. He was pulled from the water by his companions and received prompt medical attention (doctors had been called for the earlier attacks and while they couldn't help Lester Stillwell or Stanley Fisher, they were at least on hand for this third attack), and survived his wounds.

The people attempted to kill the monster shark by chucking dynamite into the water and shooting at any shadow they thought they saw in the water. Despite their thorough (and misguided) attempts, they missed the shark. One net that was laid across a narrow part of the creek was found to have a hole chewed through it, and it was assumed that the shark escaped that way. (It's also possible that the shark had simply already passed through and wasn't there at all after the last attack.)

On July 14 a 7 1/2 foot long Great White was caught in Raritan Bay only a few miles from the mouth of Matawan Creek. The shark weighed about 325 pounds and was found to have about 15 pounds of 'fleshy matter' and bones in its stomach. The bones, when sent to an independent scientist, were declared to be human, and thus the man-eater was dead. Of course, the shark itself (which the man who caught it had stuffed) eventually disappeared, and there was debate between scientists as to *which* bones there were in the shark, and whether or not they could have come from any of the victims, or were scavenged.

The witnesses to the attacks all reported a beast between 8 to 10 feet long, and given their unfamiliarity with sharks in general, it's possible that a 7.5 foot long Great White could be the culprit. Many of the attacks show Great White 'traits'. Sudden, explosive violence. (Many other sharks attack without the 'ruckus' that attends something the size of a Great White). The bite and retreat is typical of Great Whites (though not unique to them by any means...). They attack, inflict a massive wound, and circle, allowing the prey to bleed out so that they can then move in to feed without danger to themselves.

The size itself doesn't really say which species of shark we should blame. An 8 - 10 foot Great White is still a juvenile. Not even sexually mature. The largest Great White ever caught that is held to have been *reliably* measured topped out at about 20 feet long. There have, however, been reports of sharks up to 27 feet being caught, with larger specimens being reported having been seen, but not caught. A Bull shark is typically about 7 to 11 feet long, depending.

Both species are considered 'man-eaters', and actually rank in the top three killers, along with the Tiger shark. The size, ferocity, and coloration of the two sharks is close enough (though of course the Great White, as I said, gets *much* bigger, but it would have had to have been a juvenile to even fit up the creek without being seen and beaching itself when the tide went out). So we'll never really know which the true killer was, but these attacks are what started it all.

(Bull shark)(Great White shark)

"Mr. Vaughn, what we are dealing with here is a perfect engine, an eating machine. It's really a miracle of evolution. All this machine does is swim and eat and make little sharks, and that's all." - Matt Hooper, Jaws

ToB: The Alternative Between Death and Immortality Enters the Definition of Man

"It's human nature. Look, Eve walks around the Garden of Eden happy as can be, not even thinking about apples. Then one day God says, 'Oh, by the way, everything here is for you, enjoy, frolic, eat, but whatever you do, stay away from the apples.' Next thing you know, all Eve could think about is those juicy red apples. Which leads me to believe even God didn't understand women." - Marshall Mann, In Plain Sight, Jailbait

The final 'element' of man is death. Man is conscious of himself as a person. He knows that he is separate from the rest of creation, related more closely to the Creator than to the animals he is surrounded with. He is aware that he has a choice. That free will exists.

However, being told that a thing called free will (assuming it was spelled out in such terms, which it really wasn't...) is not the same as comprehending the notion of free will. In the same way, being told that you will die if you perform such and such an action does not confer comprehension of what it means to die.

Up until this point, one assumes, nothing has ever died. I even heard once a theory that Adam and Eve (assuming a literal reading of the text) were vegetarians until after their fall.

Along comes God and says, 'Look around. Look at all the awesome stuff I've made. It's all yours. All of it. *Except* this tree. This one, right here. In the center. Like I put a bullseye on it. Isn't it shiny? The fruit just *glistens*. Right. Well. Don't touch it. I mean it. If you do, you'll die.' To which one expects that Adam and Eve would just nod their heads. 'Of course, Lord. We won't touch it. Why would we even want to?' And then, in 'private', mutter between themselves, if they even thought about it, 'What's 'die'?'

One must have a concept of a word to understand it. Look, pretend, for a second, that I am God. I know it's an extreme stretch, but roll with it for a second. I'm God, and you're the first humans I've created. I show your around the great place, and then I show you a banana tree. And I say, 'If you eat this fruit, you'll glorb. For certain, glorbing will happen the second you eat it.' And, because I am awesome and full of Godliness, you nod and smile, and promise not to eat the banana. However, in the back of your mind (and the front too), you're wondering just what the hell 'glorb' is. Is it bad? Is it good? Perhaps 'glorb' tastes good. You don't know, because you don't know that the state you are currently in is the opposite of 'glorb'.

For a real world example, lets take the breaking of a bone. I was told, over and over again growing up not to do this or that thing because I'd break something. I knew that breaking something was theoretically painful, but I had no context to apply to this thought. When I was about six, my best friend and I wanted to play on her jungle gym. It had just rained, and so we came up with the brilliant plan to throw a blanket over the monkey bars. The idea was that it would absorb the water, and we could play safely. Anyone see the flaw in that?

Well. I tried the monkey bars, and I can't tell you if I missed the bar and got blanket, or if I got the bar and it as just wet and slippery, but down I went like a ton of bricks. Broke my arm near the wrist. And now, when I hear the word 'break', I know exactly what that means. I have contextualized the word and have real life experience to apply to it.

So. God says, 'eat this and you will die.' We hear the word die, and we feel association for the word. We understand, at least in part, the concept of death. The majority of us have had a friend or a family member die. We've experienced the pain of this loss. We comprehend that death is the absence of life. It is the opposite of what we have at this moment. We know that when someone dies, they are gone from us and we cannot see them, touch them, speak to them again. Not until we too experience death.

But at the time, at this very beginning of life, what meaning did 'die' have? They didn't know what it meant. It was a word without context. It could have meant anything.

The important factor, there, was not so much the consequence, but the fact that they were given a choice. Choose to eat or not to eat. God had said not to eat, and had said that something would happen if they did. The act of choosing was when they would have context for the concept of this 'free will' thing. And only later, after that, would the context for 'die' become clear.

Was it the first animal they had to kill for its skin that made the concept of death sink in? The death of their son Abel? Do we even really understand death now? We know what it means to us, from the outside of it. But we have yet to experience it, personally. It is still, partially, an uncontextualized word. And it will remain so until our time comes.

Dr. No - All the Great Men are Maniacs

"You are right, Mister Bond. That is just what I am, a maniac. All the greatest men are maniacs. They are possessed by a mania which drives them forward towards their goal. The great scientists, the philosophers, the religious leaders - all maniacs. What else but a blind singleness of purpose could have given focus to their genius, would have kept them in the groove of their purpose? Mania, my dear Mister Bond, is as priceless as genius. Dissipation of energy, fragmentation of vision, loss of momentum, the lack of follow-through - these are the vices of the herd."

And this is why the books are *so* much better than the movies. I get to read stuff like this, and reflect on how true to really kind of is.

Book: John Adams

This is, and has been for a while now, my non-fiction reading. I'm only on page 180 and it's a 651 page book. It's going so slowly because I really only get a chance to read it first thing in the morning, and so...slowness.

But so far, it's a very, very interesting book. It briefly covers John Adams' family background, childhood, education, courtship and marriage, and then gets into the beginnings of the Revolution and all the contributions that Adams made to America's birth.

It's laced with sections of the letters between Adams and his wife Abigail, which I really enjoy. It's very, very nice to see into the relationship between the two of them, which covered a very difficult period of time in history, with them being separated for years at a time, really, and the love and respect that they seem to have had for each other really shows through. You can tell that Adams respected his wife, and her intelligence, and that, more than that, they loved each other.

Anyway, in one letter he bemoans the state of the army (Washington was getting his butt kicked at the time), and Congress (with Adams as the head of the Board of War) was making many adjustments to the 'army' - their pay being increased and the punishments being increased as well. He wonders whether or not the state of the men was the fault of the times:

'Unfaithfulness in public stations is deeply criminal. But there is no encouragement to be faithful. Neither profit, nor honor, nor applause is acquired by faithfulness...There is too much corruption, even in this infant age of our Republic. Virtue is not in fashion. Vice is not infamous.'

Heh. Proof that nothing ever really changes. All those people who complain that our forefathers were more honest, etc., etc. - humanity never changes. They had the same moral issues 'back then' that we do now. The difference is in how well known they've become. Due to modern technology and media, it's hard to hide things that wouldn't have become widely known in the past.

Book: Treasure in Clay - A Bit of Humour

First, a short story that I'd heard before:

"If I added up all the summers I spent in St. Patrick's Church, Soho Square, in London, they would amount to six or seven years. Being an American, I opened the church in the morning, for the Americans rose earlier than the English did. This particular Epiphany morning in January, a limp figure fell in - that of a young woman about twenty-four or twenty-five years of age. 'How do you happen to be here?' 'Well, where am I, Father?' 'Oh, 'Father'?' She said: 'Yes, I used to be a Catholic, but not any more.' I said: 'Were you drunk?' She admitted she was. I added: 'Men drink because they like the stuff; women drink because they do not like something else. Who are you running from?' She said: 'Three men - and they are beginning to find out, so I get drunk.'

"It was one of those typically cold January mornings in London; she had been exposed to the cold all night long. I made a cup of tea and asked her name. I pointed to a billboard across the street, asking: 'Is that your picture over there on the billboard?' 'Yes, I am the leading lady in that musical comedy.' I invited her to come back that afternoon before the matinee. She agreed on one condition: 'that you do not ask me to go to Confession.' She said: 'I want you to promise me faithfully not to ask me to go to Confession.' I said: 'I promise you faithfully not to ask you to go to Confession.' That afternoon before the matinee, she returned. I then told her that we had a Rembrandt and a Van Dyck in the church: 'Would you like to see them?' As we walked down the side aisle, we passed a confessional. I pushed her in. I did not ask her to go, for I had promised not to ask her to go. Two years later I gave her her veil in a convent in London, where she is to this very hour."

~~~

And now, the beginning of the chapter entitled 'The Lighter Side':

"By nature I am a rather serious person. But in a paradoxical kind of way, I am very fond of humour and laughter. I have had several discussions with Milton Berle on this subject and he has attributed humour to me though I have never claimed to possess it as a gift. There may be incidental flashes of it here and there but it is not one of God's gifts to me. However, there is a close relationship between faith and humour. We say of those who lack as sense of humour that they are 'too thick'; that means they are opaque like a brick wall. Humour, on the contrary, is 'seeing through' things like a windowpane. Materialists, humanists and atheists all take this world very seriously because it is the only world they are ever going to have. He who possesses faith knows that this world is not the only one, and therefore can be regarded rather lightly: 'swung as a trinket about one's wrist.' To an atheist gold is gold, water is water and money is money. To a believer everything in this world is a telltale of something else. Mountains are not to be taken seriously. They are manifestations of the power of God; sunsets are revelations of His beauty; even rain can be a sign of His gentle mercy. I remember once meeting a doorman at the Great Southern Hotel in Killarney. I said to him as I came out of the hotel door: 'Oh, it's raining.' He put out his hand and said: 'You call that rain, Father. That's holy water from Heaven and it's blessing yourself you ought to be doing with it,' as he signed himself with the sign of the Cross.

"All the parables of Our Blessed Lord are tokens of something eternal. Camels, eyes of needles, patches on clothing, seed on a roadway, the quickness of the lightning flash, redness of the western sky - all these reminded Him of moral and spiritual lessons in the Kingdom of God. That is why He began each parable with: 'The Kingdom of God is like...' The only thing He ever took seriously was a soul. He did not take even death seriously, for death is a condition of life.

"In the early days when I was on national radio, a man came into St. Patrick's Cathedral one morning and, not recognizing me, said: 'Father, I want to go to Confession. I commute from Westchester every day. I had three friends with me - all Protestants. I became very angry and spoke most disparagingly and bitterly of that young priest that is on radio, Dr. Fulton Sheen. I just cannot stand him. He drives me crazy. I am afraid that I probably scandalized those men by the way I talked about a priest. So, will you hear my confession?' I said: 'My good man, I don't think you committed a serious sin. There are moments in my life when I share exactly the same opinion about Dr. Sheen that you do. Go to Communion and reserve your confession for another day.' He left very happily, saying: 'It certainly is wonderful to meet a nice priest like you.'"

“Envy eats nothing but its own heart” - German proverb

"Envy is the art of counting the other fellow's blessings instead of your own." - Harold Coffin

We all want things we don't or can't have. Even if you live a 'plain' life, you'll want things. You'll want a new washing line, a new cow, a new loft in the barn, new shoes, new quilts, new glasses, etc. I don't think that desiring things that we don't have counts as envy. I want lots of things, things that aren't even useful, or needful, but I want them. Why? Oh, many, many reasons. Acquisitiveness, maybe, or my love of them. Sometimes, they're even useful things. (But not all the time, by any stretch of the imagination.) But I can see someone else *with* that thing, and admire it, and think, 'oh, I wish I could afford/find/have room for one of those' *without* considering the person who does have it. They're (most of the time) not a part of the equation to me. I don't feel a pang of anger that *they* have it and *I* don't. I don't wail about the unfairness of the universe, that they should have this thing I so desire, and I can't.

I'm not saying I've *never* envied anyone. I don't recall any times, to be honest, but that doesn't mean that they never happened. I'm just saying I don't make a habit of it.

But I know people who do, and they want others to *know* about this unfair balance in the cosmos, so that the others can commiserate with them, and feel those sick, stabbing pains too.

Let's take the incident this morning. I was talking with a girl in another department about her department head. We were wondering if he was coming in, because his 'deputy' was off today, and no one had seen him. We joked that he was like a little kid saying, 'Mom's not home, so I'll skip school!' and then we moved on. Another woman I work with muttered something about him being a 'rich momma's boy', and 'whining to mommy and getting a new car'. She said that last a couple times, and you can just *feel* the (oh, I'm gonna sound new agey here, but whatever), the negativity, the *sourness* rolling off, in her tone, in her posture. She was *pissed* about this, and, yeah, jealous. Envious. After a few times of her saying it, I finally asked, 'did his mom buy him a new car?' 'YEAH!' 'okay' and I turned back to my work. She finished what she was doing, and went back to her desk, silent. And, seriously, it left me a little nauseous.

I mean, what difference does it make who bought who what? Is being mad about it going to suddenly make a new *yadda* appear for you? Do you think God is going to lean down and go, 'YOU'RE RIGHT, THAT'S NOT FAIR. HERE YOU GO. HAVE ONE. HAVE A DOZEN!' Nope. All that happens is you harbor this black emotion in your heart, deep down, and it poisons you. You focus on all the things you don't have, and how wrong it is that other people (people who don't need/deserve them as much as *you* do) *do* have them. How is that good? How is that constructive? Can't you be happy for the other person? Even if you don't *like* the other person, if you can't be *happy* for them, can't you just be neutral about it?

Gratitude is a burden

Men are more ready to repay an injury than a benefit
because gratitude is a burden and revenge a pleasure.
— Tacitus (56-120 AD)